Carole King Tapestry 5.1 from Sony Music HK (Feb 2017)

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I am very suspicious that this is an official Sony release. On eBay there are other Sony SACDs that are numbered such as Celine Dion's greatest hits and Billy Joel's The Stranger which recently surfaced. Has Sony Music ever issued limited edition numbered releases? I am not aware of any such cases.

The font used to mark the number just seems too generic for lack of a better description.
 
I am very suspicious that this is an official Sony release. On eBay there are other Sony SACDs that are numbered such as Celine Dion's greatest hits and Billy Joel's The Stranger which recently surfaced. Has Sony Music ever issued limited edition numbered releases? I am not aware of any such cases.

The font used to mark the number just seems too generic for lack of a better description.

I still cannot fathom to this day why these reissue companies are so damn secretive about their hi res releases, including Audio Fidelity. These are, after all, 'specialized' titles and why they cannot state upon pre~announcement/pre~order PRECISELY what we are getting for our hard~earned $$$$. Checked again over at HRAudio.net and they have NO listing for ANY of the pre~announced HK SONY SACDs. Are they Stereo, single~layered Stereo/Multi.....Are they DSD mastered from old masters or new DSD masterings done in 2016~2017?

It's not as though these are mass produced items........they are, after all, speciality items.

Frankly, all this secrecy for these new SACDs is utter BULLSHIT and serves NO purpose other than to confuse potential buyers. Enough, already! And this conundrum extends to DVD~A/DVD~V releases which are sometimes mislabeled. Are they MLP DVD~As or DTS/DD?:yikes

Perhaps we need a Wikileaks forum just for new Hi Res releases!!!!!!!!!:mad:@: http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/tNsLYBOfyQY/maxresdefault.jpg
 
I just received this and it is indeed 5.1. I have nothing to compare it to, as the last time I purchased this was a Q8 tape in the 70's (with the awful reverb).
It sounds great and it probably is the same mix as the previous SACD.

tapestry_0002.jpg
 
So, based on post saying it's multi-channel. I ordered a copy from ImportCD (on backorder). Came to $33 shipped. I don't own this, so an easy purchase for me. :)
 
I just received this and it is indeed 5.1. I have nothing to compare it to, as the last time I purchased this was a Q8 tape in the 70's (with the awful reverb).
It sounds great and it probably is the same mix as the previous SACD.

View attachment 28875

Thanks for this post. Without it (and some helpful commentary on the album's thread on the QQ forum) I don't think I'd have pulled the trigger. I'm curious, though: your image indicates stereo and 5.1, as opposed to importCDs' image which specifies single-layer multi-channel. Either way, I'm looking forward to filling this inexplicable gap on my heavily "vintage singer-songwriter" shelf.

Now the wait to find out how long importcds has it on backorder. I've never pre-/backordered from them so I'll find out soon whether they charge upon order or upon shipment.
 
Man, I hope it's a new 5.1 mix because the previously issued 5.1 SACD is pretty boring. It's pretty much double stereo with ever so slight differences.
 
Man, I hope it's a new 5.1 mix because the previously issued 5.1 SACD is pretty boring. It's pretty much double stereo with ever so slight differences.

I totally agree......ever so slight use of surrounds but I wouldn't bet on it since I think SONY is just re~releasing the existing masters to make a few of those titles available that have long been OOP.

I should think if it was a new remix they'd indicate that somewhere on the disc.

Surprisingly, since this album was remixed during that golden age of aggressive quadraphonic mixing (and panning), perhaps either Carole King or producer Lou Adler wanted the remix to be subtle. Although I've never heard it, the QUAD remix of Carole King's MUSIC is alleged to be double stereo.

What I do wish SONY HK would release on single layered multichannel/stereo SACD is Janis Ian's Between the Lines although it was never released on hi res physical disc before.
 
It's actually the Q8 of Tapestry that's double-stereo, the quad mix of Music is really good and definitely discrete. In fact, the LP sleeve of the QS vinyl release shows quad instrument positions on it:

music.jpg

And Sansui used the Japanese release of the album, which I believe was one of the first QS encoded LP's on the market, to promote their quad system, as seen in this May 1972 issue of Billboard.

music2.jpg


It's a shame the Q8 of Tapestry was faked, but I think the other three Carole King Q8's are real. I have Fantasy, and it definitely is, and from what I understand Rhymes and Reasons is as well.

I don't mind the 5.1 even though it's not the most aggressive mix. It's a singer-songwriter playing piano with a small backing band, I'm not really expecting bongo fury out of the right rear speaker or anything.
 
The Carole King Q8's are definitely an oddity.

Tapestry might as well be double-stereo. *IF* it truly comes from the multitrack and is discrete, it is the LEAST adventurous mix ever.
To my ears, it sounds double-stereo with some kind of compression or hard EQ'ing going on in the rear channels. Anything that appears up front is in the back, though maybe at slightly altered volume. It's also mirrored so that if something appears in FR, it also appears in BR.

Music is sure trying to be discrete. I believe it is, and the intention is to envelope you into the music, but it's done in such a fake, 1970's way. I think the intention was to try and surround the listener in the instruments but I don't believe the album was recorded with that in mind. So, rather than record a set of congas with four microphones on four tracks to capture all the subtle ambience, it might've been recorded on two, so to create two additional tracks of congas, they use EQ, compression, delay and echo to do so. Great idea on paper, not so much in practice.

Rhymes & Reasons is probably the best of all four albums, but that's not to say it's THE BEST. The mix suits the music. Carole is more up front on this one, but her vocals still follow up in the rear at a slightly lower volume and with some tasteful echo. Not four-corner discrete, but you can definitely pick out where elements are supposed to be placed in the area around you.

Fantasy is probably the most discrete and might even be trying to go for four-corner, Columbia style. I had to double check to make sure my back speakers were on though as the rear channels are very quiet. It's also a very front-heavy mix and there's definite use of the hard FL and FR positions.
The opening track seems a little unusual to me where it has Carole up front, her piano up front. These follow in the rear at very low volume. Bass in Front Center, Guitar hard Left and Conga hard right. There is NO TRACE of bass, guitar or conga in the rear.
 
That old MC SACDs from Sony are being reissued at all - plus the fact that Sony Japan have new SACD offerings with quad from the 70s is news to be excited about. Couldn't have come a second too soon.

That is unless HK stuff is all pirated which I don't think it is.
 
If this is 5.1 release then there may be two others at Amazon: Celine Dion: All the Way and Billy Joel: The Stranger (look at the back side of the cd cover and you will see that it's stereo and multi-ch.
 
I played my old copy
It is no a very good demo for surround
On the scope it gives a look of a matrix disc
With a little solo now and then in the rears
I played it in stereo and ran it through my Ambisonic Decoder
and it sounder just as good
 
Good lord. I admit, I'm totally confused. Is the general feeling that this "new" release is from the "poor" mix, or something better?

It's probably a reissue of the earlier 5.1 Single Layer SACD Surround edition of Tapestry.
 
Ugh - well, I guess that doesn't help. All over the board. I have no clue. I think I'm gonna cancel my order.

I know how you feel, Gene. After listening to discs such as AF's unbelievably good Billy Cobham - Spectrum SACD, it makes one expect more than what I'm reading in those reviews for Tapestry. :rolleyes:
 
This mix isn't exceptional and this music doesn't SCREAM multichannel.
 
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