Pink Floyd Sax Remasters not remastered in Europe - my Empirical Analysis

If you bought the local Sony remasters from a few years back, you should have the latest versions of most. Not sure if the later local EMI versions are the Sax remasters or a retrograde step.

 

Never safe to assume that when dealing with the Pink Floyd catalog.

Vernon's website doesn't list peak values for most of the Aussie releases.

The current Japanese Toshiba EMI versions mirror the EMI Europe ones. (see post #23 for the 8 albums that are not the US Doug Sax re-masters) The sole exception being Meddle, which has the same peak values as the Euro Shine On version. (Not the US Shine On, nor current US Capitol) This is probably a level-shifted Sax, not the EMI original in print in Europe.

My guess would be that Aussie releases either mirror EMI Europe or EMI Japan?

 

The Australian Sony remasters I think were the same as the US 1997 versions - certainly the CD presentation was. The "new" EMI ones.....who knows? I order any CDs from Amazon US anyway.

 

That's the point of this thread. The Euro ones say remastered by Doug Sax, but not all of them actually are.

For the few Aussie discs where Vernon's website does list peaks Meddle, Wish You Were Here, Animals, and The Wall match the current Euro/Oh by the Way versions, not the US ones. For the first three these are original 80's masters, for The Wall it's a secret re-master.

Still a guess, but I'll bet they all mirror the Euro versions.

 

They do. I have Wish You Were Here, Animals, and Meddle, all printed in Australia and bought around the start of this year. They have the current Euro versions. I havn't checked the EAC values for The Wall yet, but it's a tad louder than the other three, which would incate it being a remaster. Plus, it sounds awesome.

 

Thanks, maybe I'm one of those people now.
Funny thing ? ....... I sold my original Shine On box a few years back.
The Sax that got away ..........

 

Oh yeah, that's the point. What bothers me a lot are the lies in the artwork of some Euro releases, and that's why I tried to determine which ones were true remasters and which ones were not. I know there are some better masterings out there than the Sax masters (at least for some people's ears, including mine in some cases), which is a matter of tastes anyways. But I don't like being taken as a fool, and I feel that's what EMI has been doing with all this "remaster" thing.

Thankfully I'm not the only one aware of this whole thing, and as long as this thread serves as an information source for Pink Floyd listeners (...shall I say "customers"?...), I'm happy

 

Not sure about EU law but there is the UK Trade Descriptions Act 1968 which is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which prevents manufacturers, retailers or service industry providers from misleading consumers as to what they are spending their money on.

 

Anyone in for a massive lawsuit?

 

AHM and OBC info: thanks.

Not to muddy the waters, but any of you familiar with "intersample distortion" ? Not a big deal, but there's an argument there for why a max peak level of 97.7 is preferred to 100.0.

 

I was reading a little about it today, and I kinda just thought "I can't notice it anyway".

 

Great thread!
I think I'll check all my European releases and see which are the peak levels...

 

I don't know if this has been debated before, but my European copy of The Final Cut has different peak levels than the ones you have listed.
My copy is an early Harvest CDP 7 46129 2, made in Holland and peak levels are:

95.2 / 100 / 30.2 / 100 / 100 / 69.9 / 85.4 / 100 / 27.6 / 96.2 / 100 / 80.6

I don't have any of the versions you have, so can't do any spectrum analysis. Peak levels seem to be not correlated though.
Does this mean that two completely different masterings were done for the european market?

 

Well I only have 3 Pink Floyd CD's made in Argentina, but maybe they're helpful for your research.

Meddle 7243 829749 2 5
82.2 / 56.5 / 97.7 / 96.8 / 42.8 / 97.7
Same as European issue
Does not claim remastered by Doug Sax

Wish you were here 7243 8 29750 2 1
97.7 / 97.7 / 97.7 / 97.7 / 97.7
Same as European issue
Does claim remastered by Doug Sax

Dark Side of the Moon
87.8 / 94.7 / 100 / 97.2 / 100 / 99.1 / 97.7 / 93.9 / 97.7
Same as European issue
Does claim remastered by Doug Sax

 

It seems like the original European mastering was actually different from the remaster that was done later (which is currently not available, as the current version is the Guthrie re-remaster from 2004 with the bonus track).

 

Maybe this has been debated before, but looking at the spine of my European CDs it is easy to detect which ones are remastered by Doug Sax: they have a "double R" symbol. I took a "partial" shot and, as you can see, nor "A Saucerful Of Secrets" neither "Meddle" do have the "Digitally Remastered" symbol.
I don't know if the US versions of those titles do have it instead.

 

This is also the currently available version in Europe.

 

Absolutely true, as the version in the "Shine On" boxset has the following peak levels:

97.7 / 96.2 / 90.4 / 92.5 / 87.8 / 92.2 / 72.4

which are clearly a shifted version (ratio = 0.97) of:

100 / 98.4 / 93.3 / 95.7 / 89.9 / 94.6 / 75.7 (USA version)

 

Speaking of the EMI Euro masters, I got the "Now Made In The USA" CBS Wish You Were Here CD and was disappointed when I heard that it sounded very similar to the original Euro mastering. The main difference is that the CBS has a hell of a lot more hiss, and the EMI sounds a little duller. Could this mean that some NR was used on the original EMI CD?

 

BUMP...

Alright, after quite a while, I finally got a US remastered "Meddle". EAC confirmed the difference in peak levels and this US CD matched the peaks I took from Vernon's website. So, if you are looking for a truly Sax-remastered "Meddle", go get the US one!

After all the debate in this thread (thanks everyone for the information), and getting a copy of all the "truly-remastered" versions, I think for me this is a happy ending!!

Artwork in US ans EU versions is the same. For the first half of the catalogue (Piper to DSOTM) albums that were included in the "Shine On" box did not have the double-R symbol nor the small picture of the album cover on the spine, but all claim to be "digital remasters" on the liner notes. However, US versions are truly remastered and EU versions are not. This is very clear.

Cheers!

 

My point was that the owner of a stand-alone European CD can probably tell a "remastered" album from a "non-remastered" one by the double R symbol (despite what's written in the booklet).

 

My Meddle & Saucer don't have the double R's but are 1992 remasters. Guess these don't sound as good as the Doug Sax issues?

 

Did you compare the Doug Sax Meddle to the European version? I'm curious to hear your impressions, as I prefer the latter (that should be the same mastering as the original WG/Japan and the UK Swindon). Thanks

 

If they are 1992 remasters made in USA they are the Doug Sax. My European "1992 remastered" versions of Meddle and Saucerful they do not have the double R and they are actually unremastered.

 

Soundwise, the european one is, IMHO, better. Sax remaster is decent but not as good as the old european mastering, that is the mastering in the Euro "remastered" version.

However, I'll discard the european "fake" remaster only because it's fake. It's not remastered even when it was sold to me as a remaster. If I want an old WG pressing, I prefer to buy one knowing what it is, and not being taken as a fool by EMI.

Cheers