Is there any future for CDs?

[Man In The Mountain]

Sorry to correct Man in the Mountain but there were a LOT of other CDs available before BiA but he is correct that Dire Straits were there right from the beginning.

That's cool. I believe Brothers in Arms is known for being the first CD to sell a million copies. So, there certainly must have been a lot of players sold already in 1985. But, we're still looking at 1982-1985 as being the birth of CD market, and my Dire Straits CD still playing just fine being among the oldest CDs you can find.

Here is a list I just found about the first CD and the first 50 CDs on the market:
https://blog.discmakers.com/2022/09/first-cd-ever-released/

[pb2015]

Although not one of the first CDs, Brothers in Arms did have a reputation then for being one of the best showcases for the new format.

[kid_runningfox]

I very much agree with this. I can't really comment on many recent releases, but I believe it. Really crap mastering is (sadly) not a particularly new trend. I was glad to see the Parlogram Auctions guy (if you're into The Beatles, worth looking at his videos) call out the way labels get away with serving up lousy mastering on the CD format. He goes more for records himself, but he said something like, why is it that the cheapest format has to have the crappiest sound? And there is no reason for this, as far as I can see.

I have been quite genuinely shocked by just how bad the sound has been on virtually every newly-released CD I have bought since 2022 has been, especially from artists such as Trevor Rabin and Derek Sherinian (and by extension in the latter's case, Simon Phillips), who generally have a reputation for being immaculate in everything they do. It's certainly deeply depressing that Sherinian's last studio album, Vortex sounds notably worse than his albums from 20 years ago, such as Mythology, and especially, Black Utopia, while the Sherinian/Phillips live album just sounds disappointingly flat and lifeless, even if its top end hasn't been quite so compromised when compared to Vortex. I also recall that Sherinian's previous studio album, The Phoenix didn't sound that hot, either. As to the Rabin album, parts of it border on the unlistenable thanks to the degree of compression used, and it's sonically at least utterly blown away by Can't Look Away from all the way back in 1989. What the hell is going on and what can be done to make it stop??

[Mr.Krautman]

I have been quite genuinely shocked by just how bad the sound has been on virtually every newly-released CD I have bought since 2022 has been, especially from artists such as Trevor Rabin and Derek Sherinian (and by extension in the latter's case, Simon Phillips), who generally have a reputation for being immaculate in everything they do. It's certainly deeply depressing that Sherinian's last studio album, Vortex sounds notably worse than albums from 20 years ago, such as Mythology, and especially, Black Utopia, while the Sherinian/Phillips live album just sounds disappointingly flat and lifeless, even if its top end hasn't been quite so compromised when compared to Vortex. I also recall that Sherinian's previous studio album, The Phoenix didn't sound that hot, either. As to the Rabin album, parts of it border on the unlistenable thanks to the degree of compression used, and it's sonically at least utterly blown away by Can't Look Away from all the way back in 1989. What the hell is going on and what can be done to make it stop??

Simple: just stop with all this mastering/re-mastering,re-re-mastering craze and start with a good recording and production/mix.
(re)mastering is is a post-production final treatment and if everything before was shitty the end result will be shitty too, whatever you're doing to it.
"Garbage In , Garbage Out" : no mastering will ever save a poor recording (and replace poor sound "engineers").
Of course, if you bought a $ 30,000+ Fairchild 670 tube compressor for your studio you NEED to use it, even if the music don't need it...

[kid_runningfox]

Simple: just stop with all this mastering/re-mastering,re-re-mastering craze and start with a good recording and production/mix.
(re)mastering is is a post-production final treatment and if everything before was shitty the end result will be shitty too, whatever you're doing to it.
"Garbage In , Garbage Out" : no mastering will ever save a poor recording (and replace poor sound "engineers").
Of course, if you bought a $ 30,000+ Fairchild 670 tube compressor for your studio you NEED to use it, even if the music don't need it...

Agreed, though I was kind of speaking rhetorically out of sheer frustration!

[battema]

I just bought a used CD of Dire Straits Brother In Arms, the original 1985 pressing, which was among the very first albums available on Compact Disc. It's notable that it plays as flawlessly as the day it was new. I paid $4.09 for it, plus shipping.

Am I supposed to put a safety copy of it on the cloud? I don't get it.

I have a cool "DualDisc" version of Brothers in Arms, where one side of the disc is CD Audio and the second side is a DVD with a 5.1 mix of the album (it sounds excellent in 5.1). Brief tangent: just got that excellent Live box from Dire Straits but was a little surprised to see nothing from that tour. I'm wondering if a fancy-schmancy box of Brothers is in the cards and the live recordings were held back to use in that context (I have nothing to back that up, just wishful/hopeful thinking on my part!).

IMHO: even as a listener who deals primarily in digital at this point, I'd not use the cloud as my safety/backup (and just my $0.02 I would absolutely NOT rely on a service like Bandcamp to act as a backup...I would do the opposite, use the app for streaming convenience but always, ALWAYS make a download copy to be the backup). A cloud isn't directly in my possession and at any point something could happen that either removes my access entirely, or access is suddenly behind a pay wall (this happened partially with Google Music when they transitioned to YT Music).

I would rip the CD into my computer so I could listen to the tunes in multiple different contexts where I can't play a CD easily or conveniently (such as in my car, out walking, etc.).

[auxfnx]

Simple: just stop with all this mastering/re-mastering,re-re-mastering craze and start with a good recording and production/mix.
(re)mastering is is a post-production final treatment and if everything before was shitty the end result will be shitty too, whatever you're doing to it.
"Garbage In , Garbage Out" : no mastering will ever save a poor recording (and replace poor sound "engineers").
Of course, if you bought a $ 30,000+ Fairchild 670 tube compressor for your studio you NEED to use it, even if the music don't need it...

I do agree that there are times where more care could be put into recording, as people may think the tools and shortcuts that are available now mean you don't need to put as much care into the basics.
But I think more often I see people recording in very nice studios and ending up with an album that sounds... not great, because of the approach to the mix. The taste and standards that the engineer and artist may be trying to meet.
Just grabbing random examples from the top of my head, I think we could be pretty sure that people like say Rick Wakeman or Steve Hackett are probably recording with good engineers etc but the sound of their albums are nowhere at the same quality of their older recordings because of the way those recordings are mixed. A certain type of drum processing, bass and sub bass presence, more intense brightening of instruments, etc. Things that are just done a certain way as standard these days by whatever engineers are working in these areas. I feel like if you could fly the new raw recordings back in time to the engineers who mixed Voyage of the Acolyte or The Six Wives during the 70s, they would be able to give the new stuff a similar tone.

But with regards to old albums, sometimes re-mastering is all you have. You can't go back in time and hire a different engineer and re-record the album to improve its sound, but you can remaster it...

mastering is essential for a release really. remastering is indeed a different story. Remastering can be an attempt to bring the sound of the older album in line with modern 'values' when it comes to sound - a certain type of presence, punchiness, colour, etc. It makes it easier for new audiences, particularly younger ones, to connect with the music as it helps it sit alongside modern music more comfortably. I think this helps make sense of why albums may be remastered multiple times years on from their release. Essentially at each point in time the artist or label may want the best representation of an album to be available, and this is often much more quickly and affordably done via remaster than a full ground up remix. Plus, with re-mixing there is so so much more going on that to do one will inevitably give a result that is so much further away from the original than a remaster would be. Of course this can be a pro or a con depending...

[Steve983]

I agree that remastered cd's are the best in sound quality. Most of the original cd releases sounded flat and lifeless, in fact the original vinyl sounded better in the first place. I also have quite a few Steven Wilson and Yes Blu Rays with the 24 bit stereo mixes that can sound even better than cd. I'm also thinking of upgrading my cd player to a high res version that will play 24 bit FLAC or WAV files since most of what I buy from Bandcamp is high res these days anyway. Each persons mileage may vary though.

[zeprogmeister]

I agree that remastered cd's are the best in sound quality. Most of the original cd releases sounded flat and lifeless, in fact the original vinyl sounded better in the first place. I also have quite a few Steven Wilson and Yes Blu Rays with the 24 bit stereo mixes that can sound even better than cd. I'm also thinking of upgrading my cd player to a high res version that will play 24 bit FLAC or WAV files since most of what I buy from Bandcamp is high res these days anyway. Each persons mileage may vary though.

I disagree, for me it's usually the opposite. A lot of the time, the "remasters" have a lot of compression and sometimes extra EQ added, and sound crappy. The originals usually have a lot more dynamic quality.

[Mota]

I disagree, for me it's usually the opposite. A lot of the time, the "remasters" have a lot of compression and sometimes extra EQ added, and sound crappy. The originals usually have a lot more dynamic quality.

It really depends on what you're listening to it on. If you have your cheap headphones, a recording with the bass boosted and loudness added will sound better. But on a nice stereo, you want those dynamics, it just adds so much to the presentation.

[wilcox660]

I like CDs because I say that I do and that's enough.

[kid_runningfox]

I do agree that there are times where more care could be put into recording, as people may think the tools and shortcuts that are available now mean you don't need to put as much care into the basics.
But I think more often I see people recording in very nice studios and ending up with an album that sounds... not great, because of the approach to the mix.

This is an interesting point, and it's one that certainly has relevance to some of the awful-sounding recent albums that I've bought. In most cases, you can actually ascertain that before they had the life squashed out of them at the mixing or the mastering stage they were actually really well recorded. The last Marillion album, for example, was tracked at Real World - easily one of the best studios in the UK, while the Six By Six album actually sounds remarkably good in the brief, quieter sections where the otherwise merciless brickwall compression relents. The same is true for Rabin's last album as well. In each case, I'd love to hear either a remixed (Marillion) or a remastered version (Six By Six, Sherinian, Rabin) that either reverses some of the questionable choices re. EQ and reverb, or strips away the compression to reveal the full dynamic and frequency range of the tracks beneath, as there are excellent albums just waiting to get out in virtually every instance.

[Man In The Mountain]

This quick video explains it all:

[boilk]

I was under the impression that the loudness wars thing was behind us now...that it had been determined that louder isn't necessarily better? Taking the dynamics out of recordings is not a good thing?

The vast majority or the new albums that I bought last year (over 40), sounded really good to me. Of course, I'm not an advanced audiophile, or anything, so there's that.

Neil

[Man In The Mountain]

I was under the impression that the loudness wars thing was behind us now...that it had been determined that louder isn't necessarily better? Taking the dynamics out of recordings is not a good thing?

Yes & no. Like the new Beatles single was a horrific brickwall. I think, IMO, everything is mastered today for streaming, equalized for Spotify. It's just an industry standard. Like I just bought the new Kinga Glyk album, and I don't know what it is about it, it didn't strike me as being alive. It's like the music sounds the same level throughout the entire CD. Makes me bored. Very disappointing for an artist like Kinga.

Unless you buy like a Steven Wilson Remaster. But he re-mixes the recordings which is what is so appealing about his projects. His YES re-mixes, and his re-mix of Tarkus is killer. There's a difference between re-mixing and re-mastering. Remastering essentially is just equalizing the ready-made mix with no changes to individual tracks. Mostly overall EQ, cleaning, compression, loudness. Maybe someone can correct me if I'm talking out my arse.

[Jerjo]

I read a conversation between Steven Wilson and Alan Parsons not too long ago. They were pretty much of the same mind on the industry standard and it is not the way they approach mixing and volume levels. I had a playlist on my PC with a couple hard rock acts. The volume on one of the albums was so much louder than the rest I have to go back and delete it.

[kid_runningfox]

I think, IMO, everything is mastered today for streaming, equalized for Spotify. It's just an industry standard.

I think there's a further but related issue here with hardware as well: very few people now listen to music on hi-fi systems specifically intended for high quality, stereo music reproduction. Instead, the vast majority of listening is done on headphones (and crappy earpods at that), car stereos, computer speakers, home theatre systems really designed for films, and, god help us, TV soundbars. Most of these really don't produce the kind of sound quality with music of even relatively modest hi-fi equipment. This is all going to have an effect on how music is mixed and mastered for consumption and I'm sure it's instrumental in the deteriorating quality of CD sound quality, as the latter is increasingly seen as an anachronism and producers and artists elect to mix and master music to compensate for the deficiencies of the kinds of devices their music is most likely to be played on. Hopefully, if the CD revival continues then we might see some degree of rethinking in this respect, but I can't say I'm holding my breath at the moment.

[kid_runningfox]

I do agree that there are times where more care could be put into recording, as people may think the tools and shortcuts that are available now mean you don't need to put as much care into the basics.
But I think more often I see people recording in very nice studios and ending up with an album that sounds... not great, because of the approach to the mix. The taste and standards that the engineer and artist may be trying to meet.
Just grabbing random examples from the top of my head, I think we could be pretty sure that people like say Rick Wakeman or Steve Hackett are probably recording with good engineers etc but the sound of their albums are nowhere at the same quality of their older recordings because of the way those recordings are mixed. A certain type of drum processing, bass and sub bass presence, more intense brightening of instruments, etc. Things that are just done a certain way as standard these days by whatever engineers are working in these areas. I feel like if you could fly the new raw recordings back in time to the engineers who mixed Voyage of the Acolyte or The Six Wives during the 70s, they would be able to give the new stuff a similar tone.

Interesting. I had a listen to Hackett's At the Edge of Light from 2019 this evening, for the first time probably since I bought it on release. Not only did I really enjoy the music (I've blown hot and cold on SH's studio albums since To Watch the Storms, as they all seem to follow a very definite formula, some of which realise it a lot better than others), but I also thought it sounded remarkably good. Not the best produced album I own, by any means, but more than decent, and it was was nice to hear a relatively recently released album where production issues didn't detract from the music for a change.

[boilk]

Yes & no. Like the new Beatles single was a horrific brickwall. I think, IMO, everything is mastered today for streaming, equalized for Spotify. It's just an industry standard. Like I just bought the new Kinga Glyk album, and I don't know what it is about it, it didn't strike me as being alive. It's like the music sounds the same level throughout the entire CD. Makes me bored. Very disappointing for an artist like Kinga.

Unless you buy like a Steven Wilson Remaster. But he re-mixes the recordings which is what is so appealing about his projects. His YES re-mixes, and his re-mix of Tarkus is killer. There's a difference between re-mixing and re-mastering. Remastering essentially is just equalizing the ready-made mix with no changes to individual tracks. Mostly overall EQ, cleaning, compression, loudness. Maybe someone can correct me if I'm talking out my arse.

You are likely on to something with the spotify/streaming mix theory. Especially for big artists. My band recently had our album mixed and I can assure that our engineer takes great care in mixing (and mastering) for optimum CD sound and separately, for optimum vinyl sound. Of course, we aren't going to get hundreds of thousands of streams, so optimizing anything for a streaming platform, is not high on any priority list.

Neil

[abc123]

I don't know of any online CD purchase sites other than eBay that has a search tool for already-sold CDs (past sales), so I'll mention ebay: It'd be interesting to read about some total sales results (number of CDs sold, Used or New) that could be obtained via that tool. For example I'm wondering what (separately...) the classical and non-classical (rock/pop/jazz/etc) sales numbers (number of CDs) were in recent times. In various time increments, say the past 1 month, 6 months, 1 year, 2 years. I know some of you sometimes like to post regular/non-ebay sales numbers you find from various sources, and so, if any of you are also similarly obtaining some ebay past sales data for classical and non-classical separately, it'd be interesting to read those numbers, rather than me going at it myself at the ebay website.

[abc123]

I don't know of any online CD purchase sites other than eBay that has a search tool for already-sold CDs (past sales), so I'll mention ebay: It'd be interesting to read about some total sales results (number of CDs sold, Used or New) that could be obtained via that tool. For example I'm wondering what (separately...) the classical and non-classical (rock/pop/jazz/etc) sales numbers (number of CDs) were in recent times. In various time increments, say the past 1 month, 6 months, 1 year, 2 years. I know some of you sometimes like to post regular/non-ebay sales numbers you find from various sources, and so, if any of you are also similarly obtaining some ebay past sales data for classical and non-classical separately, it'd be interesting to read those numbers, rather than me going at it myself at the ebay website.

Forgot to mention: Mainly interested in the case where the buyers are in the USA only.

[auxfnx]

Just in relation to some of the discussion in January I missed - it may be a bit surprising to hear that streaming services are actually helping things move away from loudness.
Streaming services 'normalise' the track volumes so that when you switch between albums and artists there's not a massive volume jump. Essentially all releases are equalised to the same target volume (I think generally -14LUFS)
This option can be disabled in settings for streaming services i think but is enabled by default and rarely switched off.

This means that, at least for streaming, there is no advantage to pushing the volume of your master, and in fact quieter masters are rewarded, as they will be set to the same volume as the louder masters but will retain their better dynamics and cleaner, less clipped peaks.
This is allowing mastering engineers and artists to release quieter masters without having to lose out. However, old habits die hard so the loudness is still going on, and I'm sure radio is still a consideration to major labels. So, progress but not quite there yet.

[Trane]

it seems that the vast majority of the Soleil Zeuhl Festival attendance was only interested in CDs (note that there was very few vinyls on offer at the merchandise table), but it was a regular discussion topic.

I came back from Paris with 12 CDs - roughly half of them from the SZF desk.
I don't remember seeing one single CD on offer above 15€, and most of them were 10 or 12 apiece.
The others came from the Souffle Continu record shop.

[Nijinsky Hind]

Hello friends

I didn't write here for ages....
Wanted to hear after so many years detached from the subject where do you guys think we are heading in the CD area?
Will the CD do a come back similar to Vinyl? Is it dead?

I understand prices are very cheap and ppl tend not to buy CDs anymore....

I am "stuck" with 20,000 CDs in my warehouse of very rare to very easy to find CDs mainly progressive, psych, folk, classical, jazz music and not sure if i should even bother to list these OR if there is even a market for that.
Another question would be: what is the web site best to list these CDs? Amazon/Ebay fees are VERY HIGH. Discogs?

Thanks in advance...

Meidad (MIO Records)
Attachment 14638

I sell CDs and LPs on Mercari. A bit better than eBay in my opinion.

If you make an album and you don’t have a physical CD to send out for reviews and ratings, I’ve found that your band/music won’t get much attention. Reviewers want a CD.

I do think some CDs will become as collectible as Vinyl, and I suspect many of you Prog collectors are sitting on goldmines. Unfortunately many of us are older folks may not be around to enjoy the renaissance. I told my daughters to sell them on Mercari if I fly away, and not donate them to goodwill.

If you go look at eBay “sold items-Highest sale price” in the advanced search settings, you will be shocked by some of the CD prices… people will pay. Certain Grateful Dead CDs can bring a buck… Obscure Rap CDs are big.

Equally shocking to me is the popularity of cassettes right now.

[JKL2000]

I read something today - I can't remember what it was, except that it was aimed at a younger audience, 20s - 30s, and it mentioned physical CDs being kind of popular right now, as in having a resurgence of sorts. I know that's not a lot of info, but it seemed to be non-sarcastic, and kind of makes sense as there are other kinds of '80s tech that are making a resurgence or just having a fad moment, like 90s digital pocket cameras.