Mirage & Tango In The Night (Remastered & Expanded)?

[James Kirk]

Good Day brucewayne,

The quick answer is YES, the HD Tracks versions are superior to the original albums (Mirage more so, Tango already sounded pretty good) and also in my opinion better than the tracks that appeared on the Very Best of Fleetwood Mac (they are not Brickwalled and with clipped high end and loss of Dynamic Range)

Here is a good video that describes Brickwalling and the Loudness Wars that makes so much of what is called remastering rather unappealing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9xX...ature=youtu.be

However and this is a big HOWEVER, it all depends on how you are going to be listening to these HD versions.

If you are listening primarily in your car then unless your car stereo is set up with the ability to play back High Resolution recordings of 192kHz 24 bit (Mirage) or 96kHz 24bit (Tango) then the increase in quality may not be as apparent.

Yes, you do get a remastered version of both albums that is as close to a flat transfer as possible with no clipping, greater dynamic range and in the case of Mirage all songs are of an equal volume level. I found the original CD irritating as I was constantly having to change the volume between tracks.
But the real benefit to the HD Tracks and other High Resolution recordings become much greater when played back on equipment capable of decoding the greater resolution.

I’m sorry I could not give you a definite yes or no to your questions but there are just too many variables.

In my case I am listing to my HD tracks through my portable High Resolution Player The Fiio x5 or through my Oppo system when I want to listen at home and the A/B testing between the original CD and the HDTracks versions is astounding.

At the end of the day the mastering of the HDTracks is wonderful when compared to the original CD’s or especially to that “Remastered” Best of Fleetwood Mac 2 CD set that really is a rather uncomfortable listen for me due to the Brickwalling.

If you have any more questions concerning this issue please feel free to ask. I have been collecting HD recordings for quite a few years now and really enjoy the increase in quality.