Wise Words - Audio Fidelity Moves to Selective Multichannel SACD Releases

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Truth be known - I guess I bought most as well. But, I promise you, I didn't do it for anyone buy myself. You know, sort of got wrapped up in the "new thing" and yeah, it's fun. Most of them sit on my shelf, never even listen to them. Maybe 25% of them I truly love and play often. But I think that's how it goes when you decide you are "into something". You take the good with the bad. I'm never going to feel somehow obligated to buy into something that seems fringe unless:

a. I truly love what I'm buying and believe in what I'm buying
b. I'm supporting a good friend or family member

Other than those 2 things, it's all about me. :)
I will continue to buy multi-channel music...in ANY format. MC is what gives me the most pleasure, by far, and as long as that is available, I'll be happy as a Lark. Oh, well and a few vinyls for good measure.

:banana:
 
I'm so pleased they released Child Is Father To The Man. It's exciting that they managed to get a shelved mix of a relatively obscure album. I'm grateful for that. Good mix too!
 
Without NEW and mainstream artist involvement in the Surround movement, I did not expect newbies to embrace the surround phenonemon and still maintain the renewed interest in stereo centric vinyl didn't help the cause but one thing we all must accept: fads have always come and gone and except for the trickle of Quad/5.1 titles one might encounter in the next few years.........our days of a relatively steady stream of new titles are coming to an END.
right on. sadly demographics of our QQ community prevalent toward very conservative views, who mostly stuck on their preferences of 60s~70s acts.
to be honest, it seems even SW popularity here only due his reworks of those their faves old acts rather than his own works. at least only handful of
members participate in discussions, when new artists comes here with their ideas and request for suggestion. the most sad - you cannot express your
own view, if it doesn't fit values of this majority, without being attacked and criticized.
 
Well in the UK a lot of back catalogue is being sold on vinyl. My experience is that people younger than me are buying old and new stuff and are not interested in it being in surround. I know we can't take that for the whole world, but that's my small corner.
 
Well in the UK a lot of back catalogue is being sold on vinyl.
what you're considering as a lot?


AlbumsUs2015.jpg
 
Sorry, I completely failed to qualify that. I meant a lot of what is being sold on vinyl is back catalogue, rather than vinyl is selling a lot in its own right.
 
Well in the UK a lot of back catalogue is being sold on vinyl. My experience is that people younger than me are buying old and new stuff and are not interested in it being in surround. I know we can't take that for the whole world, but that's my small corner.

This is not directed at you Mike - or anybody - but the voices of dissension wrt surround on here tonight hurt (checks; "am I on the right board tonight?" ;) :p ) ... I'll remember all the negativity towards surround and it being such an almighty flop next time some piece of work outbids me to the tune of a gazillion quid for some silly old surround disc, cos nobody cares about surround, it must be a figment of my miiiind, la la la it's not happening..!!!

:mad: :flame :violin:smack: :ugham: :nuke :popcorn :couch :smokin etc.

Right, I'm off for a pint! :D
 
I think what I'm trying to say is that back catalogue is clearly a viable market, and if vinyl is stealing sales from opitical media it's not entirely due to new music, or buyers new to vinyl. Now if I'd actually said that a few posts back instead...
 
i guess vinyl and surround format by the market margin today holds approx equal share.
worrisome are the preference by the label toward vinyl as a cheaper in production commodity.
 
Here's the problem 0tto. The new stuff, the Kanye West, Adele, Justin Bieber, Lukas Graham, and whatever artists are current - their fans do not buy CDs and BluRays. They do not have 'stereos'. They don't have any physical product and they listen 90% of the time using headphones. They don't care about stereo let alone surround.

If AF licensed the new Twenty One Pilots album and issued a surround mix, who would buy it? Who would have the equipment to play it?

<crickets>

There is still a short window available for an old fart title like an Aerosmith quad or something like that. That window is closing - fast.
 
There's some validity to that argument.

On the other hand.....how come all those artists you listed can get issued on vinyl if no one is listening to them on a stereo?

Surround discs may never be mainstream, but certainly there is room for niche product in the industry.
 
Here's the problem 0tto. The new stuff, the Kanye West, Adele, Justin Bieber, Lukas Graham, and whatever artists are current - their fans do not buy CDs and BluRays. They do not have 'stereos'. They don't have any physical product and they listen 90% of the time using headphones. They don't care about stereo let alone surround.

If AF licensed the new Twenty One Pilots album and issued a surround mix, who would buy it? Who would have the equipment to play it?

<crickets>

There is still a short window available for an old fart title like an Aerosmith quad or something like that. That window is closing - fast.
Jon you're right. they also don't know about existence of AF as well thus obviously not an audience to be targeted by AF.
but you have dismissed range of potential consumers, who's at beginning of 00s missed due to different reasons (lack of funds
for gears, lack of knowledge at that time, etc.) the wave of newly created 5.1 releases. and i believe that's quite significant
group in range 30~40 years, who can't afford to buy OOP titles from scalpers but gladly would go for same titles at reasonable price,
even if it has extra cost for exclusiveness, as AF practiced.
 
There's some validity to that argument.

On the other hand.....how come all those artists you listed can get issued on vinyl if no one is listening to them on a stereo?

Surround discs may never be mainstream, but certainly there is room for niche product in the industry.

What ALWAYS perplexed me was that millennials frequent the cinema and experience IMAX size screens and Dolby Atmos and yet watch movies on their Iphones and Ipads with earbuds!

And the new resurgence in audio is the Open Reel Deck. I have three of them in my house including a Teac QUAD OR and I haven't hooked up a single one in my system for eons.

I don't want to go BACK....I want to go forward [physical disc~wise] but unfortunately the Major record conglomerates are aggressively gearing up for downloads so that they will eventually have FULL control over their intellectual properties. Whether that includes multichannel is up for grabs. Probably NOT, IMO.

Eventually the vinyl fad will fade as well.

If the Music Industry had stuck with ONE high definition digital format, nurtured it PROPERLY [including the ALL important marketing of said format], got major artists on board to master their albums in surround from scratch and stopped confusing the market with vinyl [still NOT hi def] and other assorted sundry formats I think we might've had a chance to realize our goals.

Instead we got what has now been foisted upon us. Downloads of still questionable quality and an impending farewell to the physical disc as we know it.

And WE can't do a damn thing about it....except sheepishly accept what they give us!
 
I'm not overly pessimistic concerning optical discs given the almost entirely unexpected vinyl resurgence. Who would have imagined a steady wave of analogue enthusiasm in 2016? It's probably true that DVD Audio and SACD physical discs don't have the same "coolness" factor as vinyl right now but who knows what the nostalgic leanings of a thirty year old might be in a decade. Some of the same factors might apply particularly the artwork and liner notes though in a smaller format. Are the sometimes overly elaborate deluxe box sets telling us something? Given the millions of people as potential consumers the first item of business seems to be improving sound quality in general and appeal to that. Maybe I'm strangely optimistic.

Once these discs are sold out, or out of print, they are going to be hot collectibles I'm telling you. Just like previous SACD and DVD-A discs, they hold their value, and some go way up in value. At least with the slowing down of releases, it will be easier for me to build my complete collection of AF surround discs.

Everyone is acting like it's over with AF and surround, and I don't think so. I could be wrong, but I really think its just a correction they are making with their releases.
 
Here's the problem 0tto. The new stuff, the Kanye West, Adele, Justin Bieber, Lukas Graham, and whatever artists are current - their fans do not buy CDs and BluRays. They do not have 'stereos'. They don't have any physical product and they listen 90% of the time using headphones. They don't care about stereo let alone surround.

If AF licensed the new Twenty One Pilots album and issued a surround mix, who would buy it? Who would have the equipment to play it?

<crickets>

There is still a short window available for an old fart title like an Aerosmith quad or something like that. That window is closing - fast.
Right, I would not issue anything If were AF that is not one of those hotter titles with album rock radio all over or a hit or two. That Jeff Beck Group album was not one I would have chosen because of the lack of radio or hit material. Nice album but... The last America album AF issued some felt was the wrong surround title, and the better album was passed over perhaps for later consideration. There is no later for this series and these 4.0 titles. In fact, the problems AF is facing might have more to do with shrinking physical media market (and wrong album choices), than surround is expensive and uninteresting to many listeners.

My suggestion to AF is: choose the titles more carefully, and charge an additional price when a multi-channal layer is being provided. Cover your costs upfront if need be. I can afford an extra $4 - $5 to get that quad layer when it is something like BS&T, Sly, Alice, Mahavishnu, or L&M's Full Sail. But I might not pay the extra cost for Jeff Beck Group, Labelle, America, Judy Collins, or a less interesting Billy Joel album.

I think that is a great solution, extra costs for additional 4.0 mastering covered by a higher list price!
 
I was thinking much the same, basically if we want physical discs we'll have to pay more, we can't have the music for 'next to nothing' and still expect musicians/companies to release albums & with surround.

I bought an additional BD machine a few months ago just to do 5.1 FLACs, not my preference, but it is heading that way. What I don't want to do is just rent the music, or pay a monthly streaming subscription (which I think is making it unecomonic for musicians to earn a living), I want to buy it, and I want to able to download it many times over many years as hard drives etc. fail. But I'd prefer physical media as it is a tangible 'link' back to the musician, like holding a gatefold LP and perusing the liner notes, thanks, lyrics etc. Madness........probably!
 
There's some validity to that argument.

On the other hand.....how come all those artists you listed can get issued on vinyl if no one is listening to them on a stereo?

Surround discs may never be mainstream, but certainly there is room for niche product in the industry.

Jonathan,

The whole vinyl resurgence is something that is actually a bit mystifying when you consider that a HiRez download will get you more. I think it's more of a "cool thing", or trendy thing to say "I have the vinyl" or show someone an LP. I would wager that many a purchased LP never gets played.

In that same vein, the cool factor of an SACD or DVD-A or BluRay Audio is zero, because no one knows just what the heck they are. To the majority of the world they are either CDs or DVDs and there is absolutely positively nothing cool about those formats. Heck, I would wager that a VHS tape brings back warmer memories than any DVD could.
 
Yeah, but it just shows there's room and interest in things that have a cool factor, and surround formats could certainly fit that. But you are right that a big part of the equation is that few people know what the heck they are. The thing is, the industry is to blame for that, they never marketed it properly.

As far as VHS goes...

good-guy-vhs_o_330963.jpg
 
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