Dual Disc Bjork Surrounded Box Set

[dabl]

Thanks for the post and the info Dave. Yeah, I'm holding out for real high res versions of these, possibly as European SACDs as you mention.

 

[SexyToad]

You haven't set anything straight, all you've done is sum up everything that's been said earlier in this thread and injected it with your apparent pissiness and arrogance.

Firstly, you spelled erroneous erroneously. It's erroneous, not 'erronious'. Secondly, Neil Wilkes is a golden god and one of this forums most knowledgable posters on technical issues. How many other professional DVD-Audio authors and/or surround mixers that post on this board or any other board for that matter? Neil is a weath of information and his complete willingness to share is a true asset to this board. Thirdly, the 'live surround' discs that Neil was referring to are Bjork's DVD-Video releases, and everyone else on this thread seems to realise that except for you. You then go on to confirm what he said, that they only sport Dolby Digital tracks, either 5.1 or 2.0.

I'd hardly call a $100+ box set 'generous'. Generous is volunteering at a soup kitchen for the homeless. This is an item produced for commercial gain, and quite a clever ploy at that, making you re-buy a CD side you probably already have just so you can get the 5.1 mixes you crave. This box set is a wholesale ripoff if it doesn't include DVD-Audio streams; if Bjork wanted to be 'generous' she 'd sell the 5.1 streams as multichannel mp3 or Windows Media downloads for $5 an album, because both those codecs offer sound quality of about the same level as Dolby Digital 5.1.

I remain hopeful (not for my sake but for others, because I think Bjork is an insane shrieking pixie) because as Neil (you know, the guy that spouts 'erronious' information) said, a DVD-5 is big enough to hold all of the content specified in the press release AND a 24/48 MLP track. If not, I suspect you'll see Europe-only SACDs of these titles in a year's time or so, because these 'generous' artists always find a way to make their die-hard fans re-buy their back catalog many times over.

It's also worth noting that play.com has listings for the individual albums from this box set so don't get conned in to buying the box set by the old PR hype of "It's a limited edition! Buy it before it's gone forever!" Sure it's limited - strictly limited to an edition of as many copies as they can sell and then a few extra for good measure.

Dave.

Okay, I really don't mean to come off as pissy or arrogant. I really just want people to have information that they want. I'm sorry if I wasn't helpful. Please, keep your flames to yourself.

I've apologized to Neil myself. I agree that he is one of the leaders in expertise when is comes to technical matters. What I meant to correct was erroneous infomation he had submitted about the shreiking pixie (of whom I have been a devout fan for the last 10 years) Bjork's DVD-video releases have for the most part been strictly in DD 2.0 audio with the exception of "Live at the Royal Opera House"; it is the *only* live 'surround' disc.

I only meant to summarize information I knew to be true, amid a lot of claims that have been warped in the rumor mill. I hope to be clear that I am only speculating about (_surrouned) containing advanced resolution tracks. I do NOT know for sure. But the technical specifications seem to match up to Bjork's previous DVD-A releases. I hope Dave is right when he says, "It wouldn't really make sense for them to all of a sudden say 'never mind MLP, Dolby Digital 5.1 is fine!'"

I consider Bjork to be a generous artist as she has provided something her fans actually want. We've been waiting a long time for this. If you don't want it, don't buy it. Simple. I don't consider this a commercial ploy, either. Bjork has what is known as "complete artistic control" which is part of her contract with Warner and OLI. She can release anything she wants to, at any time. No deadlines, or censorship. Few artists in the world have this control. This isn't about a buck in her pocket. As aesthetic as it sounds, it really is about the music.

I was unaware that play.com had the individual albums for sale. Thanks. I'll pass it on to appropriate channels.

 

[Manmc]

" But I think that you should be grateful that we'll finally be able to hear some music we've been listening to for the last 13 years in 5.1! "

I do think enough of Bjork to be honestly mystified that she might believe " 5.1" at its best equates to Dobbly or dts only. My intention in mentioning Dolby TrueHD was simply to suggest that there are better quality sound formats out there (it is based on mlp) not to advertise Bluray ( which only supports TrueHD in Stereo anyway ) so 'generous artist' or not I never understand musicians sanctioning losing some resolution of their music (Dobbly/dts lossy ) when it is already possible to retain it (Dvd-A/Sacd)

dts can indeed be fine but I agree with others that at this price point an mlp track would be a clincher for many of us.The Talking Heads 'Brick' set showed what can be done.

Ultimately, we're all entitled to vote with our wallets.
Enjoy your music,
~~M~~

 

[neil wilkes]

AFAIR, I didn't actually say that all the live albums were in 5.1, I actually said they were all in Dobly Dirgital.
I did say that "all the live surround discs I have are DD", where at the time I had the ROH one. Maybe this got misunderstood, and maybe I should have explained it better. Fair enough.

What I still stand by is the disbelief that these are all in lossy forms.
DD (Dobly Dirgital) is a 5.1 version of MP3 IMHO, as it literally throws away 11/12 of the audio.
If a 24/48 stream is in PCM, then the data is around 141kb/sec, multiplied by 6 = 846kb/sec.
In Dolby Dirgital, this is reduced - by throwing away supposedly redundantdata and data that "cannot be percieved" to a pitiful 0.448kb/sec

As we now know the DTS stream is at 24/96.
This is both good news and bad at the same time.
It's good because the DTS 24/96 stream is incredibly detailed and a definite audible improvement over 24/48.
It's bad because it implies that the albums were in fact mixed at 24/96 PCM. So, I ask again, Why no lossless product here?
DTS 24/96 is only of any use to those who have a suitable decoder, or all you will get will be 24/48 payload stream.

Generous?
No, not really.
Improvement over straight Dolby? Undoubted.
Improvement over standard DTS? Only with the right decoder, or it will give you a 48K output.
Improvement over Medulla & Vespertine?
categorically not.

As has been eloquently stated earlier here - customers will vote with their wallets.
And there would be many more wallets prized open for lossless audio.
This is a step backwards.

 

[neil wilkes]

Reason for no High Res. versions as follows:
Warners are DVD-A
Universal are SACD
Neither one will budge
therefore no content at all because of licensing rows.

 

[JonUrban]

Reason for no High Res. versions as follows:
Warners are DVD-A
Universal are SACD
Neither one will budge
therefore no content at all because of licensing rows.

Yet Universal did many DVD-A's (GBYBR, Tommy, Beck, Frampton, McDonald, etc.) Do you think they are still restricted by the "150 SACD" contract they did with Sony?

As an aside, you would think at this point, with both sides not seeming to care about their own formats, they would not care what format titles came out in.

 

[bnyhof]

This looks promising! Rhino indicates Advanced Resolution 5.1 for all the single issues.
http://www.rhino.com/media/requests/2006/req2006-07.lasso

 

[bugdaddy]

This looks promising! Rhino indicates Advanced Resolution 5.1 for all the single issues.
http://www.rhino.com/media/requests/2006/req2006-07.lasso

agree that does sound promising. still, i don't trust that labels even think the term "advanced resolution" might have specific meaning for many of us. either way, we'll know on tuesday when the box is released.

 

[dabl]

This looks promising! Rhino indicates Advanced Resolution 5.1 for all the single issues.
http://www.rhino.com/media/requests/2006/req2006-07.lasso

Awesome, there *is* a god!

 

[neil wilkes]

So why are One Little Indian telling me that it's not happening?
Apparently they were all mastered for both SACD and DVD-A, but label politics forbid the release.
I so hope that Rhino are doing the decent thing though.....I will ask the record label tomorrow.

 

[raetselhaft]

Hi, I've just registered to this site in order to stay informed of the latest developments.

Any word on whether these discs in the box contain MLP streams since the brick is now released? I went to my local Barnes and Noble last night (prior to Superman) and the packaging did not indicate whether it contained DVD-Audio - just lossy schemes. Ugh! I hope the single album releases have them! Particularly, since I've already got Vespertine.


cheers!
raetselhaft

 

[SexyToad]

Rhino yesterday released the following information at http://www.rhino.com/store/ProductDetail.lasso?Number=73212:

Since leaving The Sugarcubes almost 15 years ago, Björk has charted a musical course as unpredictable and challenging as it is inspiring and beautiful. Rhino Records follows the artistic adventures of the mercurial singer/songwriter/sonic sculptor with Surrounded. Presented in deluxe "brick" packaging, the seven-DualDisc collection contains 5.1 remastered versions of the Icelandic performer's six studio albums expanded to include each album's videos.

Paul "PDub" Watson oversaw the surround sound remixing, which includes all of Björk's studio albums: the gold-certified Debut (1993), Post (1995), Homogenic (1997), Selmasongs (2000), Vespertine (2001), and 2004's Medulla. The collection also includes Drawing Restraint 9, featuring music Björk wrote for her film collaboration with Matthew Barney last year. All seven discs include the original release on the CD side, with the DVD side presenting the original album remastered in Dolby 5.1 and DTS Surround Sound, plus all the videos released from the album (a total of 26 videos on the box).

Selection # 73212

All Songs From Debut (DVD)
All Songs From Post (DVD)
All Songs From Homogenic (DVD)
All Songs From Selmasongs In Dolby Digital 5.1 And DTS Surround Sound 96/24 Bit (DVD)
All Songs From Vespertine In Dolby Digital 5.1 And DTS Surround Sound 96/24 Bit (DVD)
All Songs From Medulla In Dolby Digital 5.1 And DTS Surround Sound 96/24 Bit (DVD)
All Songs From Drawing Restraint 9 In Dolby Digital 5.1 And DTS Surround Sound 96/24 Bit (DVD)

 

[SexyToad]

Whoops, didn't see page 2. Sorry for the double post.

 

[natiahs]

Just got this yesterday ($98 shipped Priority from CDUniverse, although I've seen it locally for as little as $100 + tax) and I am VERY happy with the release. The DTS 96/24 5.1 mixes are wonderful. Unfortunately, the quality of the mixes make it very hard to watch the videos, which are presented in 5.1 at 48/16. Comparing the versions of, for example, It's Oh So Quiet makes the difference between them strikingly obvious.

While I would have liked AR stereo or surround mixes, I am very pleased with what is on the disks as is. As a fan of both Bjork and surround audio, I think the set is an incredible bargain. I'm looking forward to my 4 day holiday weekend so I can listen to the albums in full!

That said, I would happily pay another $100 to rebuy the set as HD-DVD or Blu-Ray disks with lossless stereo and multichannel tracks.

Natiahs

 

[neil wilkes]

I also got mine today.
Not had the time to check them out carefully, but will be doing so as I want to find out if Vespertine & Medulla are new mixes or just remastered off the earlier releases.
Haven't checked the videos yet either - my set says the Videos are in both Dobly Dirgital & DTS 5.1, although I have yet to pull one apart & find out what resolution has been used. I will not be surprised if they used 16/48 - even though there is no need to as the encoded bitstream will be exactly the same size & bitrate with DTS - because the one downside I can see is that it looks, well, cheap.
The actual disc navigation for example.
WTF is that all about, with white rectangles as the selected/active button overlay? it looks like someone just couldn't be bothered.
Spoils the whole look, especially as all you get onscreen is the exact same playlist for the entire album. And you need this too, otherwise you cannot see what you're playing stream-wise. A little more effort in this department would have gone a long way to me.

Music wise it's hard to fault, except for the lack of High Resolution lossless. YES, DTS 96/24 is close to lossless, but in a way it's even more of a wind-up as we know for a 100% certainty the albums do exist in 24/96 resolution - or we wouldn't have the DTS streams.

Perhaps it's just a dream (a stupid one? Sorry. Couldn't resist) but what are the chances that once this set has sold out (Very few are being made) we might get the collection on DVD-A?

 

[neil wilkes]

This looks promising! Rhino indicates Advanced Resolution 5.1 for all the single issues.
http://www.rhino.com/media/requests/2006/req2006-07.lasso

Sorry to disappoint, but I have it on the very best authority - Rhino Records themselves - that the single releases are identical to the DualDisc.
Just available individually is all.
NO "Advanced Resolution" at all.
Very Misleading. Unless, ofcourse, Advanced Resolution now means DTS at 24/96 of course.

 

[Cai Campbell]

Just picked up my box. Bummer about no MLP. Nice enough to have these discs in surround. Too bad I can't listen to 'em. My entire sound system is now in storage, and will be for probably another year. Finally something new I want to listen to and I can't! I'm having surround-sound withdrawals! @:

 

[natiahs]

According to careful comparison, the Vespertine and Medulla DD & DTS are the same as the previously available releases. Depending on which version of the previosu releases you have, there may be additional mixes (such as the AR stereo & multichannel versions of Medulla) that are absent here.

I find it odd that the albums are encoded as a single track - selecting a song takes you to that location in the album. You can'ttrack forward or backward without using the video menus.

But I stand by my previous statement - I think this set is great for the price. I'mvery glad to have it. The surround mix of Pluto is fantastic!

N

 

[Chris Gerhard]

Now I need to figure out what my DTS decoders can do with 96kHz/24-bit DTS. As long as I have been involved with these various formats, advanced resolution has not been consistent at all, so I feel certain there is no rule restricting advanced resolution advertising to DVD-A or 96/24 LPCM. My DTS decoders are a Pioneer DV-588A, Yamaha RX-V2300, and Yamaha HTR-5490, anybody know what I will get from the DTS streams? I am going to try to find the specifications but I don't recall ever having 96/24 DTS on any disc. In theory it sounds great to me, so I am excited about this set.

Chris

 

[neil wilkes]

I find it odd that the albums are encoded as a single track - selecting a song takes you to that location in the album. You can'ttrack forward or backward without using the video menus.
N

???
I can go from next/back using the >>| and |<< buttons on my remote with no trouble at all.
Also, the Video menus I find appalling.
What the F*** is that white rectangular box all about for the highlight!!
And if BOV is going to be used, as it is, then for gods sake make sure it is highlighting the track that is actually playing. (see review of DEBUT in the DTS Spotlight section for details)