Emerson Lake & Palmer - BRAIN SALAD SURGERY [DVD-A]

[JonUrban]

Pulled this one out for a spin the other day. Realized that I had not voted on it. It's a strong 9, and the addition of "Lucky Man" is a winner.

It's nice to visit "old" releases!

[Ed Bishop]

"Lucky Man" was a great surprise...but I also felt it was an indication that perhaps the first album would NOT be remixed to 5.1...hated being right...

ED

[SBax]

This is the best one I have too. Yes's Fragile comes in second.
You know what I loved to hear....Supertramp's Crime Of The Century. I heard Bloody Well Right in my crappy car stereo the other day and I was knocked out by the recording quality of that song. 1974 I think.

[stormchaser]

I just recently picked this one up and even though I was a big prog rocker back in high school, I haven't listened to any ELP in years. I enjoyed the nostalgia of the music and particularly hearing Keith Emerson's manic keyboards coming at me from all directions. Karn Evil No 9 will become one of my demo songs for my surround system.

[timbre4]

Just re-reading this thread caused me to crank up Jerusalem on DVD-A right now! Okay, let Toccata play too.....

Same chills....:

[The_Nephilim]

A 10 for Sure!! The more I listen to this one the more I like it The Moog Never sounded Better!!

[daved64]

This is the best one I have too. Yes's Fragile comes in second.
You know what I loved to hear....Supertramp's Crime Of The Century. I heard Bloody Well Right in my crappy car stereo the other day and I was knocked out by the recording quality of that song. 1974 I think.

Ken Scott did great work on that. He's a member over on SH, and he said he looked into a doing surround version, and it was pretty much a given that it would happen, but.....nothing happened!

[Chris Gerhard]

A 10 for Sure!! The more I listen to this one the more I like it The Moog Never sounded Better!!

I decided to sell mine so I have been listening to it this week. I agree, I should end my auction now and keep it, I love this disc and finding a replacement will be nearly impossible. I hadn't listened but maybe twice the past year until this week.

Chris

[leevitalone1]

I was never a big elp fan and now I know why. because I never had a decent sounding stereo. at that time you had limited choices as to good sounding equipment and it was costly. consiquently the old 'webcor" could not deal with what I needed to hear. so I enjoy BSS a lot of course now. and other stuff from those days too that "needed" good equipment. my friend had all marantz stuff and he went quad too. of course he was wealthy! remember 1st quad I heard- leon russell album, blew me away!

[hwkn]

Hearing this again makes me wish they'd do "Welcome back my friends"in 5.1

[Ed Bishop]

Hearing "Lucky Man" makes me wish they'd done the entire catalogue, even the crap....

ED

[JohnA]

Gave it a 9 as well, actually it is 9.x, rounded down to 9.
A must-have for the prog-rock generation.

If I also had Trilogy and Tarkus in 5.1 oooh what a Lucky Man I'd be...

[timw]

Hearing this again makes me wish they'd do "Welcome back my friends"in 5.1

Absolutely!!! ...They even used a quad surround sound system during that tour!!! I believe the LP set was to be released in quad along with the stereo version originally. I always wondered what happened with that???

I agree with what others have mentioned here....to have s/t ELP, Tarkus & Trilogy in 5.1 would be incredible!

...and Yet, another 'Deluxe version' of BSS is now scheduled for release in Sept!!!
http://www.amazon.com/Brain-Salad-Su...9780575&sr=1-1

I also read that "Pictures" is to get this similar 'deluxe' treatment.

Tim

[timbre4]

Looks like you were posting in a 2004 QQ thread (Search ELP CD4) and missed what I put there 6 days later:

Re: ELP - From The Front Row...Live
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Welcome Back was issued as Q8 triple tape pack only; during a visit to the JVC CD4 Cutting center, the engineer told us the master tapes they sent to work with were too distorted to cut a stable CD4 vinyl master. So the tapes went back in the closet.

The artwork on the Q8 tapes is derived from what would have been the vinyl cover with it's CD4 logo intact.

[timbre4]

Pictures At An Exhibition looks to be two different STEREO performances on the two discs; the original (Fall 1971) and an earlier (1970?) soundtrack version...

[StPete]

I didn't care for this as a record or the CD except for " Still you turn me on". But this DVD-A is now one of my favorites. Surround sound really enabled me to appreciate the rest. "Lucky man" was an excellent bounus track. This is a very solid 10!

StPete

[ArmyOfQuad]

I have just discovered the most peculiar thing about this disc. Tracks 3, 4, and 6 have no LFE channel. Yet all other tracks do. That's very weird.

[timbre4]

Maybe not; think about the material and instrumentation on these tracks. Still You Turn Me On is guitars and Moog plus it's arranged like a ballad. Benny The Bouncer certainly contains bass guitar but is a light throw away track. Karn Evil 9 1st Impression pt 2 is where Lake switched to electric guitar and Emerson throws in some Moog bass.

The remaining tracks are where the bulk of the bombast is and Mr. Kellogg applies his technique of generating sub-bass synthetically from the existing bass (ELP, Chicago tracks exhibit this and I really like the way he did it).

I submit that he likely tried it on every track and then made decisions to take it off some because it drew attention to itself or didn't work musically for some other reason.

[Johnm]

It's an OK quality recording. Even on vinyl, the highs are boosted at some unspecified notch and the sound is harsh and tinny. As for the surround aspect, bravo. As many others have said this was made for surround and it doesn't disappoint there. But you can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear and the master tapes just don't have what it takes.

And the HUGE disappointment was the mislabeling that says there is a stereo hi-res mix, but there isn't. I don't always listen hi-res and was looking forward to good headphone session with DVD-A stereo and I was sad.

[strat54]

I'm glad this disc is still being chatted about. I thought I would add my thoughts.

I have the original DVD-A. My first DVD-A purchase. It's one of my favorite surround discs.
I tried to buy the SACD also from Music-Wow but they went out of business and kept my money.

Greg and company did a fantastic job producing this for surround.

I know some folks don't like the adventurous and aggressive mix with all it's pans, sweeps and spins. I assure however it sounds exactly as it should, it's as if you were sitting in the sound booth in the venue during the tour.
They traveled with a quadraphonic sound system.
I saw them several times during the 73-74 tours, the first was Madison Square Garden in NYC around Christmas '73. They had two large JBL speaker stacks on each side of the side, two more equally large stacks in the back behind the audience for quad.
During "Karn Evil 9" the synthesizers would sweep and pan around the stadium and several times it would shoot up over your head to the nest of horns on the ceiling that is the Garden's P.A. system for basketball games ( 5.0 quintaphonic even ) . Greg's guitar solos, Carl's Moog drum solo, Keith's end-over-end piano solo all swirling around. A fantastic circus of sound, the largest surround system I ever heard.

They finished the show with a choir singing Silent Night while a snow machine covered the stage in a fresh layer of fake snow from above.
....See the Show!

I found this site about it. See the snow.
http://www.brain-salad-surgery.de/19...%20York%20.htm

The only detraction about the DVD-A for me is the inclusion of "Lucky Man". It shouldn't be there, it should be on a proper surround release of the first ELP album. They should have included the single "Brain Salad Surgery" or "Tiger in the Spotlight" instead.

I'm still waiting for the first album and Tarkus, Trilogy, etc. C'mon Greg, hop to it.
I'll buy them all.

[carledwards]

Very, very good MC mix. Very fun to hear and the album is, of course, a classic.

[kap'n krunch]

.....
I saw them several times during the 73-74 tours, the first was Madison Square Garden in NYC around Christmas '73. They had two large JBL speaker stacks on each side of the side, two more equally large stacks in the back behind the audience for quad.
During "Karn Evil 9" the synthesizers would sweep and pan around the stadium and several times it would shoot up over your head to the nest of horns on the ceiling that is the Garden's P.A. system for basketball games ( 5.0 quintaphonic even ) . Greg's guitar solos, Carl's Moog drum solo, Keith's end-over-end piano solo all swirling around. A fantastic circus of sound, the largest surround system I ever heard.
....

Wow, I just read this and thanks for the extra info about them using the overhead speakers...
maybe Tomita was there because that was his vision of surround sound too...
check out the "Bermuda Triangle" LPs...
that's where I have seen it...

[LizardKing]

Anyone noticed that the vocals seem "cleaner" on the 5.1 DVD-A mix compared to the original stereo mix. Or is it just my old CD copy?

I really like the mix of Toccata...I couldn't stand this track in stereo but now its one of my faves

[timbre4]

Toccata was clausterphobic in stereo, robbed of it's power. DVD-A undid that injustice....

[d0zer]

Love this disc. Listening to all the sounds shooting through my room just makes me happy. 11 points (if that was possible...)