Mirage To Finally Be REMASTERED In 2011

[James Kirk]

Now, I should add that not all HD Tracks are created equal. I don’t want it to come cross that EVERY HD digital download will sound better than the CD, this simply isn’t true.

Not having a lot of spare funds sitting about since becoming a father and buying my own house I make sure I do my due diligence and research titles that I am interested in. if I am going to drop $26+ on a download I want to make sure it is a reasonable increase in sound quality.

I find the Steve Hofferman music forums to be an invaluable source that has helped me in my decisions in the past.

The recent Tom Petty and Bruce Springsteen remasters on HD Tracks are quite honestly absolute revelations. They sound absolutely wonderful. The Rolling Stones releases can be quite nice as well but you do have to cherry pick a bit. But for every wonderful release there can be poor ones as well.

Now keep in mind I am only critiquing the sound/mastering quality, not the performance or song writing quality, that being said I do fine Miss Nicks recent 24 Karat Gold HD Tracks release to be lacking. Too similar to the CD and not enough of an open sound stage that one starts to expect with HD music, and rather muted.

Also please keep in mind that these are just my opinions, yours may vary as I do find this to be subjective, what I like you may not, and I certainly do not want to impugn or criticize Miss Nicks’ talent in any fashion, I am just talking about the sound quality of this in particular release in HD. To be fair to Miss Nicks there is a note on the HD Tracks site that the 24 Karat Gold HD release is basically a 44k recording up converted to 96/24, so they are not trying to pull the wool over anyone’s eyes.

That being said I do find that when I do listen to 24 Karat Gold my go to release has been the Vinyl version, I find that a nice listen.

In regards to Fleetwood Mac, I have found sonic improvements on almost all the HD releases, Fleetwood Mac, Rumours, Tusk, Mirage and Tango in the Night are all really nice, Say You Will I found to be rather brick walled and a tough listen, very similar to the CD. I prefer the DVD-Audio version as I get a kick out of the 5.1 surround sound.

I find that music sound quality should help you be pulled into the music, not repel you, which is what I find with a lot of the current mastering techniques, all in the hopes that “I want my music louder than anyone else’s” well yeah, it's loud, sure, but it doesn’t make me what to listen.

Anyway, sorry to ramble, I just wanted to make sure that if someone is going to dip their toe in to the HD music world they do a little bit of research before committing almost $30 and album.
Take care all.

Christian