The O'Jays' "Survival" SQ on CD?

[fredblue]

While I'm SACD & DVDA starved, I'm going through all my CDs of albums that were released in Quad, in some shape or form, whether SQ/QS/CD-4/Q4/Q8.. you name it...

and it seems this album by The O'Jays also plays back really effectively in PLII..!

Maybe the remastering of this was done by the same team (Al Quaglieri, Darcy Proper, et al..?) that prepared the Ship Ahoy SACD from the Quad tapes and was just folded down to stereo for the CD when the SACD never happened!?

Anyway, the remastered CD of this album sounds great in Pro Logic! If you've got it, I'd say give it a try!

 

[oxforddickie]

While I'm SACD & DVDA starved, I'm going through all my CDs of albums that were released in Quad, in some shape or form, whether SQ/QS/CD-4/Q4/Q8.. you name it...

and it seems this album by The O'Jays also plays back really effectively in PLII..!

Maybe the remastering of this was done by the same team (Al Quaglieri, Darcy Proper, et al..?) that prepared the Ship Ahoy SACD from the Quad tapes and was just folded down to stereo for the CD when the SACD never happened!?

Anyway, the remastered CD of this album sounds great in Pro Logic! If you've got it, I'd say give it a try!

Have tested this and it doesn't appear to be SQ encoded, unfortunatley




http://the-quad-blog.blogspot.co.uk

 

[Sea Level]

While I'm SACD & DVDA starved, I'm going through all my CDs of albums that were released in Quad, in some shape or form, whether SQ/QS/CD-4/Q4/Q8.. you name it...

and it seems this album by The O'Jays also plays back really effectively in PLII..!

Maybe the remastering of this was done by the same team (Al Quaglieri, Darcy Proper, et al..?) that prepared the Ship Ahoy SACD from the Quad tapes and was just folded down to stereo for the CD when the SACD never happened!?

Anyway, the remastered CD of this album sounds great in Pro Logic! If you've got it, I'd say give it a try!

Could you please tell me what the catalogue number of that CD is. Also does MFSB do the backing?

Thanks

 

[Sea Level]

Have tested this and it doesn't appear to be SQ encoded, unfortunatley




http://the-quad-blog.blogspot.co.uk

Have you given it a go in RM or QS and heard the result?

 

[fredblue]

Could you please tell me what the catalogue number of that CD is. Also does MFSB do the backing?

Thanks

no problem, its this one..

http://www.overstock.com/Books-Movies-Music-Games/The-OJays-Survival-Remaster/238408/product.html

UPC - 074646524824

Its MFSB backed, yes and although it's not quite as wonderful as Ship Ahoy/Backstabbers, it's right up there with Family Reunion and Message in the Music, imho, as superb examples of meticulously crafted Philly soul.

 

[fredblue]

on the subject of lovely Gamble & Huff productions, does anybody know if any of the Billy Paul (I have something of his in quad, I think its 360 degrees of..?!), MFSB, or Lou Rawls albums on CD sound good in Pro-Logic..?

 

[fredblue]

Have you given it a go in RM or QS and heard the result?

I have to bow to Oxford Dickie's great knowledge on these things, I guess there must just be lots of out of phase info here.

I say this because when testing out these stereo discs, I literally walk around the room, constantly going up to individual speakers, scrutinising elements time and again, track by track... and after all these years my ears do not deceive me.

played back in PLII on my Yamaha receiver this CD (and several other O'Jays and Isley Brothers remasters, among others, that were all originally quad releases too) sounds wonderful, there's lots of separation from front to back and unique elements discretely placed in the rears. works for me!

my bottom line - try it out for yourself in PLII and see how you find it!

 

[oxforddickie]

It is more than possible that your getting an effect using DP-II. Because of the equation used, it is possible for the decoder to remove random out-of-phase information and create the illusion of surround sound.

That doesn't mean it's encoded though. There are ways of telling whether something is encoded, especially when it comes to SQ, and most of the CD's i've tested, and believe me i've tested a lot, fail at the first hurdle.

I must make a point here, because of the way the SQ matrix works, nothing decodes it properly apart from a dedicated decoder.

On the odd occassion i find one that has used the encoded master for the release, and it's those that i've used.

One thing that does seem apparent is that it's normally the first CD release that is encoded, later versions revert to the stereo master. I've come to the conclusion that itmay have been possible that there was a quad fan who selected the masters to be used for CD release who deliberately selected the encoded versions.

Unfortunately, i can't see this issue ever going away, it's like the 96k sampling of LP's (CD-4 & Stereo/Matrix) and Q8's........ now there's another nest of vipers lol

 

[fredblue]

if anybody on here is remotely interested, the discs to get and try out for yourself in PLII are:

Isley Brothers - Live It Up, Harvest For The World (both Sony early 2000's remasters, "Live It Up" is particularly good!).
O'Jays - Survival (Sony remaster, I've detailed the UPC and info above).

I should add, I run these through in PLII Music.

This is in a 7.1 configuration. the rear/back surrounds are often an echoey mess during these so I mute them but the surrounds are wonderful with lots of backing vocals/strings/effects uniquely/discretely in the surround pair.

I have "Panorama" set to "On", Dimension set to "0" or Off, Center Width for me is at "4" but this is less essential.. and irrelevant if you're running a quad setup, of course!