Talking Heads individual remasters

[robert h.]

"You know, I guess I am sort of offended by calling it "Hoffman's publicity board." Not that Steve Hoffman needs me to defend him, but I think that's way off mark. Publicity for what?"

It's a publicity board for Hoffman, to advance himself as some sort of mastering 'expert', to get attention for him so he can get work. To be blunt, Hoffma spends more time doing photo ops than actual mastering.

Nothing wrong with that, if you recognize it as such and take it with a huge grain of salt.

That board is VERY heavily edited and controlled to ensure the host keeps on smelling like a rose, and VERY strongly dominated by a few who are his acolytes. There's far too much following over there and, quite bluntly, not very much interesting.

want to hear again about how "bad" one particular owner of a $99 JVC CD player thinks K2 Remasters are? You can find that guy's umpteenth post about it just about every day. There's a lot of agendas going on over there and most of it to advance Hoffman's career goals.

A little while ago, one over the top nutster actually wrote to a Japanese remastering engineer to tell him how he should remaster and actually directing him to read the Hoffman board to learn more about how to do it! The engineer politely took the time to reply that he mastered just fine and besides, he was doing so to suit the Japanese market that employed him, not some American audiophiles, to which this guy had the arrogance to tell him was all wrong! Imagine - telling a Japanese engineer how to do his job and that he should cater to the Hoffmanites, not his actual domestic audience!

When Red Trumpet folded, the courageous Hoffman, who himself was employed by and still does work for a bankrupt operation that stiffed people, allowed and participated in the vilification of red trumpet's owner for stiffing some audiophiles for unfilled orders, but when it was pointed out to him that DCC stiffed people too, took offense and claimed that no people were stiffed by DCC, only corporations - duh, dummy, ever hear of shareholders - they are people, rocket scientist! He then courageously announced that he never really knew red trumpet very well and took the link he had to them down when he heard they were bust. OK to have links and get support when they are selling your product, but the minute they are a liability, it's 'oh, I didn't really know them at all' to distance himself.

I could go on and on. I really wasn't intending to start a Hoffman thing here, but that site really does damage to the music with the extremely censored and limited views directed towards one person's agenda, which imflames me as a musician and music lover, that is my only point. Take the views expressed there as such - free speech it isn't.

[Big Al]

Listening to the 5.1 mix of FEAR OF MUSIC. Eh, nothing to write home about, if my dinky little computer DVD player is any indication. Even Jerry Harrison admitted in the liner noted that there wasn't much he could do to the master tapes to make much of a 5.1 mix. Still, a lot clearer than any other version I've heard.

Money well spent (or rather, a gift card well spent!)

[Parkertown]

Howdy RobertH.,

Wow, I guess I was wrong about you. You really have spent some time there. Thanks for your thoughtful reply and for sharing your opinions. I don't quite see it the way you do, but I'm glad to have your perspective. However, for as much as you say you don't like the activity on the SH board, you do seem to be following it pretty well. Do you lurk there a lot?

I do often wonder how system-dependent these types of listening comparisons are...?

Peace...

[Alfred]

An increasing number of classical and jazz reissues also sound bright and (too) loud, that's why I'm currently selling so many reissues from my collection; they're hurting my (admittedly aging) ears and I can't enjoy the music that way. I often prefer earlier CD issues of the same music, most of them sound pretty good to excellent on my system, not too loud and certainly not bright.

Very true. I'm selling lots of my CD collection out of the same reason. My CD collection is still shrinking while the vinyl part grows heavily ...

[Man with the Golden Arm]

led from DMG's newsletter: Rhino and iTunes only have put up a rarities mix that did not make the time cuts on the DualDisc format.

18 cuts in all with a solo acoustic of Byrne doing Nancy's "Boots..." that's worthy of a visit from some of Frank's boys.

[BruceH]

"Some density...moved right beside meeeee...."