Old Albums, re-done?

HAWKWIND and TANGERINE DREAM/ EDGAR FROESE have a tendency to re-record old classics regularly, often not for the better!  

A B Negative wrote: febus wrote: HAWKWIND and TANGERINE DREAM/ EDGAR FROESE have a tendency to re-record old classics regularly, often not for the better!     Hawkwind recorded new versions of Sonic Attack, Silver Machine and Psychedelic Warlords in the 80s (and possibly others but these are the ones that spring to mind). They don't annoy me as much as the Tangerine Dream / Edgar Froese reworkings but the original versions are much better.

Hawkwind only recorded new versions of the odd old song and put it on a new album, but did not redo the albums completely. I actually like the newer versions of the songs too. they are different, but not necessarily bad


Edited by BaldJean - June 27 2008 at 11:17

I think the problem is a psychological one. those old recordings with their objectively imperfect sound quality sound better because in real life we never are in completely undisturbed surroundings; there is always some background noise, and be it only minimal. anything that we hear against that background sounds natural and "warm". remove that background sound by digitally recording all instruments directly into the console, and it sounds sterile, though objectively the sound is better. there is a lesson we can learn from that: "better" is not always better


Edited by BaldJean - June 27 2008 at 14:12

Edited by The T - June 27 2008 at 21:18

I don´t know if re-record them so that they sound modern. But if there are albums I wish could be re-recorded but with the same kind of sound of the time (the best of the time that is) would be Lark´s tongue in Aspic and Starless and bible black. Great albums but they don´t sound so good. Now, if they sounded as good as Red... mmm niceeeeeeee

There is a prime example of what happens when an artist from the classic era decides to improve on an album:  Frank Zappa's Ruben & the Jets.  I don't know what FZ was thinking, but re-recording the bass and drums on this for the CD release effectively made it unlistenable to anyone who grew up with the original LP.  Maybe he was in full Dada mode, throwing a jar of paint on one of his earlier masterpieces which he no longer deemed worthy.  I still hope that Dweezil will make this particular mistake right.

BaldJean wrote: I think the problem is a psychological one. those old recordings with their objectively imperfect sound quality sound better because in real life we never are in completely undisturbed surroundings; there is always some background noise, and be it only minimal. anything that we hear against that background sounds natural and "warm". remove that background sound by digitally recording all instruments directly into the console, and it sounds sterile, though objectively the sound is better. there is a lesson we can learn from that: "better" is not always better

That's also why ProTools aren't what they're cracked up to be... they make the music sound like something nobody could actually play.

I might add that I regret buying my mk2 Deep Purple records on vinyl (and not just because my phonograph is broken right now ), the 25th anniversary editions being rare cases of a remaster actually improving upon the original.

ExittheLemming wrote: your post outlines the exact rationale behind John Cage's infamous 4.33 piece (i.e his assertion that 'silence' is impossible)

I thought that was just one of those jokes whose underlying premises are so ridiculously convoluted that I don't know how to end this sentence because I'm busy trying to figure it out.

Does that make any sense? No. Neither does that type of joke.

Toaster Mantis wrote: BaldJean wrote: I think the problem is a psychological one. those old recordings with their objectively imperfect sound quality sound better because in real life we never are in completely undisturbed surroundings; there is always some background noise, and be it only minimal. anything that we hear against that background sounds natural and "warm". remove that background sound by digitally recording all instruments directly into the console, and it sounds sterile, though objectively the sound is better. there is a lesson we can learn from that: "better" is not always better That's also why ProTools aren't what they're cracked up to be... they make the music sound like something nobody could actually play.

Well no. ProTools is a recording/engineering program not a device that you put onto music. It has plug-ins (reverb, delay, compression, EQ, etc) that can be used on the recorded music, but considering most places that remaster things are big studios, they have hundreds of thousands of dollars worth in analog equipment that you can patch into. So instead of mixing a recording in the box (on the computer with only what the program offers + the plugins purchased), these well off studios can patch an API 512C into the console to EQ it, or whatever else is available, or depending on the quality of their console, they could just get a great sound through since they usually have a decent amount of needed options. Then you are easily able to make a great sounding recording. The problem is engineers that either suck, think mixing only through a computer sounds good, and more importantly the fact that many people that decide to "make it" can't actually play their instrument well and so the engineer is faced with the sh*tty job of covering that guys goofs and lack of skills.