The 2009 remaster of "Brown Sugar" leads one to believe Bobby's contribution was a kazoo. That says it all for me.

The 2009 Stones remasters were so bad that even I could tell. That says it all. I listen to everything on crappy speakers VERY loud.

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Rocky Dijon
The 2009 remaster of "Brown Sugar" leads one to believe Bobby's contribution was a kazoo. That says it all for me.

Yet that is exactly what I've thought & said before .

Great kazoo solo from Bobby.

There's no real low end on any of them either.
..and you often can't follow the pitch of the bass lines properly ...they're just a series of indistinct thuds .

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Spud

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Rocky Dijon
The 2009 remaster of "Brown Sugar" leads one to believe Bobby's contribution was a kazoo. That says it all for me.

Yet that is exactly what I've thought & said before .

Great kazoo solo from Bobby.

There's no real low end on any of them either.
..and you often can't follow the pitch of the bass lines properly ...they're just a series of indistinct thuds .

There's only one real kazoo-solo on Stones records, though. Played by... Keith

PS: I agree to the above - the tone is sucked out of Bobby's solo.

My opinion is that the bad rep the Universal versions have here is extremely exaggerated and that the Virgins are praised way beyond their actual merits.

The Universals are brickwalled, true, but they also represent a richness of detail that the Virgins do not have.

Virgins were a great improvement over the old CBS versions, but are very far from being perfect.

Bought a Japanese version of sticky fingers in 2014 that was very, very, VERY good.

C

What people are mainly talking about are the 2009 Universal re-mastered albums.

There have been good sounding releases from Japan since 2011 onward.

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liddas
My opinion is that the bad rep the Universal versions have here is extremely exaggerated and that the Virgins are praised way beyond their actual merits.

The Universals are brickwalled, true, but they also represent a richness of detail that the Virgins do not have.

Virgins were a great improvement over the old CBS versions, but are very far from being perfect.

Bought a Japanese version of sticky fingers in 2014 that was very, very, VERY good.

C

The detail clarity-aspect is a good point (and true). However, does it really help?

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DandelionPowderman

The detail clarity-aspect is a good point (and true). However, does it really help?

Do not know if it helps, but I like it!

C

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liddas

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DandelionPowderman

The detail clarity-aspect is a good point (and true). However, does it really help?

Do not know if it helps, but I like it!

C

At least the clarity confirms that Taylor is not on Brown Sugar. There are only the three Keith guitars

The richness of detail is compromised when the highs and lows are gone. The Stones 70's catalog was not recorded very well to begin with. Keith has even said that's the way he liked roughness of it. There is not much to improve on. It's more a matter of matching the tape as close as possible. CBS achieved the match, Virgin found that little bit of improvement and made it work. We have seen Universal in-house promos of them using the Virgin masters to brickwall theirs. The should have started from scratch. Regarding SACD, I have not heard these yet but I would assume you can't get any better at this point.(Although I read some of them have speed problems) When you balance the quality of the recordings to begin with and the physical quality of the decades older master tapes, We're done tweaking, that chase is finally over.

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liddas
My opinion is that the bad rep the Universal versions have here is extremely exaggerated and that the Virgins are praised way beyond their actual merits.

The Universals are brickwalled, true, but they also represent a richness of detail that the Virgins do not have.

Virgins were a great improvement over the old CBS versions, but are very far from being perfect.

Bought a Japanese version of sticky fingers in 2014 that was very, very, VERY good.

C

In Japan you can buy CD's made from either the 2009 remasters or the 2011 remasters. The latter being totally different in mastering.

The 2009 of GHS is unlistenable imho. Really bad

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liddas
My opinion is that the bad rep the Universal versions have here is extremely exaggerated and that the Virgins are praised way beyond their actual merits.

The Universals are brickwalled, true, but they also represent a richness of detail that the Virgins do not have.

Virgins were a great improvement over the old CBS versions, but are very far from being perfect.

Bought a Japanese version of sticky fingers in 2014 that was very, very, VERY good.

C

Based on what I've heard of the 2009 remasters, your opinion is wrong.

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kowalski

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liddas
My opinion is that the bad rep the Universal versions have here is extremely exaggerated and that the Virgins are praised way beyond their actual merits.

The Universals are brickwalled, true, but they also represent a richness of detail that the Virgins do not have.

Virgins were a great improvement over the old CBS versions, but are very far from being perfect.

Bought a Japanese version of sticky fingers in 2014 that was very, very, VERY good.

C

In Japan you can buy CD's made from either the 2009 remasters or the 2011 remasters. The latter being totally different in mastering.

2011

This new ‘mastering’ (transfer might be a better way of putting it) was used on the non-hybrid Japanese SHM-SACD in 2011, but this is its debut on a CD that is compatible with all players. It’s also significantly cheaper than the SHM-SACD. Here’s the science bit – this is how this CD was created (taken from the booklet):

• DSD flat transferred from UK original analogue master tapes by Mick McKenna and Richard Whittaker at FX Copyroom, London in 2011
• Edited in DSD by Masaru Takagi at Sunrise Studio, Tokyo in 2011
• 176.4 Khz/24 bit transferred from DSD by Yumetoki Suzuki at Universal Music Studios, Tokyo in 2013
• HR (High-Resolution cutting from 176.4 Khz/24 bit at Victor Creative Media in 2013

[www.superdeluxeedition.com]

C

liddas

The 2011 DSD masters are the best, at least digitally speaking. But they were made only for the Japanese market. Too bad it didn't become the standard version for streaming services as well...

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kowalski
liddas

The 2011 DSD masters are the best, at least digitally speaking. But they were made only for the Japanese market. Too bad it didn't become the standard version for streaming services as well...

The DSDs are great. But do they sound a bit more panned that other releases. I listened to BB the other day, and the separation was really noteworthy.

I haven't been able to compare this stuff streamed or via any Hi Res digital medium because , as an old luddite, I still play vinyl LPs.

It's interesting that it sounds more "panned" .
It can't really be more "panned" as this would require a remix, not just a remaster ....

...but a similar impression is gained if you listen to the Mobile Fidelity 1/2 speed mastered SF on vinyl.
The instruments just sound better separated with air and distance between them.
The downside is that it maybe sounds just a little too "nice" for R&R.

I am so bl**dy relieved and happy that I am old enough to have bought all the Virgin stuff up to 2005. Only Oasis sounds good while brickwalled (cause they're supposed to).

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Spud
I haven't been able to compare this stuff streamed or via any Hi Res digital medium because , as an old luddite, I still play vinyl LPs.

It's interesting that it sounds more "panned" .
It can't really be more "panned" as this would require a remix, not just a remaster ....

...but a similar impression is gained if you listen to the Mobile Fidelity 1/2 speed mastered SF on vinyl.
The instruments just sound better separated with air and distance between them.
The downside is that it maybe sounds just a little too "nice" for R&R.

Yeah, I know (that's why I was caught by suprise). I guess enhancing some frequencies might have done the trick. Real mastering (not just some digital filter effect people call mastering nowadays) is a work of art, a professional secret they keep in a Fort Knox vault, so what do I know what technically happened with the DSDs

I wish they did keep the secret in vault .

We could then retrieve it ...

Sadly, I think we've pretty much lost it !

[To be fair. I suspect there are plenty of people around today with the skills & knowledge to master wonderful sounding recordings.

The problem is the decision typically taken these days to optimise for low res playback systems by overly compressing everything ..ie Brick walling . ]