what is your favorite CD mastering of the Rolling Stones "Sticky Fingers"

[Slipperman87]

Now that the 2009 is out, I am curious

[Oatsdad]

Virgin!

[MilesSmiles]

The Japanese 32DP-600.

[ATSMUSIC]

I have the Japanese 23DP and that sounds pretty good.

[quarzo]

I've only heard the 1994 remaster, and I think it sounds good, but I don't have anything else to compare

[MikeP5877]

I haven't heard the 2009 but I'm quite happy with the 1994. I never liked the sound of the CBS CD and got rid of it as soon as I heard the Virgin. Then after seeing all the love it got here I bought it back, and found that I still didn't like the sound, so I got rid of it again.

[rob macd]

Originally Posted by MilesSmiles

The Japanese 32DP-600.

[citizenkeith]

The Virgin has nice EQ but is limited to the point of ruining "Moonlight Mile" for me.

I go with CBS. Haven't heard the Japanese... isn't it the same mastering?

[yasujiro]

CBS/Sony 32DP or 23DP (sound identical to me) is the way to go. And Brown Sugar is included on an ABKCO SACD!

[JuanTCB]

Generally the Virgin, but something about "Bitch" on the CBS just rocks unlike any other version I've heard.

Anyway, I haven't heard the new one yet but I went with Virgin.

[Stefan]

While I haven't done level-matched comparisons for Sticky Fingers, I recently did level-matched comparisons for Goats Head Soup of my needledrop from an early Canadian pressing, the Ludwig Virgin remaster and the Marcussen Universal remaster. The Marcussen and the needledrop have roughly the same EQ curve but the Ludwig has a 2-3dB boost throughout the upper midrange, lower highs. I've always found the Virgins fatiguing and harsh and this is a good reason why. Yes, the new remasters are louder than they have to be, but whatever limiting Marcussen used is quite transparent. Once the levels are matched the new ones sound closer to the original vinyl in tonality than any of the others. As for the CBS versions, I've only owned a couple of them but I always found them thin and bright sounding, and of course in the case of Sticky Fingers, the sloppy fade-in on Wild Horses is just ridiculous.

[jon9091]

Originally Posted by Stefan

Yes, the new remasters are louder than they have to be, but whatever limiting Marcussen used is quite transparent.

I disagree. The limiting used on the Universals is not "transparent". It's your basic brickwall limiting and does nothing but turn even the most sophisticated of systems into a giant iPod. Even the most perfectly applied EQ setting cannot make up for the complete loss of dynamics which have been thoroughly destroyed.

And yes, the sloppy fade in on Wild Horses back back in the 80's was ridiculous. So is censoring lyrics in 2009.

[Stefan]

We were through this all in the other thread. We disagree, and as you know, some in the thread agree with me and some with you. However, to say the dynamics have been "thoroughly destroyed" is hyperbole at best, and you know it. The difference between the peak and continuous RMS values on the UMEs is about the same as on the Virgins. It's just that the Virgins have a harsh, edgy EQ and the UMEs have an EQ similar to the LPs. No one is disputing that they're louder than they have to be, but they're certainly no Memory Almost Full or Springsteen's Magic.

[Ma Kelly]

Originally Posted by jon9091

It's your basic brickwall limiting and does nothing but turn even the most sophisticated of systems into a giant iPod.

what does that even mean?

[jon9091]

Originally Posted by Stefan

However, to say the dynamics have been "thoroughly destroyed" is hyperbole at best, and you know it. The difference between the peak and continuous RMS values on the UMEs is about the same as on the Virgins.

Huh? It's about 5dB difference. Measure the chorus for Heartbreaker and get back to me.

Originally Posted by Stefan

It's just that the Virgins have a harsh, edgy EQ and the UMEs have an EQ similar to the LPs. No one is disputing that they're louder than they have to be, but they're certainly no Memory Almost Full or Springsteen's Magic.

I find the exact opposite. The Uni's have the harsh EQ. Heartbreaker for example has a much warmer sound on the Virgin's than it does on the Uni's. They rolled out a lot of bass and rolled in a lot of mid high's on the Uni's...right around 4k...just like they did on IORR. So, you must be listening to different Virgin's than I am.

[jon9091]

Originally Posted by Ma Kelly

what does that even mean?

It means that if it was mastered for the iPod even the best systems can't compensate for that.

[alex-57]

My favorite- 23DP 5569(Japanese release)

[jon9091]

Originally Posted by Stefan

No one is disputing that they're louder than they have to be, but they're certainly no Memory Almost Full or Springsteen's Magic.

And honestly...should we really lower our standards because of those 2 pieces of sonic crap?

[Stefan]

Originally Posted by jon9091

Huh? It's about 5dB difference. Measure the chorus for Heartbreaker and get back to me.



I find the exact opposite. The Uni's have the harsh EQ. Heartbreaker for example has a much warmer sound on the Virgin's than it does on the Uni's. They rolled out a lot of bass and rolled in a lot of mid high's on the Uni's...right around 4k...just like they did on IORR. So, you must be listening to different Virgin's than I am.

Ok, I'm getting back to you. I measured the entire song for both the Virgin and UME versions:

Virgin:
Maximum RMS Power: -7.33 dB -6.64 dB
Average RMS Power: -14.15 dB -13.76 dB
Difference: 6.82 dB 7.12dB (6.97dB avg)

UME
Maximum RMS Power: -2.94 dB -2.5 dB
Average RMS Power: -8.44 dB -8.53 dB
Difference: 5.50 dB 6.03 dB (5.77dB avg).

So, in reality the average loudness level to the loudest continuous level is only 1.2dB less on the UME. No I didn't use peaks here because as I explained in the other thread, momentary peaks mean very little perceptually. The ear needs continuous tones to perceive loudness.

Now as to EQ. Once I level-matched both songs using Audition's Group Waveform Normalize function with equal loudness contour selected to make sure the perceived level was matched and not just numbers, here's what I discovered:

Frequency          UME       Virgin            Virgin is    
   21.533    -58.47796059    -64.14460182     -5.7 quieter
   43.066    -45.46677208    -42.45509148      3.0 louder
   86.132    -29.23810959    -24.70752049      4.5 louder
  150.732    -27.57978058    -23.62421227      4.0 louder
  258.398    -31.8235569     -30.11529446      1.7 louder
  506.03     -35.34750938    -35.54429626     -0.2 quieter
 1001.293    -35.75452423    -36.61853409     -0.9 quieter
 2002.587    -39.02109146    -41.31520462     -2.3 quieter
 4005.175    -50.66157913    -51.77513886     -1.1 quieter
 6007.763    -58.82945251    -58.08983803      0.7 louder
 7999.584    -61.93138123    -60.11195755      1.8 louder
10002.172    -64.02729988    -60.92479897      3.1 louder
12004.76     -67.81972885    -65.63744736      2.2 louder
14007.348    -71.12938309    -70.08338547      1.0 louder
16009.936    -73.35652542    -73.61241913     -0.3 quieter
18001.757    -78.62042618    -85.86948013     -7.2 quieter
20004.345    -87.05589676    -104.9141502    -17.9 quieter

In the graphics below, you can see the numbers plotted in Excel and using Audition's Frequency Analysis (green line is the UME, red line is the Virgin). As you can see, the Virgin cranked the bass but rolled off the really low bass. Worse, the highs start to rise around 6k and peak around 10k where they're up 3dB. That's the harsh, fatiguing glare I talked about before. If you listen to the sample of Angie I posted to the other thread, you can clearly hear how the vocal and snare is effected by Ludwig's cranking the highs. Then way up high around 16k, the Virgin's roll the highs off badly. You can really see this in the Audition graphic.

So, yes, the UMEs are louder, more than they need to be, but all you have to do us turn down your volume control and they sound fine. With the Virgins you have to turn down the bass and the treble, providing your playback system's tone controls correspond to the same frequencies, and of course turning them down mean the the extreme high end and low end that's already rolled off on the Virgins will be long gone!

[ziggysane]

CBS...I think that the Virgins are okay, but the compression on them bugs me. With the CBS cds, I'm willing to overlook the sloppy fades and the other errors in favor of the whole.