Is SONY pulling the Plug on SACD??

Sony has actually released more SACDs than you might think. According to sacdinfo.com they have released a total of 280 SACDs across all of their various labels. This compares to 79 releases from Warner on DVDA.

Sony should be doing better but that's a good number overall considering all the other ways Sony is investing in the format such as pro equipment, studio promotion, recording projects, etc.

 

I picked up Barbara Streisand's "Movie Album" on SACD last week and thought it was really excellent. This woman can STILL belt it out and the flow of the material is well thought out....Sonics were

 

Lee, 280 titles in 5 years really ain't much! Maybe the real question is will Sony ever get serious about their own bleeding format?

 

Niche format, people. Nothing wrong with that. In fact, save for my wallet, if SACD took off like CD did in the late 80's, I'd consider having myself committed just so I couldn't blow every loose dime I had on the music I wanted on SACD.

Sony also made some really nice moves with what they could license and they never turned the mastering into a rush job. There's something to be said about that.

The music is available, there's more coming out, legal snags in every way you could think of. The CD market for reissues and stuff I would want and desire is doing well but not like it used to either. Is that a good thing or a bad one? Hey, think about it!

 

So-called niche format or not, 280 in 5 anos, t'ain't much effort, me thinks.

 

I listen to some classical and jazz, but mostly to western (not Asian) pop/rock. If Sony's released 280 SACDs in five years, they've probably released only about 40-50 (estimated) western pop/rock discs. Pop/rock is the largest segment of our music industry. Warner may have even released more high-res pop/rock than Sony has, I'm not sure. If you look at the pop/rock market, high-res isn't even really big enough to be a niche. It is miniscule.

 

Perhaps for pop but the SACDs on rock have been really good titles. We have had a lot of activity at ABKCO with the Stones, Animals, etc., Sony on Dylan, Pink Floyd DSOTM, a slew of other 60s and classic rock titles, and we are getting classic Elton John and Eric Clapton soon and perhaps Floyd's Animals and Wish You Were Here and a rumored Springsteen catalog.

It's a miniscule part of the overall record business but still offers some great classic albums. I think the pop titles will continue to expand over time. Nine Inch Nails, Incubus, and others indicate some willingness for a more current group of artists to play in the SACD sandbox.

 

Pop/rock is (IMO) best lumped into one genre, that's what I was doing. Trying to categorize an album by Sting, Elton John, or Paul McCartney into one or the other is an exercise in futility.

Why don't you mention the exclusive DVD-A high-res releases from strong rock acts like Yes, REM, Queen, Neil Young, Frank Zappa, Steely Dan, and many others?

When you look at pop/rock, and stack up the two formats against each other, neither looks that much stronger than the other. Both have some great acts, but the overall quantity is very small when compared to the immense pop/rock back catalog. When I look at my CD rack, I'd say at least 98% of my albums could not be bought in high-res digital.

By all appearances they are reducing SACD budget and increasing DualDisc budget (from nothing to something).

I don't want Sony to pull the plug on SACD. I want more high-res releases. Since Sony doesn't appear to want to use DualDisc for high-res, we should all hope they keep (or increase) SACD support. Otherwise we may eventually find we aren't getting any high-res from Sony artists at all!

 

I don't want Sony to pull the plug on SACD. I want more high-res releases. Since Sony doesn't appear to want to use DualDisc for high-res, we should all hope they keep (or increase) SACD support. Otherwise we may eventually find we aren't getting any high-res from Sony artists at all!

>>>>>Well, Neither do i...I LOVE high res!!!

however, I think that this is just SONYS stand at the moment. I could see them giving in and joining everyone else with using DVD for High Res. Especially if they start to sell well.....SONY will be forced to jump aboard to sell THEIR Dual Discs. SONY isnt going to lose lots of money on Dual Disc sales just to keep a few bucks revenue from SACD disks.

 

They may not have pulled the plug, but I think it is safe to say Sony has given up on their dream of replacing the CD with SACD. It wasn't very long ago that I read many posts in many different forums about how SACD would slowly take over the CD bins until there was no need to include a CD layer on the discs at all. Once it became clear that was not going to happen I think Sony lost interest. I don't think the original goal of a company the size of Sony was to create a niche format. I have pretty much pulled the plug from my end, refusing to buy any deeper into formats that I believe will soon disappear.

 

Tim, I'd have to agree with you.

Youre right about Sonys "dream" to replace copyable and ripable Cd with SACD.
Those first SACDs were NOT hybrid, for that reason. But when people couldnt play them on their existing player, those went out the window and the Hybrid was born.
But folks can rip and burn the Cd layer of a Hybrid Cd, so that killed that idea.

I do think SONY has lost most of its interest in selling SACD disks. Sure, they will always license the technology to those who want it, and they will use DSD encoding for its original purpose.....to archive the SONY Music master tapes to digital form.
But as far as releasing all those great Columbia Records titles on hybrid SACD, that i dont see happening.

 

Right. I don't want to get into a format war thread again, but that was the reason why so many small audiophile labels got into the sacd act.

 

I know four audiophile labels very well. They have no plans to exit SACD. Indeed we are seeing more labels offer SACDs.

Steve, I think it will be interesting to see if people stop issuing SACDs now that the cost for some has gone up.

I think the fact that they are not adding hirez is a good sign they remain committed to SACD.

I did not reference DVDA because I was only rebutting a comment made on SACD's number of pop/rock releases.

 

Sony's plan all along has been to move to hybrid SACD. The only thing slowing it down has been the fact that there hasn't been enough replication capacity to turn 100,000 units of a big hit around in a day or so. My understanding is that they've got everybody but Warners on board for when the industry finally reaches the amount of capacity needed to handle a hit. It'll remain a niche reissue medium up until that point.

 

Bob, do you work in the music industry? Are you privy to insider information? I hope you're right!

Somebody needs to get a shotgun and take Miss Warner and Senor Sony to the altar! They both need to commit to each other's format and run the rapids and see what happens. Their destuctive feud is a BIG part of the industry's problems, IMO. Their 5-year plan to upset the apple cart has worked splendidly!

 

I would say that a ball was dropped somewhere. With the release of DSOTM, the general "press" was very public about the fact that this disc was a surround sound spectacular, and you needed a "special" player to get the surround effect. Later, the famous Rolling Stone sampler SACD was released to the public, giving a lot of people a real "good" SACD disc.

However, after that disc got out, not much happened. If the publisher problem was the cause, well, it should have been solved quickly. (What's Universal's secret?) If they would have followed DSOTM 6 months later with WYWH, then with other "important" stuff like the Springsteen, Aerosmith, or more of their significantly large quad back catalog, the public awareness may have been higher. "Dream On" in 5.1 would be awesome!

Instead, the format has been allowed to withdraw into a "niche" format. Some released titles are now hard to find and may never be seen again. This is a shame, as we ALL would like more titles in this format.

DVD-A is no better off. This is not a "format war" thing, as it is totally disappointing that 3 years after these format came out, we are still going back and forth as to whether they are a "success" or not.

 

I think one could argue that they never got beyond niche status.

This I agree with.

 

So how can you explain the small labels still getting into the SACD act? There are close to 300 labels doing SACD now, and there must have been 100 or so added this year, (seemingly) after the subsidy was dropped. I'm just a consumer.

 

You have forgotten the Dylan SACDs. That was newsworthy. So too The Police, Peter Gabriel and Creedence.

Obviously we need some more major artists to have a significant body of work released on SACD. Springsteen is a solid rumour.

I don't understand Warners though. They seemed to be frightened of the big effort - tackling a significant body of work from one artist. Instead, they scatter their shots, not really knowing what the public will buy. They should play their best cards.

If you compare what we have seen from the SACD labels with what we have seen from Warner's as far as a catalogue commitment, it's hard to not give many more marks to the risk takers. Warner's are wimps.

 

Can you show me some proof?

Sorry, just giving you some of your own medicine

 

I can't tell you exactly when these labels have been joining in, but I do remember counting the labels on sa-cd.net. I counted 268 about two months ago and 230 some three months before that. I can do mental arithmetic, so that's where the 100 came from.

Let's just say I'm in the ballpark.

Question: explain why these new labels have been joining in SACD production even though they can't get the Sony subsidy?

Answer: they like the format.

 

You could also look at High Fidelity Review site and count up the number of labels. I have not done it recently but about 2 years ago it was around 200 and the last time I counted it was approx. 250.

Answer #2: Consumers like the format, have invested in a player, and want more software.

 

So you answered your own question.

Sony did a smart thing offering subsidies to small labels and by doing so they created some demand in the audiophile community. So if I were a small audiophile label, I would definately consider releasing sacds even now because that is the audiophile prefered format.

But as Steve indicated, suddenly it has become a lot more costly to produce an sacd.

 

Jumping in here, assuming that Bob is the same Bob Ohlsson that I used to know (or at least converse with on the old CompuServe CEFORUM), he is a brilliant engineer who worked at Motown making many great records, including Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" and later made some cool records with Quicksilver Messenger Service. Hi Bob.