jimfisheye
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
- Joined
- Jan 8, 2010
- Messages
- 3,025
ELP's catalog is in a sorry state! At the same time, we have some gems and more than we get from a lot of other very deserving bands. Some Steve Wilson remixes even! This should all be... finished, frankly!
The two SW remixes sound like first drafts. (This is what I'd expect from the likes of SW in a first draft anyway.) If not first drafts, they're at least not his normal perfect final draft work. Short of a final round of mixing from his hand, these could easily be framed very well with competent mastering. (Something else apparently in short supply in the industry in general! The "competent" part.)
They're still pretty great as is of course. There's this trick mastering engineers hate to have you know about (Is that how the click bait thing goes?): The volume control!
That first BSS remix is a little hyped in approach. For one of those it's actually a pretty decent mix. It is not included in this new box.
The Jakko Jaznik remixes are bluntly unfinished disaster messes. I don't know what's up with this guy... The more messed up mixes with his name on them still sound more like what was going to be a serious approach on the mix was started but yanked out of his hands unfinished and with some really awkward 'work in progress' elements never meant to be heard as they sit at the moment. As opposed to that earlier intentionally hyped mix or some of the intentional ambient surround mixes or upmixes.
His unfinished BSS remix is not salvageable with any kind of restoration mastering. Parts of the album shine a bit though! Again, this sounds like the beginning work of a serious mix attempt.
Trilogy... I have a hard time accepting that the multitrack was THIS damaged to where the mix flaws were unavoidable. This was their first 16 track recording and they went nuts with overdubs and orchestrating these songs. So... that awkward vocal reverb is really baked into the lead vocal track on the multitrack?! (Just one example.) Well, it obviously wasn't in the original mix! I think it's just a poor clumsy mix and there's nothing wrong with the multitrack. And this album could be remixed in surround just fine. I guess we'll never know?
And then the one they DID try to release in surround back in the day - the Welcome Back... live set. They even ONLY mixed it in surround and released it folded down for the stereo version. So this quad master is apparently lost and we only have very very manufacturing flawed Q8 copies (that are rare to find at that). At least I finally found a copy that could be cleaned up and restored fairly decently. And that gratuitous live pan happy on the keyboards mix makes a lot more sense in original quad!
If I could dig that up, the label sure should be able to do similar. Then at least get a solid mastering engineer involved to go over everything. Upmix those lost tracks from the first album. (Or just leave them in original stereo in front L/R. Jeeze, come on now!) Get a real remix going for BSS. It's only their biggest album... Then Trilogy. Put a little effort in cleaning up Welcome Back... and get the actual surround released album back in print officially.
The two SW remixes sound like first drafts. (This is what I'd expect from the likes of SW in a first draft anyway.) If not first drafts, they're at least not his normal perfect final draft work. Short of a final round of mixing from his hand, these could easily be framed very well with competent mastering. (Something else apparently in short supply in the industry in general! The "competent" part.)
They're still pretty great as is of course. There's this trick mastering engineers hate to have you know about (Is that how the click bait thing goes?): The volume control!
That first BSS remix is a little hyped in approach. For one of those it's actually a pretty decent mix. It is not included in this new box.
The Jakko Jaznik remixes are bluntly unfinished disaster messes. I don't know what's up with this guy... The more messed up mixes with his name on them still sound more like what was going to be a serious approach on the mix was started but yanked out of his hands unfinished and with some really awkward 'work in progress' elements never meant to be heard as they sit at the moment. As opposed to that earlier intentionally hyped mix or some of the intentional ambient surround mixes or upmixes.
His unfinished BSS remix is not salvageable with any kind of restoration mastering. Parts of the album shine a bit though! Again, this sounds like the beginning work of a serious mix attempt.
Trilogy... I have a hard time accepting that the multitrack was THIS damaged to where the mix flaws were unavoidable. This was their first 16 track recording and they went nuts with overdubs and orchestrating these songs. So... that awkward vocal reverb is really baked into the lead vocal track on the multitrack?! (Just one example.) Well, it obviously wasn't in the original mix! I think it's just a poor clumsy mix and there's nothing wrong with the multitrack. And this album could be remixed in surround just fine. I guess we'll never know?
And then the one they DID try to release in surround back in the day - the Welcome Back... live set. They even ONLY mixed it in surround and released it folded down for the stereo version. So this quad master is apparently lost and we only have very very manufacturing flawed Q8 copies (that are rare to find at that). At least I finally found a copy that could be cleaned up and restored fairly decently. And that gratuitous live pan happy on the keyboards mix makes a lot more sense in original quad!
If I could dig that up, the label sure should be able to do similar. Then at least get a solid mastering engineer involved to go over everything. Upmix those lost tracks from the first album. (Or just leave them in original stereo in front L/R. Jeeze, come on now!) Get a real remix going for BSS. It's only their biggest album... Then Trilogy. Put a little effort in cleaning up Welcome Back... and get the actual surround released album back in print officially.
