DVD/DTS Poll Bowie, David - Young Americans [DTS/DD DVD]

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Rate the Audio-DVD of David Bowie - YOUNG AMERICANS

  • 6

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 5

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 4

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 3

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 2

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 1 Bad Mix, Bad Sonics & Bad Content

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    72
Yup: One of the few Bowie albums I owned as a teenager. It was great then and it's even better in surround. Album 8.5 surround 9.
 
Music: 6. Not my favorite Bowie album, but I certainly admire the sudden change in style. More of an album that I admire than enjoy. A mixed bag experiment.
Mix/Sonics: 8. Strange my receiver registers this disc as 24/96, but my BD player states it is 24/48. In any event, the sonics sound much fuller than Ziggy Stardust 5.1. To my ears this is a conservative enveloping mix, but I'm not complaining. To address the earlier posts complaining about a lack of low end, I must disagree. This album gave my sub a workout. Overall, I would give it a 7. Points detracted for music and no MLP.
 
Like many others, I was only familiar with "Young Americans" and "Fame", but this album has so much more to offer. From start to finish there are smooth, pleasing R&B grooves to be found. The only song that doesn't really work for me is Fascination, but hey, that's what ">>|" is for! The surround mix is fantastic, with discrete background singers in the surrounds and David Sanborn's sax isolated in various speakers depending on the song. The fidelity sounds full and dynamic. Another side of Bowie that I'm really digging! An 8.
 
I listened to Young Americans this week and enjoyed it. It's a bit "bright" to my ears (and the menu music is way too loud) but it has such a unique soulful feel that I give the content a ten. I need a proper session to rate the mix and fidelity.
 
I purchased this surround disc the day after Bowies death. I have given it a 10, likely because of the emotion of his passing but I was really surprised at the great sounding, very active discrete mix. Yes, I can also go to that place of not enough bottom (bass) but that view point is highly critical and this disc based solely on sonics is super good. Really great song is Somebody Up There Likes Me, with the song ending Bowie front center and back up singers rear right and left, going back and forth, awesome. Menu is a little screwy, I picked DTS 5.1 as my listening choice, hit play and was coming out in stereo, usually that is all you have to do, this DVD, you have to hit the first track for it to engage the audio of your choice, this threw me off for a second.
So glad I have this disc.
 
Just uploaded scans for this one to Bob's original 2007 post.

This is a strange release. Not sure why EMI didn't make this an SACD (like Ziggy), probably because they wanted to include the videos. But at least it's 24/96 DTS, which is as close as you can get to HiRez perfection. I still cannot understand why these labels refused to take the tiny effort it would take to add the AUDIO_TS files to make it a DVD-A as well as a DVD-V. It's kind of a big F U to everyone who bought their earlier DVD-A product and players.

BUT, I digress. This is a fine mix, although it's almost a quad mix. The center channel is presented at a much lower volume level than the main 4, and it's basically drums and Bowie, but his vocal and the drums are louder in the front left and right, so they absorbed into the audio presentation. I would bet if you didn't have a center speaker you would not miss a thing in the mix.

The DTS 24/96 sounds great and the mix is way worthy with the background singers where they belong and the audio spread around so you know you have a surround mix without going "I think I heard something back there, but I wasn't sure".

The "hits" are great, and the album tracks grow on you. Overall, this is a 9 for me. Again, where's my DVD-A track????
Especially since it says "DVD Audio" on the back cover! :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

Bowie Arrow.jpg

ARGGHHH!!
 
I still cannot understand why these labels refused to take the tiny effort it would take to add the AUDIO_TS files to make it a DVD-A as well as a DVD-V. It's kind of a big F U to everyone who bought their earlier DVD-A product and players.

Overall, this is a 9 for me. Again, where's my DVD-A track????
Especially since it says "DVD Audio" on the back cover! :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

View attachment 24922

ARGGHHH!!

Seriously, so glad to see that someone else is fired up and angry about these injustices we have been served over the years when it comes to DVD-A/V vs DVD-V. I'm giving this disc a '9' for the exact same reason that you are.

Content: 3/3
Surround Mix: 3/3
Fidelity: 3/3
High-Res Disc: 0/1

Content-wise, it's not quite up to par with "Ziggy Stardust", but it definitely excels in terms of the surround mix and fidelity. Everyone who loves Bowie and surround should snatch one up before they go for REALLY expensive prices! :)
 
Seriously, so glad to see that someone else is fired up and angry about these injustices we have been served over the years when it comes to DVD-A/V vs DVD-V. I'm giving this disc a '9' for the exact same reason that you are.


Content-wise, it's not quite up to par with "Ziggy Stardust", but it definitely excels in terms of the surround mix and fidelity. Everyone who loves Bowie and surround should snatch one up before they go for REALLY expensive prices! :)

I have been 'chronically' complaining about releasing ANY new surround mixes in LOSSY 'anything' for the past 5 years when we have three perfectly adequate hi res formats from which to choose.

When TUSK was announced as a pricey box set and the awareness that a previously prepared MLP DVD~A 5.1 was already 'in the can,' I naturally thought it would be a genuine DVD~A upon release. Yes, it sounds good in DTS 5.1 but, IMHO, would've been 'awesome' in MLP 5.1! But from previous experience with Warner's disappointing use of lossy DTS 4.0 for their Quadio releases of CTA's 1st album and Aretha's Greatest Hits and their initial promise to inagurate a BD~A launch, akin to Universal, and then releasing almost nothing in that format [apart from box sets]......I wasn't surprised.

I'm not much of a conspiracy theorist [although, I do have my moments), but I do believe these ultra greedy record comglomerates are holding back LOSSLESS releases because they KNOW that down the road when they do release them as higher rez downloads (stereo/multi), that we'll buy them ALL OVER AGAIN just as we've done in the past when newer high res formats were initially introduced.

And that hogwash that not everyone has a BD~V or Universal player to play BD~A, SACD and/or DVD~A is such a cop out because any 'budding' audiophile in their right mind does have access to at least one of these.

The 5.1/4.0 market has always been a niche market but apparently the heads of these comglomerates apparently didn't get the memo that we're tired of being shat on!

And as long as we continue to purchase these increasingly pricey boxsets for a LOSSY 5.1 remaster, the message we are sending them is that we don't care........akin to leading sheep to .........
 
Hi. rtbluray

I think it`s to late....it`s all ready happening

http://www.amazon.com/Americans-tra...ds=Audio-DVD+of+David+Bowie+-+YOUNG+AMERICANS

http://www.discogs.com/David-Bowie-Young-Americans/release/1045272

http://www.ebay.com/itm/YOUNG-AMERI...em3f5b199ccb:g:WrYAAOSwHaBWlaG0#ht_620wt_1157

Seriously, so glad to see that someone else is fired up and angry about these injustices we have been served over the years when it comes to DVD-A/V vs DVD-V. I'm giving this disc a '9' for the exact same reason that you are.

Content: 3/3
Surround Mix: 3/3
Fidelity: 3/3
High-Res Disc: 0/1

Content-wise, it's not quite up to par with "Ziggy Stardust", but it definitely excels in terms of the surround mix and fidelity. Everyone who loves Bowie and surround should snatch one up before they go for REALLY expensive prices! :)
 
I have been 'chronically' complaining about releasing ANY new surround mixes in LOSSY 'anything' for the past 5 years when we have three perfectly adequate hi res formats from which to choose.

When TUSK was announced as a pricey box set and the awareness that a previously prepared MLP DVD~A 5.1 was already 'in the can,' I naturally thought it would be a genuine DVD~A upon release. Yes, it sounds good in DTS 5.1 but, IMHO, would've been 'awesome' in MLP 5.1! But from previous experience with Warner's disappointing use of lossy DTS 4.0 for their Quadio releases of CTA's 1st album and Aretha's Greatest Hits and their initial promise to inagurate a BD~A launch, akin to Universal, and then releasing almost nothing in that format [apart from box sets]......I wasn't surprised.

I'm not much of a conspiracy theorist [although, I do have my moments), but I do believe these ultra greedy record comglomerates are holding back LOSSLESS releases because they KNOW that down the road when they do release them as higher rez downloads (stereo/multi), that we'll buy them ALL OVER AGAIN just as we've done in the past when newer high res formats were initially introduced.

And that hogwash that not everyone has a BD~V or Universal player to play BD~A, SACD and/or DVD~A is such a cop out because any 'budding' audiophile in their right mind does have access to at least one of these.

The 5.1/4.0 market has always been a niche market but apparently the heads of these comglomerates apparently didn't get the memo that we're tired of being shat on!

Thanks for also fighting the good fight along with me and others!
I don't think there's any conspiracy in all of this. When it comes to choosing DVD-V over DVD-A/V, I think it's mostly down to ignorance and apathy, whereas choosing DVD over Blu-Ray is mostly down to cost factors.
This release should have been DVD-A/V but it's so far in the past now that it's best to move on and continue to fight the good fight for all future releases! :)
 
That makes me all the more furious! :mad:

At least it got released in the end, unlike Visconti's surround remixes of "Low" ;)
..although from a couple of things posted here and at the SHF it seems like we may well be getting more Bowie in 5.1 in the months (years) ahead.. including a 5.1 of "Lodger" that's seemingly come out of nowhere.
 
At least it got released in the end, unlike Visconti's surround remixes of "Low" ;)
..although from a couple of things posted here and at the SHF it seems like we may well be getting more Bowie in 5.1 in the months (years) ahead.. including a 5.1 of "Lodger" that's seemingly come out of nowhere.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if Bowie's back catalogue is now exploited even more since his untimely death, including the release of any and all unreleased 5.1 mixes that have been lingering in the vaults over the years. I just hope none of us depart this earth as well before we have a chance to hear them!
 
There is, quite literally, nothing I don't like about this album, be it the songs, the performances or the 5.1 mix. It is, without a doubt, the best Bowie 5.1 mix (so far) out there and I was delighted to snag a brand new, sealed copy from a trader in Greece who wasn't posthumously price gouging :)
 
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