On Feb 10, 3:56*pm, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:
There's an editorial of that title, by Steve Guttenburg, in the March 2012
"Stereophile".
If J Gordon Holt is looking down on us (joke intended), he must be laughing
his ass off. One of his classic articles (about 45 years old) shows the
"process" through which the microphones' outputs go before reaching the
cutter head. These include an "automatic dematrixing obfuscator" and (my
favorite) the "dynamic subtlety suppressor". *
Mr Guttenburg shows a startling ignorance of the history of recording. The
major recurring theme (joke intended) throughout the history of recorded
sound is the degradation of the original sound so that the recording will
"sound good" on cheap playback equipment.
This should have ended with the introduction of the Compact Disk, but
didn't. ** Most music (except classical, and some jazz) doesn't have enough
dynamic range to stress even modest playback systems, yet the recording
industry insists on flattening what little dynamic range there is to the
point of non-existence. If the purpose is make recordings subjectively
louder -- what is the point? The home listener can set the volume wherever
he wants. If a radio station feels it needs a competitive advantage, it can
apply compression at the station.
The problem, as I see it, is that most "popular" music has no meaningful
acoustic equivalent. The mics' outputs are simply raw material to be altered
however the producer cares to. This is not seen as a creative option, but an
unalterable necessity.
There is simply no need for this. But people are unaccustomed to hearing
live, unamplified sound in an appropriate acoustic environment, and they
know no better.
* I designed a device that -- on paper -- would do that.
** It seems that SACDs and Blu-ray Audio disks have "better" sound,
apparently because their producers and engineers really want to make honest
recordings.
--
"We already know the answers -- we just haven't asked the right
questions." -- Edwin Land
___________________________
Short answer: Y E S !
I have just scrounged the entire web for a decent mp3 or wav of
"Urgent" by Foreigner - they are all "remastered" versions that make
Lou Graham sound like he's yelling in your FACE! Unless you own the
CD from LP that came out 25 years ago you out of luck!
-CC