I started listening to this album back when the box set was first announced (never heard of the band) and it didn’t do much for me musically at the time--especially the more avant-garde songs like “Mr. X” and “Western Promise”. The infectious melodies in tracks like “New Europeans” and “Passing Strangers” kept me coming back to the point where I now love the whole thing from start-to-finish.
For me, this might be Steven Wilson’s best 5.1 remix to date. It's almost certainly the most adventurous/aggressive one he’s ever done: every track has instruments bouncing from speaker-to-speaker and loud isolated elements in the rear channels.
@fthesoundguy's excellent post upthread is spot-on regarding what’s happening in each song (nice detail!). It really does feel like a fun ‘70s quad mix at times. Overall, it’s engaging, clever, full of interesting surprises, and the instrument balances are spot-on: nothing sounded buried or overexposed to my ears.
In terms of fidelity, this album sounded pretty good to begin with and the remix doesn't change that. The biggest change that I could identify in the remix is that the lead vocals are louder, especially on the 5.1 where they're locked to the center with very little support in the other speakers. You can play this disc at incredibly high levels and it still holds together nicely. The 'punch' in the kick drum on the title track has to be heard to be believed.
A few other observations:
- “New Europeans” - the original stereo mix had the electric guitar hard-panned to the left channel, the new stereo mix has it maybe 75% left-of-center, but the 5.1 mix centers it...in the rears! That took me by surprise the first time. I also noticed that the snare (sample?) is mixed to the center speaker along with the lead vocal, which makes for an interesting effect when soloing that channel (I attached a short clip below).
- “Passing Strangers” - I never realized how many different layers made up the repeating backing vocal refrain in the chorus (“we were talking…”). In the 5.1 mix, you can hear the higher harmonies in the front channels and the lower harmonies in the rears.
- The title track is still my least favorite song on the album, but it really comes alive in 5.1: the section where the beat speeds up and the ‘orchestra’ builds up all around you is demo-worthy.
Needless to say, I voted a 10.