HiRez Poll RUSH - A FAREWELL TO KINGS (40TH ANNIVERSARY STEVEN WILSON 5.1 MIX) [Blu-Ray Audio]

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Rate the BDA of RUSH - A FAREWELL TO KINGS (40TH ANNIVERSARY STEVEN WILSON 5.1 MIX)

  • 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: Poor Content, Surround Mix, and Fidelity

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    72
I'm not aware that there is any other 40th anniversary deluxe edition with vinyl and all without the SW mix. Maybe the resident Rush aficionado Edisonbaggins can offer some assurance.
There is definitely a 2 CD version. And I believe there might be a vinyl only version.
But the only way to get the 5.1 is in the mega-ultra deluxe. The listing in question looks correct. The wilson disc is the red one in the slip sleeve.
 
One of the best surround mixes ever for me. It's astounding how Steven Wilson took a three piece band and made them this surroundy!
rock.gif
 
Damn, a 10! This may be only the third time I've given a 10 to a surround sound mix on this forum. Folks, no other Rush 5.1 mix sound this good. I don't know the back story as to why Wilson isn't doing any more mixes for Rush, but if this is the only one he does - then I'm happy. Packaging is ace (though the LP covers in my box came scraped), live stuff kicks ass, and the blu ray is devine!
 
Oh Bliss! My porch present this morning is about as good as it gets. I've had the previous surround mix for a while, but everything is better when Steven Wilson digs into it. How early is too early to crank up the system?

I think the record labels have figured out they can sell an entire box set of things to people like us just so we can get that juicy Bluray. Can't blame 'em, it works and that will give them an incentive to do more so I just plunked down full retail for this fm Amazon just to get the SW surround mix. Well, I did get a nice skull king ring too.
 

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First things first, all hail Steven Wilson for his acoustic alchemy. Every time he gets his hands on a set of master tapes, he brings each instrument and voice further into the room and separated without losing a coherent soundstage.

Overall there is no way I can give this mix of A Farewell to Kings anything but a 10. I love this record so much I’d listen to it on vinyl dragging a rock on a stick across it amplified through a traffic cone if that was all I had. But this mix is the absolute opposite of that. This is true fidelity.

The first thing I always notice in a surround mix is where did they put us. In this case it is perched on Neil Peart’s shoulder in the middle of his drum kit with Geddy and Alex out in front of it facing us. When Steven Wilson discussed this mix he noted that even though Rush creates an incredibly lush musical tapestry, there really is not a huge number of separate tracks or instruments involved. They are just that brilliant as a trio and the additional parts are well-designed to complement the initial three plus voice. That didn’t give him a ton of options for using the surrounds.

So he decided to pull Neil’s drum kit around us putting some of the outer toms and cymbals and cool percussion toys in the rears.

Thank you for that. Even if you don’t love Rush you can still be stunned at Neil’s virtuosity, he is THE percussionist, all others compete for second. If you do love Rush, you will grasp how fully he can be the steady engine of the band, while still managing fills and thrills that boggle the mind. He seems to be everywhere and so precise at the same time.

Now you can sit with him and when he takes a spin around his kit hitting several dozen different targets in stunningly rapid succession, the sound flows around the room to match his run. There are other examples of moving his fills across multiple speakers, like Tom Sawyer. But no one else has managed to plop us right in his lap while the percussive fireworks go off all around us.

But it’s not just drums in the rears, there are obviously a lot of fun effects in AFTK and Xanadu and Cygnus that allow some discrete action and they are nicely tied in with the LCR so the overall immersion level is very high. There is never really a second where you are not well aware you are listening in surround, but also never a moment where you’re thinking cute trick. You just climb on board the Rocinante and go wheeling through the galaxies.

There are also visits from Alex on acoustic guitar or an additional electric track in the surrounds and it feels like he just wandered over while playing to stand to Neil’s back left or right and just jam a bit with him. Same with the occasional Moog or pedals from Geddy. I was either off floating in the world they created or sitting in the studio with them as they made the record and both were equally enjoyable.

The second thing I notice is the bass. Nothing ruins a record like crap bass either boomy or missing. My system and room is well-fitted with acoustic treatments and room-correction magic to let good bass fill up the proper amount of space and punch you in the chest when it should. This mix lets Geddy’s Rickenbacker growl just like you want. He and Chris Squire use that to perfection and it allows the bass be a lead instrument not a rhythm back up. You get all you want of that and more. It comes at you from out front and pile-drives right at you. Even when all three of them are playing more or less in unison on a riff, you still have separation for all the instruments. Plus when the LFE effects come into play in Cygnus and elsewhere, the room quakes like it should.

Alex’s guitars are wonderfully varied and either clean or dirty as needed. Plus they fill a large area in the mix when Geddy is playing a lead riff. Again it’s not a question of having a half dozen guitar tracks doing that. It’s one or two most of the time, but well played and placed to create that full feel but never turning to mush in any way. His leads are right out front where you want them but like the rest, never at the expense of all the other fun going on at the same time.

One of the things that left me short on the previous mix was Closer to the Heart. I had just expected more. Now I got it. Again, there is not a ton of stuff there. But it all got embiggened. The acoustic intro was just taller, wider and closer and as each verse brought more parts and power, the soundstage grew with it. I just wish the song was longer, I never want it to end. But that is also part of its appeal, how do you get that much thoughtful philosophy and wonderful music into 3 min? Don’t know, but they sure did.

Highlights for me have always been the title track as both a great song and brilliant commentary on the mess we make of our world and then Closer to the Heart as the solution we can’t seem to grasp but always still sits there for us to aspire to. That didn’t change, they just got fantastically better to listen to. Jaw-droppingly so.

Close to the Edge & DSOTM have always vied with AFTK for the record I most want to drop into to drop out of this world for a while. AFTK just solidly hit the top for me.

But, I do have one quibble. That’s why we’re here, right? Because we listen so hard and pay so much attention and we finally have people who ”get it”. This doesn’t take even a fraction of enjoyment away, just something I noticed.

Since SW put us on Neil’s drum stool as our listening position I wondered how closely the fills moving around me matched the actual setup of Neil’s kit. While listening it didn’t matter I was there and happy, it was just a thought. But they also included the promo videos for AFTK, Xanadu and Closer to the Heart, thankfully all in 5.1. So when I watched the video it feels like SW mixed the drums as if you were standing in front of Neil looking at him. The temple blocks are the real giveaway. They are on his right side as he sits, and as we do in the mix, but they are in the left rear. OMG can you believe this massive failure, Heh.

This record is a massive victory for why any good record deserves a good surround mix and the great ones deserve, well Steven Wilson. It also proves that the new trick of hiding the Bluray we desperately want in a box full of big frisbees and little ones that I will never use is dastardly but effective. Even though I already owned the previous Blu-ray version, I plonked down a Buck Thirty for the Super Duper Double Deluxe Magic Box Set, just to get this SW mix. I hated it, but couldn’t be happier with the result. We need to push the bean counters in the right direction, so they keep unlocking more of the gold they have for us to hear.

That was a lot of words, the simple take…Buy This & Blast Off!
 
First things first, all hail Steven Wilson for his acoustic alchemy. Every time he gets his hands on a set of master tapes, he brings each instrument and voice further into the room and separated without losing a coherent soundstage.

Overall there is no way I can give this mix of A Farewell to Kings anything but a 10. I love this record so much I’d listen to it on vinyl dragging a rock on a stick across it amplified through a traffic cone if that was all I had. But this mix is the absolute opposite of that. This is true fidelity.

The first thing I always notice in a surround mix is where did they put us. In this case it is perched on Neil Peart’s shoulder in the middle of his drum kit with Geddy and Alex out in front of it facing us. When Steven Wilson discussed this mix he noted that even though Rush creates an incredibly lush musical tapestry, there really is not a huge number of separate tracks or instruments involved. They are just that brilliant as a trio and the additional parts are well-designed to complement the initial three plus voice. That didn’t give him a ton of options for using the surrounds.

So he decided to pull Neil’s drum kit around us putting some of the outer toms and cymbals and cool percussion toys in the rears.

Thank you for that. Even if you don’t love Rush you can still be stunned at Neil’s virtuosity, he is THE percussionist, all others compete for second. If you do love Rush, you will grasp how fully he can be the steady engine of the band, while still managing fills and thrills that boggle the mind. He seems to be everywhere and so precise at the same time.

Now you can sit with him and when he takes a spin around his kit hitting several dozen different targets in stunningly rapid succession, the sound flows around the room to match his run. There are other examples of moving his fills across multiple speakers, like Tom Sawyer. But no one else has managed to plop us right in his lap while the percussive fireworks go off all around us.

But it’s not just drums in the rears, there are obviously a lot of fun effects in AFTK and Xanadu and Cygnus that allow some discrete action and they are nicely tied in with the LCR so the overall immersion level is very high. There is never really a second where you are not well aware you are listening in surround, but also never a moment where you’re thinking cute trick. You just climb on board the Rocinante and go wheeling through the galaxies.

There are also visits from Alex on acoustic guitar or an additional electric track in the surrounds and it feels like he just wandered over while playing to stand to Neil’s back left or right and just jam a bit with him. Same with the occasional Moog or pedals from Geddy. I was either off floating in the world they created or sitting in the studio with them as they made the record and both were equally enjoyable.

The second thing I notice is the bass. Nothing ruins a record like crap bass either boomy or missing. My system and room is well-fitted with acoustic treatments and room-correction magic to let good bass fill up the proper amount of space and punch you in the chest when it should. This mix lets Geddy’s Rickenbacker growl just like you want. He and Chris Squire use that to perfection and it allows the bass be a lead instrument not a rhythm back up. You get all you want of that and more. It comes at you from out front and pile-drives right at you. Even when all three of them are playing more or less in unison on a riff, you still have separation for all the instruments. Plus when the LFE effects come into play in Cygnus and elsewhere, the room quakes like it should.

Alex’s guitars are wonderfully varied and either clean or dirty as needed. Plus they fill a large area in the mix when Geddy is playing a lead riff. Again it’s not a question of having a half dozen guitar tracks doing that. It’s one or two most of the time, but well played and placed to create that full feel but never turning to mush in any way. His leads are right out front where you want them but like the rest, never at the expense of all the other fun going on at the same time.

One of the things that left me short on the previous mix was Closer to the Heart. I had just expected more. Now I got it. Again, there is not a ton of stuff there. But it all got embiggened. The acoustic intro was just taller, wider and closer and as each verse brought more parts and power, the soundstage grew with it. I just wish the song was longer, I never want it to end. But that is also part of its appeal, how do you get that much thoughtful philosophy and wonderful music into 3 min? Don’t know, but they sure did.

Highlights for me have always been the title track as both a great song and brilliant commentary on the mess we make of our world and then Closer to the Heart as the solution we can’t seem to grasp but always still sits there for us to aspire to. That didn’t change, they just got fantastically better to listen to. Jaw-droppingly so.

Close to the Edge & DSOTM have always vied with AFTK for the record I most want to drop into to drop out of this world for a while. AFTK just solidly hit the top for me.

But, I do have one quibble. That’s why we’re here, right? Because we listen so hard and pay so much attention and we finally have people who ”get it”. This doesn’t take even a fraction of enjoyment away, just something I noticed.

Since SW put us on Neil’s drum stool as our listening position I wondered how closely the fills moving around me matched the actual setup of Neil’s kit. While listening it didn’t matter I was there and happy, it was just a thought. But they also included the promo videos for AFTK, Xanadu and Closer to the Heart, thankfully all in 5.1. So when I watched the video it feels like SW mixed the drums as if you were standing in front of Neil looking at him. The temple blocks are the real giveaway. They are on his right side as he sits, and as we do in the mix, but they are in the left rear. OMG can you believe this massive failure, Heh.

This record is a massive victory for why any good record deserves a good surround mix and the great ones deserve, well Steven Wilson. It also proves that the new trick of hiding the Bluray we desperately want in a box full of big frisbees and little ones that I will never use is dastardly but effective. Even though I already owned the previous Blu-ray version, I plonked down a Buck Thirty for the Super Duper Double Deluxe Magic Box Set, just to get this SW mix. I hated it, but couldn’t be happier with the result. We need to push the bean counters in the right direction, so they keep unlocking more of the gold they have for us to hear.

That was a lot of words, the simple take…Buy This & Blast Off!
Yes, this mix is most embiggened, lol! Love that word (in a bigley way 😁 )
Great review!
 
Finally got around to this one today. As expected, it put a smile on my face.

MIX: Any mix that gives me goosebumps and makes me say, "Yeah!" out loud to no one in particular is going to get full marks. I'd say this is one of Steven's best mixes, full stop. Although it sounds unnatural in theory, wrapping the toms around the rear soundfield works very well in practice. "Xanadu" being presented at its recorded speed/pitch, rather than the slightly sped-up original mix, didn't bother me nearly as much as I thought it would (I have phonographic memory). Only two mixing decisions, both on "Closer To The Heart," bugged me: 1) the level of the lower harmony during the guitar solo seemed way too low to me; and 2) the inclusion of an extra "whoa" vocal from Geddy at the end of the guitar solo elicited a, "What?!" 3.

FIDELITY: This album has always sounded good, and I dare say Steven managed to extract just a bit more fidelity than Terry Brown did in '77. Dynamics are good, if not great, with only a few instances of, "Huh, I thought this would be louder by contrast." 3.

CONTENT: This is my favorite '70s LP from Rush, followed closely by 2112. "Xanadu" is my favorite '70s track from Rush. I know it front-to-back and it's as enjoyable as ever here, if not more so. The visuals are well done and a nice accompaniment to the music, neither distracting nor dull. The bonus 5.1 mix of "Cygnus X-2 EH"—a collection of unused sound effects from the intro to "Cygnus X-1"—playing during the menu (be sure to select a surround audio option while viewing the menu!) was a pleasant surprise. Sean Magee's mastering of the original stereo mix is the best it has ever sounded or probably ever will sound. The included promo videos probably look as good as they ever will (which is to say, not bad at all, actually) and can be accompanied by either the stereo mix or surround mix, which is welcome. 3.

PACKAGING: The boxset is... Meh. The new art is mostly uninspiring and it's really annoying that the spine is completely devoid of any text or label. I'll get around to the other content on CD, but the vinyl to me is superfluous (as is, therefore, the poorly-themed mat). More to the point, the surround is prisoner of yet another big box. 0.

TOTAL: 9
 
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First things first, all hail Steven Wilson for his acoustic alchemy. Every time he gets his hands on a set of master tapes, he brings each instrument and voice further into the room and separated without losing a coherent soundstage.

Overall there is no way I can give this mix of A Farewell to Kings anything but a 10. I love this record so much I’d listen to it on vinyl dragging a rock on a stick across it amplified through a traffic cone if that was all I had. But this mix is the absolute opposite of that. This is true fidelity.

The first thing I always notice in a surround mix is where did they put us. In this case it is perched on Neil Peart’s shoulder in the middle of his drum kit with Geddy and Alex out in front of it facing us. When Steven Wilson discussed this mix he noted that even though Rush creates an incredibly lush musical tapestry, there really is not a huge number of separate tracks or instruments involved. They are just that brilliant as a trio and the additional parts are well-designed to complement the initial three plus voice. That didn’t give him a ton of options for using the surrounds.

So he decided to pull Neil’s drum kit around us putting some of the outer toms and cymbals and cool percussion toys in the rears.

Thank you for that. Even if you don’t love Rush you can still be stunned at Neil’s virtuosity, he is THE percussionist, all others compete for second. If you do love Rush, you will grasp how fully he can be the steady engine of the band, while still managing fills and thrills that boggle the mind. He seems to be everywhere and so precise at the same time.

Now you can sit with him and when he takes a spin around his kit hitting several dozen different targets in stunningly rapid succession, the sound flows around the room to match his run. There are other examples of moving his fills across multiple speakers, like Tom Sawyer. But no one else has managed to plop us right in his lap while the percussive fireworks go off all around us.

But it’s not just drums in the rears, there are obviously a lot of fun effects in AFTK and Xanadu and Cygnus that allow some discrete action and they are nicely tied in with the LCR so the overall immersion level is very high. There is never really a second where you are not well aware you are listening in surround, but also never a moment where you’re thinking cute trick. You just climb on board the Rocinante and go wheeling through the galaxies.

There are also visits from Alex on acoustic guitar or an additional electric track in the surrounds and it feels like he just wandered over while playing to stand to Neil’s back left or right and just jam a bit with him. Same with the occasional Moog or pedals from Geddy. I was either off floating in the world they created or sitting in the studio with them as they made the record and both were equally enjoyable.

The second thing I notice is the bass. Nothing ruins a record like crap bass either boomy or missing. My system and room is well-fitted with acoustic treatments and room-correction magic to let good bass fill up the proper amount of space and punch you in the chest when it should. This mix lets Geddy’s Rickenbacker growl just like you want. He and Chris Squire use that to perfection and it allows the bass be a lead instrument not a rhythm back up. You get all you want of that and more. It comes at you from out front and pile-drives right at you. Even when all three of them are playing more or less in unison on a riff, you still have separation for all the instruments. Plus when the LFE effects come into play in Cygnus and elsewhere, the room quakes like it should.

Alex’s guitars are wonderfully varied and either clean or dirty as needed. Plus they fill a large area in the mix when Geddy is playing a lead riff. Again it’s not a question of having a half dozen guitar tracks doing that. It’s one or two most of the time, but well played and placed to create that full feel but never turning to mush in any way. His leads are right out front where you want them but like the rest, never at the expense of all the other fun going on at the same time.

One of the things that left me short on the previous mix was Closer to the Heart. I had just expected more. Now I got it. Again, there is not a ton of stuff there. But it all got embiggened. The acoustic intro was just taller, wider and closer and as each verse brought more parts and power, the soundstage grew with it. I just wish the song was longer, I never want it to end. But that is also part of its appeal, how do you get that much thoughtful philosophy and wonderful music into 3 min? Don’t know, but they sure did.

Highlights for me have always been the title track as both a great song and brilliant commentary on the mess we make of our world and then Closer to the Heart as the solution we can’t seem to grasp but always still sits there for us to aspire to. That didn’t change, they just got fantastically better to listen to. Jaw-droppingly so.

Close to the Edge & DSOTM have always vied with AFTK for the record I most want to drop into to drop out of this world for a while. AFTK just solidly hit the top for me.

But, I do have one quibble. That’s why we’re here, right? Because we listen so hard and pay so much attention and we finally have people who ”get it”. This doesn’t take even a fraction of enjoyment away, just something I noticed.

Since SW put us on Neil’s drum stool as our listening position I wondered how closely the fills moving around me matched the actual setup of Neil’s kit. While listening it didn’t matter I was there and happy, it was just a thought. But they also included the promo videos for AFTK, Xanadu and Closer to the Heart, thankfully all in 5.1. So when I watched the video it feels like SW mixed the drums as if you were standing in front of Neil looking at him. The temple blocks are the real giveaway. They are on his right side as he sits, and as we do in the mix, but they are in the left rear. OMG can you believe this massive failure, Heh.

This record is a massive victory for why any good record deserves a good surround mix and the great ones deserve, well Steven Wilson. It also proves that the new trick of hiding the Bluray we desperately want in a box full of big frisbees and little ones that I will never use is dastardly but effective. Even though I already owned the previous Blu-ray version, I plonked down a Buck Thirty for the Super Duper Double Deluxe Magic Box Set, just to get this SW mix. I hated it, but couldn’t be happier with the result. We need to push the bean counters in the right direction, so they keep unlocking more of the gold they have for us to hear.

That was a lot of words, the simple take…Buy This & Blast Off!
OK I just noticed one more favor SW did us on Closer to the Heart. He buried and EQed some of the VibraSlap that comes in at the start of each first measure of the bridge segments and the outro. It was prominent and had a high pitch to it that always distracted me. It's still there but now in the background more and that is where it belongs.
 
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Since SW put us on Neil’s drum stool as our listening position I wondered how closely the fills moving around me matched the actual setup of Neil’s kit. While listening it didn’t matter I was there and happy, it was just a thought. But they also included the promo videos for AFTK, Xanadu and Closer to the Heart, thankfully all in 5.1. So when I watched the video it feels like SW mixed the drums as if you were standing in front of Neil looking at him. The temple blocks are the real giveaway. They are on his right side as he sits, and as we do in the mix, but they are in the left rear. OMG can you believe this massive failure, Heh.

That's the one thing that i've always disliked about how Rush mixes their drums. They're always (I think) in the audience's perspective instead of the drummers. For a live show or music video, I get it since we are watching them perform, but its like that on all their studio albums as well. I want to drum along in the car!
 
That's the one thing that i've always disliked about how Rush mixes their drums. They're always (I think) in the audience's perspective instead of the drummers. For a live show or music video, I get it since we are watching them perform, but its like that on all their studio albums as well. I want to drum along in the car!
Personally, as a non-drummer, I prefer audience perspective. Unless a client specifically requests it, that's how I mix drums: hat right, ride left.
 
Personally, as a non-drummer, I prefer audience perspective. Unless a client specifically requests it, that's how I mix drums: hat right, ride left.
I normally do too, but since SW put us in Neil's seat for this mix it coulda used a flip. It really was fun to visualize the band like that w/ Geddy & Alex facing Neil/Us
 
I didn't get that vibe at all. Does he specify that as his technique/goal/intent? Mostly, it's tom rolls in the rears, which is not where the toms are placed in Neil's kit.

Agreed. I always thought his intention was to replicate the basic 'stereo picture' of the drum kit and spread the elements around the listener. It's not a realistic perspective, but it is 'true to the original' in terms of which components of the kit are placed left-center-right and which direction the tom fills move. I think surround music wouldn't be nearly as much fun if mixers didn't take liberties with acoustic reality.

In the liner notes, SW does acknowledge that the panning of the drum kit is somewhat unconventional:
Rush-FWTK_booklet.jpg
 
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Personally, as a non-drummer, I prefer audience perspective. Unless a client specifically requests it, that's how I mix drums: hat right, ride left.

I'm not one either, but I sure would like to be. I like drummers perspective for studio stuff because I get sucked into the music and like to be in the saddle for whatever I'm doing. For anything live, I feel like a spectator, which is where the audience perspective comes in. I guess I just like to keep studio and live (most of what I do in my career) in two different mindsets.
 
A similar debate cropped up not long ago over the quad mix of the Mahavishnu Orchestra's Birds Of Fire. That mix places Billy Cobham's drum kit across the rear channels, but the direction that the drum rolls move matches the stereo mix - so Cobham has effectively turned his back on the listener.
 
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