News Of The World remastered 2011

dysan wrote: We know SHA was around the time of the album of the same name - it is often said to have been 'started' at those sessions, but is the backing track from then, or was it totally newly recorded for NOTW?

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The drums are from 1977, I'm pretty sure of that.

Well I think they didgreat on News of the World. Very nice sound...

I love the albumsong Sheer Heart Attack... but when itcomes to the guitar solo : I think it is quite a annoying sound....reminds me of a dentist drilling..... And with headphones you can't play it to loud....

There is on HUGE problem which I have with these remasters. They are way too loud, I hate loud CDs

Rick wrote: dysan wrote: We know SHA was around the time of the album of the same name - it is often said to have been 'started' at those sessions, but is the backing track from then, or was it totally newly recorded for NOTW?

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The drums are from 1977, I'm pretty sure of that.

From memory there are no concert toms on the SHA album??

Besides, there's no way, bearing in mind the methodical process of RT pulling drum sounds in 1977 that they would have kept a drum take recorded three years before when they would have had a considerably smaller recording budget....

ghostwithasmile wrote: Well I think they didgreat on News of the World. Very nice sound...

I love the albumsong Sheer Heart Attack... but when itcomes to the guitar solo : I think it is quite a annoying sound....reminds me of a dentist drilling..... And with headphones you can't play it to loud....

I think that was the intention!!!!

OK, so I've listened  to it twice. Initial impressions.

Good:
- Haven't tampered drastically with the EQ on the tracks that clearly didn't need it. (eg, All Dead, All Dead). ...Although, in the end, I prefer other versions and possibly won't buy (many) of this remaster series, I like the fact that (so far) Ludwig has been prepared to accept when (in his opinion) the first press got it right (in terms of the EQ), and leave it more or less alone. (This is not withstanding the fact that there has been an across the board bottom end boost on all the remasters so far)

- The EQ changes on tracks that perhaps were either a bit muddy or just needed a little bit more definition, have been done reasonably tastefully. (eg, Spread Your Wings, It's Late etc..).

Bad:
- Generally a bit too loud. Although, again, not brick-walled, as some hysterical audiophiles are screaming, there are moments when I just wished there wasn't quite so much hard limiting on the more dynamic tracks.

Conclusion:
- I think a middle ground between the occasional stodgy first press and the over bright MFSL has been reached. However, whether this positive will outweigh the occasional moments of heavy limiting remains to be seen. I'll have to live with it a bit longer. But, I think it might.

pittrek wrote: There is on HUGE problem which I have with these remasters. They are way too loud, I hate loud CDs
  lol - that was my problem with the original remasters, they were recorded too low. I  had to crank them all the way up to get any punch of out it. The new remasters are juicy!

ghostwithasmile wrote: Well I think they didgreat on News of the World. Very nice sound...

I love the albumsong Sheer Heart Attack... but when itcomes to the guitar solo : I think it is quite a annoying sound....reminds me of a dentist drilling..... And with headphones you can't play it to loud....

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I was at some local dance club other day and they played Sheer Heart Attack song there :)
People actually went quite crazy during that song, they played some other punk songs there too. But as soon as that terrible squeaking sound started, the dance floor got quite empty:) can't blame them..

I haven't heard the 2011 remaster yet, so I can't comment, but from what I'm reading, I'm eager to hear it!

As for the album itself, hear are a few thoughts...

My understanding was that Roger started "Sheer Heart Attack" in 1974 for the album of the same name, but hadn't finished it. I assumed this meant the writing, or at most a demo of some sort, but that Queen never recorded anything more than that. I also read often that it was Roger's response to punk rock, so I'm curious, if that's true, whether the 1974 beginnings bear any similarity to the 1977 finished version. Punk was just getting geared up in 1974 and was well established by 1977, so the questions are: was the music and/or words influenced by punk in 1974? Or did Roger work the song into a punk style by 1977?

"Feeling Feelings," either version, would've made a respectable B-side, but aside from "See What A Fool I've Been," non-album tracks didn't exist for Queen in the '70s, despite having a few candidates: "FF," "Mad The Swine" and "KYA (Long Lost Re-Take)." (Note: "God Save The Queen" was, in 1974, temporarily a non-album track until ANATO came out, but as it wasn't recorded for that [or any] album, only later used because it did suit "Opera," it nearly became a rarity).

I freakin' love this album!

I get the impression that a lot of you guys like "It's Late". I watched the movie about Kurt Cobain - "About a Son", and "It's Late" is in that movie, because Kurt Cobain listed to Queen a lot, and was an inspiration to him.

It's a great movie by the way!

Just thought you should know : )

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Cobain:_About_a_Son

I don' think these CDs are way too loud - that's a necessary part of modern mastering. Standardising the levels.

dysan wrote:

I don' think these CDs are way too loud - that's a necessary part of modern mastering. Standardising the levels.

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But it's not levels they're fixing - it's compression being added.  They're squashing the peak to average ratio, meaning the difference between the quietest and loudest parts is being decreased.  This aspect of the mixing process is just the next instalment in the loudness war.

Just compare the Calling All Girls bonus track on Hot Space to the picture gallery on the Live At The Bowl DVD - the latter sounds much better because they left it alone.

Sir GH wrote: dysan wrote:

I don' think these CDs are way too loud - that's a necessary part of modern mastering. Standardising the levels.

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But it's not levels they're fixing - it's compression being added.  They're squashing the peak to average ratio, meaning the difference between the quietest and loudest parts is being decreased.  This aspect of the mixing process is just the next instalment in the loudness war.

Just compare the Calling All Girls bonus track on Hot Space to the picture gallery on the Live At The Bowl DVD - the latter sounds much better because they left it alone.
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Actually, to be fair, the compression on most of the 2011 remasters is reasonably conservative by today's standards. The problem is the hard limiting. Although the end result is similar, and could be certainly be argued to be a form of compression, it is actually a fundamentally different effect. So yes, similar, but noticeably different.

Personally I think it was a compromise they reached in wanting to have the albums sound loud, while also retaining as much of the original dynamics as that approach would allow.

It's sad that they felt the need to distort their music to fit the fashion of the time. From Ludwig's  recent history, we can be reasonably sure the push didn't come from him.

I have a feeling that unofficial Feelings Feelings (the "clean" version or/and Number 9 version) is better than bonus Take 10. Especially Freddie's vocal isn't that true and powerful on Take 10. What do you think about it?

I like them both and since the leaked version was of decent quality, I'm actually happy to have two different recordings of a previously unreleased outtake. If they'd released the previously leaked version, it would have been nice, but nothing new for we fans who already had it. This way, we have two looks at a session track that might otherwise have never seen the light of day.