Jazz albums reissued on CD by Atlantic Japan

[etherbored]

i'll never forget the first time i heard 'satin doll' from 'the great american songbook / live at dante's'. i was forever on carmen's side after that. as soon as i retrieve my ailing amp from the shop (s i g h), the first thing i spin will be the chris connor gershwin set!

i have some contacts i can ask about cd manufacturing and pressing process, but i'm sure we have sufficient resources right here who can clarify what could go wrong in the process of country b pressing country a's master; and indeed if in a case such as this one where italy may have grey marketed japan's master...

for those who have a euro pressing of a 'jazz best 1000' title, is there a mastering credit...?

[king ubu]

i have some contacts i can ask about cd manufacturing and pressing process, but i'm sure we have sufficient resources right here who can clarify what could go wrong in the process of country b pressing country a's master; and indeed if in a case such as this one where italy may have grey marketed japan's master...

Please do, I'd be interested! (Unless someone who does know the process and has inside knowledge about how majors handle this jumps in here, of course!)

for those who have a euro pressing of a 'jazz best 1000' title, is there a mastering credit...?

No, at least not in latin letters ... there are Japanese liner notes too, so I have no clue what it all says in there or on the OBI. "Manufactured in the E.U." is the only bit I can read on the OBIs, except for some dates, a catalogue number, a 24bit logo, price in yen ...

Edited September 15, 2014 by king ubu

[xybert]

Yeah, from memory the note that it is 'manufactured in the E.U.' is the only point of difference in the packaging, also the 'Jaspac' logo is removed. I'll take a closer look when i get home tonight though.

I'd love, love to get confirmation from the people that are actually producing these CDs. There's just so much 'why?'

Simplest answer seems to be = Manufactured in the EU using a Japanese template and same masters as the Japanese versions.

But then why the apparent difference in sound quality? Possibly caused by incompetence during manufacturing? Or are they using different masters altogether? Then why bother using the japanese packaging? To fool people? But nobody is fooled. The only people that would care if it is manufactured in Japan are connoisseurs and connoisseurs are immediately sceptical about the fact that these aren't the real deal. So maybe it was just somehow cheaper to use the Japanese template for the packaging rather than just imitate previous packaging. But then why include the Obi? Maybe they thought "hey why not go all the way?" But would using the Japanese template actually be cheaper than just mocking something up in the Andorran style?

Why why why?

[etherbored]

okay - i've reached out. in the meantime, i was thinking of king nessa as a resource. i'm sure that lon was partially onto something when he mentioned the potential for botched eq settings and the like.

the italians used the japanese template for two reasons; 1. it was cost effective (i.e. cheap). 2. they did it because they could - and create a small budget series of their own. i'm certain that they were only thinking of their own market. now this is presuming that wea italy arethe ones behind the euro series. is that the case? or is it wea eu in some larger, ahem, more exacting and corporate of a location? i believe if this series were german i would have heard about it.

[etherbored]

i'll be talking to an engineer who prepares masters for manufacture for a major label on wednesday or thursday. let's queue up a list of questions?

[xybert]

i'll be talking to an engineer who prepares masters for manufacture for a major label on wednesday or thursday. let's queue up a list of questions?

I guess the main thing that i wanted to confirm is whether there is potential to make the CD sound worse at any point in the manufacturing process.

Here's some grist for the mill:

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/jul/09/dinosaur-jr-recall-new-album

From the linked article:

Dinosaur Jr don't want their European fans wearing earplugs. The deafening American guitar band have issued a recall of their new CD, saying that the album is too loud.

The problem affects copies of Farm purchased in "European shops", according to the band's website. While it's not clear if this affects copies released in the UK, buyers can either check the bar code – copies with the number 5414939004926 are affected – or else pop the CD into your stereo and see if your ears start to bleed.

A mastering issue is at the root of the problem, the band explained. "While duplicating the original master ... the software programme 'doubled' the sound layers. This resulted in a 3dB increase in volume."

Not sure if the part about duplicating the original master occured before it was sent to the manufacturers, but interesting none the less. Funnily enough this affected the European version only (obviously a coincidence, but pretty funny in the context of this discussion). I actually bought a european copy of the album second hand and only found out about this issue after searching on line to see if anyone else thought the album sounded way too loud.

[king ubu]

Thx etherbored!

I'd be interested to know about the steps in the whole manufacturing process, as I said above. And wherein the margins lie, i.e. how can the purely technical side of production interfere with sonics? That example about poor T-Rex Jr. fans without volume buttons on their equipment might be an indication indeed. But then: why don't labels or the engineers they hire hand over protected files that can't be edited and come in the correct format?

[Daniel A]

While I have released a CD of my own, I'm an "outsider" and I urge you to apply "FWIW" on my thougts.

If two pressing plants are using the same master, that means that the same 1:s and 0:s are supposed to be on the end product. If a CD-ROM for computer use is manufactured, one single bit error may render a complete file - and possibly the whole program - useless. I'm assuming that the tolerances are the same when manufacturing audio CD:s.

It is true that the audio CD standard employs error correction (which is not the case with CD-ROM:s). A theory that I see mentioned sometimes is that if the error correction circuit of the CD player is forced to work extensively, it may cause the sound to appear shrill, or affected in some other way.

Given that this even is the case - which I haven't seen being proved - it would have been caused by either a CD which is way below normal standard or a faulty laser in the CD player. So, to actually sound different, the CD would pretty much have to be regarded as defective.

[erwbol]

Flurin, I believe all the single disc versions of the Carmen Songbook omit many of the vocal introductions. . . which are all great and I wouldn't want to be without them. I could be wrong, I know the US single cd version did omit them.

To find out if two different pressings are bit identical, you may compare the checksums displayed for each track by ripping software like EAC (Exact Audio Copy). If the checksums are identical, so is the data.

Hear, hear.

Except the current Japanese Warner jazz discs are garbage.

Wow, don't feel that way at all (I don't have any of the European ones, only the Japanese).

To find out if two different pressings are bit identical, you may compare the checksums displayed for each track by ripping software like EAC (Exact Audio Copy). If the checksums are identical, so is the data.

Hear, hear.

Except the current Japanese Warner jazz discs are garbage.

probably it`s because english is not my mother language - but could not find IMO in you last statement. otherwise, i believe that this sort of statements is disrespectful towards other thread contributors........and yes, I do remember you`ve stated your (same) point of view already several times....

Oh, I forgot to add IMO and ?

(Now listening to MoFi's Bitches Brew SACD hybrid. Now that's a proper re-issue!)

[soulpope]

Flurin, I believe all the single disc versions of the Carmen Songbook omit many of the vocal introductions. . . which are all great and I wouldn't want to be without them. I could be wrong, I know the US single cd version did omit them.

To find out if two different pressings are bit identical, you may compare the checksums displayed for each track by ripping software like EAC (Exact Audio Copy). If the checksums are identical, so is the data.

Hear, hear.

Except the current Japanese Warner jazz discs are garbage.

Wow, don't feel that way at all (I don't have any of the European ones, only the Japanese).

To find out if two different pressings are bit identical, you may compare the checksums displayed for each track by ripping software like EAC (Exact Audio Copy). If the checksums are identical, so is the data.

Hear, hear.

Except the current Japanese Warner jazz discs are garbage.

probably it`s because english is not my mother language - but could not find IMO in you last statement. otherwise, i believe that this sort of statements is disrespectful towards other thread contributors........and yes, I do remember you`ve stated your (same) point of view already several times....

Oh, I forgot to add IMO and ?

(Now listening to MoFi's Bitches Brew SACD hybrid. Now that's a proper re-issue!)

you got it.....good job.....

[jazzbo]

Okay I was able to so I did do some comparisons today between two Coltrane titles which I now have on hand in both Euro and Japanese versions (I got a backordered shipment from importcds that I had forgotten about and already had the Japanese on hand of these and a few more titles).

There ARE differences between the two from the comparisons that I did, they sound as if they are the same basic mastering but with eq differences. The European ones sound darker in the bass and crsiper and a bit more congested in the highs. Not a big big difference, but noticeable on my system which especially now with the PS Audio DirectSteream DAC is pretty detail-revealing.

It occurs to me now that I didn't check the phase of one against the other, I'll do that when I revisit this soon.

[xybert]

Thanks for posting Lon.

Questions still abound but it seems we've now had more than one confirmation that there is an audible difference between the Euro and Japanese versions (for at least some of them anyway).

Now i'm mentally scanning the Euro ones that i've purchased and wondering whether there are any that i love enough and sound bad enough for me to purchase the Japanese version. I think i'm okay, overall i've been pretty happy with the Euro versions. I'm thinking about the MJQs though... reasonably happy but my expectations are low for MJQ recordings... is there room for improvement via remastering though or are the original recordings mostly to blame? Maybe i'll order one CD as a test...

[jazzbo]

It's hard to say which is "better" with the subtle differences I hear. It would be very system dependent and some systems the differences may not even be detectable. I'd try one certainly, not more, to see what your reactions would be. . . . But it's probably just as sensible to just stick with what you have. I didn't hear anything that was more than quite subtle.

The MJQ. . . all those I have on the Mosaic set sound the best of any I'e heard, and that set includes nearly all the MJQ I need. So that's a one-stop and done for me.

[king ubu]

Thanks indeed Lon!

No love for live MJQ? I think some of their live albums are pretty hot!

[jazzbo]

I have some of them, yes. I like some of them indeed. But I haven't been buying them in the new series. I may get to them eventually, but I'm not in a hurry.

I guess what I wanted to convey with my comparisons is that the differences are so slight that they may even be my imagination (I don't think so to be honest) and if someone thought, listening to either the European or the Japanese, "this is garbage!," listening to the other is not going to alter that.

[Daniel A]

The results from my comparison of "EU" and Japanese 1000 Yen reissue of 'Tones for Joan's Bones' can be found in thread.