Studio Master Quality Neph recordings

Discuss about the albums and videos the band has released over the years. The band we are talking about here is of course F.O.T.N. and not side-projects, similar bands etc. Please use other sections if you want to talk about the weather.

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Drazor
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Studio Master Quality Neph recordings

Post by Drazor » Thu Jan 31, 2008 8:39 am

Long time FOTN fan first time poster, so forgive me if this is the wrong forum.

Anyhow, I have 2 somewhat related questions.

1. I would love to get all the albums in 24/96 or similar quality. Do such files exist, and where can I get them?? I would pay 2-3 times more than the 16/44 cds.

2. Mourning Sun is very compressed and hard to listen to. Everything is the same volume (loudest possible) and there is no dynamic range. Where can I get a version that has a quality recording minus the compression??

Thanks.
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weebleswobble
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Post by weebleswobble » Thu Jan 31, 2008 8:56 am

fcuked if I know, but hello regardless....
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Badlander
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Post by Badlander » Thu Jan 31, 2008 8:57 am

Hello there. Image

1. Dunno.

2. Dunno.

Glad I could help. :mrgreen:
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kazamel
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Post by kazamel » Thu Jan 31, 2008 10:54 am

I saw this on another forum
Pista wrote:There is even 1 site that offers studio masters & SACD/DVDA format downloads for sale (you'd need to spend a small fortune on a burner for those though)
http://www.linnrecords.com/
Dunno if it's any good though
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angry bob
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Post by angry bob » Thu Jan 31, 2008 11:13 am

Hello buddy!

Are you telling me that Mourning Sun is a shitty record? Now i'm really confused...
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Post by gilgamesh » Thu Jan 31, 2008 11:35 am

Badlander wrote:
1. Dunno.

2. Dunno.
At least you seemed to understand the question! 24/96 sounds like some convenience store to me and I solve the volume thing on my albums by twisting the big round knob on my stereo.

Hello by the way, hope you get your answers!!
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Post by Ahrayeph » Thu Jan 31, 2008 2:36 pm

24/96 versions of the Neph songs? Ask the owners of the album masters i.e.. Beggar's Banquet. These songs have been recorded in analog times, so the only way to get your hands on 24/96 files, is to ask the record company (and I'm pretty sure they'll nix your request).

Once a record has been premastered (the master being the actual printed CD), there's jack all you can do to reverse the use of EQ, (multiband) compression and maximization. So I think you're going on a wild goose chase concerning MS.

Your questions give me the impression you'd like to remaster all the songs, as a) the albums up to ZOON weren't mastered or digitally remastered (hence them sounding so quiet as opposed to ZOON and MS for the technical ignorami) and b) you attempt to acquire an unmastered version of MS. I'm not sure what to think of that...
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Bau
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Post by Bau » Thu Jan 31, 2008 5:12 pm

Well I couldn't agree with you more on this practice of compressing the hell out of things. It makes me wonder where modern audio engineers are getting thier training. I learned the old school way. It concerns me that its going to become a lot art. I know a lot of these young kids know how to run a piece of gear, but Idon't know that too many of them understand the nature of sound. With compression I feel the need for a happy medium. You should just have some leveling of the peaks. I like a hot signal but not at the loss of all the dynamics like you say. seeit in the guitar world too, some players feel the need for so much distortion and stuff all the time , all the dynamic power is sapped. They play with a full band and sound like mud. The same goes for song writing that is full tilt all the time too.

It is definately obvious on Mourning sun, interestingly the downloads that were put out don't have this delema it has a bit of the opposite problem and should have been a bit hotter in my opinion to bring it to 0.0

Image

Its disapointing on MS , all that subtlty Carl working into the music only to be squashed by this kind of mastering. The Zoon album they seemed to get it right on.


My drummer and I were checking out a song by Disturbed , because it was so compressed it was wreaking havoc with certain sound systems. Terrible distortion even at low levels. We brought it up and looked at it and it was literaly ALL signal.
Not only bad for your ears but death to your speakers at loud volumes especialy, the cones are ment to move! Others wise heat builds and oops


People need to be educated, but I don't know if the lay person can realy benefit from this topic, but here

101:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkkqsN69Jac

As far as getting masters?? Even from the company, I seriously doubt that that would happen with out theft....
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Bau
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Post by Bau » Thu Jan 31, 2008 5:20 pm

kazamel wrote:I saw this on another forum
Pista wrote:There is even 1 site that offers studio masters & SACD/DVDA format downloads for sale (you'd need to spend a small fortune on a burner for those though)
http://www.linnrecords.com/
Dunno if it's any good though
intersting, thanks for the link! I didn't know there was stuff being released in 24bit format.

Im at odds with the whole 24bit to 16 bit dithering delema too...
Ahrayeph

Post by Ahrayeph » Thu Jan 31, 2008 6:08 pm

I record in 32 bits floating point, then render to 16 bit. Chances are, that the headroom still is higher than recording in just 16 bit. I however don't record in 96 k sampling rate, as the engineer of the Ancient Rites record explained to me that under 192 k, there isn't really that much difference in the rate of the wave. He even explained it with a printout of a sine wave at rates under 192 k and at 192 k.

As for the extreme levelling of premasters, there's a good read about that on Wikipedia. Even for the laymen. It answered a few questions I had about some things I had observed before when mastering songs.

As for the MS mp3's, Bau, chances are that what you see in those waveforms is the reduced frequency rate of the mp3's (low end and high end chopped off by the data compression used by mp3's) as opposed to the full frequency 16/44 file of STTL. I don't think the advance press copies from which the mp3's have been made would have had a different mastering treatment than the consumer CD...
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Post by Drazor » Thu Jan 31, 2008 7:40 pm

Hey Everyone,

Thanks for the nice welcome!('*notworthy*')

Instead of many posts to all the great responses, I'll try to respond in one post.
angry bob wrote:Hello buddy!

Are you telling me that Mourning Sun is a shitty record? Now i'm really confused...
NO. What I am saying is that they recorded it in such a way that every instrument is the same volume...very loud. So there is no dynamic range. Here is a link that explains it better than I ever could.

http://www.mindspring.com/~mrichter/dyn ... namics.htm

What this link describes is how MS is recorded. the 1st 3 albums did not suffer this.

Because of the way it is recorded, I find MS hard to listen to.
Ahrayeph wrote:
Your questions give me the impression you'd like to remaster all the songs, as a) the albums up to ZOON weren't mastered or digitally remastered (hence them sounding so quiet as opposed to ZOON and MS for the technical ignorami) and b) you attempt to acquire an unmastered version of MS. I'm not sure what to think of that...
Not exactly. I just have a hifi rig that could benefit from higher res recordings. FOTn are my favorite band, and it just makes sense that I would want to hear them at their best even if it was too revealing. I figured I was on a wild goose chase here, but more sites are offering hi-res versions. Like the drm free ones at music giants: http://mgn.musicgiants.com/Albums.aspx?SUPERHD=TRUE
Bau wrote: Its disappointing on MS , all that subtlety Carl working into the music only to be squashed by this kind of mastering. The Zoon album they seemed to get it right on.
Yeah, I agree totally, and thanks for showing what i was talking about graphically. On MS you never get to relax because it is loud all the time (yes, even when you turn down that volume knob :wink: ). Elizium would let you drift into a trance like state if you wanted...
Ahrayeph wrote:I record in 32 bits floating point, then render to 16 bit. Chances are, that the headroom still is higher than recording in just 16 bit. I however don't record in 96 k sampling rate, as the engineer of the Ancient Rites record explained to me that under 192 k, there isn't really that much difference in the rate of the wave. He even explained it with a printout of a sine wave at rates under 192 k and at 192 k.

As for the MS mp3's, Bau, chances are that what you see in those waveforms is the reduced frequency rate of the mp3's (low end and high end chopped off by the data compression used by mp3's) as opposed to the full frequency 16/44 file of STTL.
I think you are right about the mp3s and what their graphs show.

See, I would LOVE a 32/192 file. Even a 32/44 file would be better. I just hate the fact that all that resolution is discarded, and would love to get the material before it was rendered, even if it took a day to download. But what I am hearing is that the studios don't care and won't make that content available even at higher prices.
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Post by gilgamesh » Thu Jan 31, 2008 10:56 pm

For a technical ignoramus like me those links were pretty handy. I listened to MS tonight and in my non-technical speak I agree that it feels a bit, well, muddy. Before I have acknowledged that the vocals are too forward in the recording, but this evening I listened hard from a technical perspective and I see what you mean- its all a bit jumbled together particularly on She and MS itself.

I see now why you might be interested in those higher quality masters my hifi is pretty good but not high end, if you ever track them down I hope you let us know.

Mind you I think that MS is still very good compared to Dawnrazor which could do with some similar treatment to make it even better.
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Post by Lord Mureth » Fri Feb 01, 2008 12:14 am

It's interesting to hear different takes on the 'sound' of Mourning Sun; to my ears, I think it's extremely subtle. I can still listen to it now, and hear things... sometimes just the slightest noise - that I'd not noticed previously. Can't think of a specific example off of the top of my head; but I know the last time was less than a month ago!
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Post by Blue Angel » Fri Feb 01, 2008 12:39 am

Welcome Drazor, can't help with the requests but please keep posting...

:roll:
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Bau
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Post by Bau » Fri Feb 01, 2008 3:30 am

Ahrayeph wrote:I record in 32 bits floating point, then render to 16 bit. Chances are, that the headroom still is higher than recording in just 16 bit. I however don't record in 96 k sampling rate, as the engineer of the Ancient Rites record explained to me that under 192 k, there isn't really that much difference in the rate of the wave. He even explained it with a printout of a sine wave at rates under 192 k and at 192 k.

As for the extreme levelling of premasters, there's a good read about that on Wikipedia. Even for the laymen. It answered a few questions I had about some things I had observed before when mastering songs.

As for the MS mp3's, Bau, chances are that what you see in those waveforms is the reduced frequency rate of the mp3's (low end and high end chopped off by the data compression used by mp3's) as opposed to the full frequency 16/44 file of STTL. I don't think the advance press copies from which the mp3's have been made would have had a different mastering treatment than the consumer CD...
I don't even bother recording at the high res because it all gets downed to 16 bit and mp3 anyway and I'd rather hear it as the listener would get it, know wht they are hearing etc, no surprises that way. Like you say there is a point where it negligable.

But I don't agree with you on the conversion to mp3 aftecting the amplitude, thats not what the graph shows otherwise they would have clipping just at a reduced volume. I've bought other pro mp3s that arent like this . Even if this was the case , the producers should take that into account when creating the product I feel.

Of note I haven't listened to the download version of STTL in comparison to the MS version for this, but now y'all got my curiosity piqued, thanks for the audio inspirating...

and thanks for the link and yes that was the nature of my post as well the 'loudness wars'.

As far as actualy having a good variance on instruments in the mix, that is an art too, knowing when to turn up an instrument for only a certain passage, and at what level to put everything so one instrument doesn't step on another. The eqing has a lot to do with it too, so that each instrument has its own frequence range , another trick my brother, long time studio builder and audio enginner taught me, something I still don't quite have a handle on. Its a hell of a ballencing act especialy when you've got so many layers in the music. Then there is the whole issue of spacial placement in the stereo spectrum that affects how you hear things how loud they seem, but lets not go there....
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Post by Drazor » Fri Feb 01, 2008 6:15 am

Thanks again for such a warm reception. Neph fans are as cool as the band we love.


Bau wrote:
I don't even bother recording at the high res because it all gets downed to 16 bit and mp3 anyway and I'd rather hear it as the listener would get it, know wht they are hearing etc, no surprises that way. Like you say there is a point where it negligable.

But I don't agree with you on the conversion to mp3 aftecting the amplitude, thats not what the graph shows otherwise they would have clipping just at a reduced volume. I've bought other pro mp3s that arent like this . Even if this was the case , the producers should take that into account when creating the product I feel.

Of note I haven't listened to the download version of STTL in comparison to the MS version for this, but now y'all got my curiosity piqued, thanks for the audio inspirating...
Well, I for one long for the day when everyone listens to 24/96 or higher...even if it will probably never happen.

Anyhow, I think I was wrong about the mp3 of MS. I took the original .wav of Straight into the Light and encoded it to mp3. The graph didn't look what you showed. So it looks to me like those mp3s are different.

Where can I get them? I would love to see which is better the .wav with no dynamic range, or the mp3 with less info.

Now I should note that there do seem to be SOME passages of MS that aren't compressed. Most of the quiet passages aren't compressed. Thats were some subtleties can still be heard.

At least the Nephilim fans here are as cool the Nephilim themselves. Thanks.
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Post by Bau » Fri Feb 01, 2008 3:50 pm

Drazor wrote:Thanks again for such a warm reception. Neph fans are as cool as the band we love.


Bau wrote:
I don't even bother recording at the high res because it all gets downed to 16 bit and mp3 anyway and I'd rather hear it as the listener would get it, know wht they are hearing etc, no surprises that way. Like you say there is a point where it negligable.

But I don't agree with you on the conversion to mp3 aftecting the amplitude, thats not what the graph shows otherwise they would have clipping just at a reduced volume. I've bought other pro mp3s that arent like this . Even if this was the case , the producers should take that into account when creating the product I feel.

Of note I haven't listened to the download version of STTL in comparison to the MS version for this, but now y'all got my curiosity piqued, thanks for the audio inspirating...
Well, I for one long for the day when everyone listens to 24/96 or higher...even if it will probably never happen.

Anyhow, I think I was wrong about the mp3 of MS. I took the original .wav of Straight into the Light and encoded it to mp3. The graph didn't look what you showed. So it looks to me like those mp3s are different.

Where can I get them? I would love to see which is better the .wav with no dynamic range, or the mp3 with less info.

Now I should note that there do seem to be SOME passages of MS that aren't compressed. Most of the quiet passages aren't compressed. Thats were some subtleties can still be heard.

At least the Nephilim fans here are as cool the Nephilim themselves. Thanks.
well the mp3 I show in the graph is from the download versions of the song being sold on the official site. I'm not sure what you mean , I haven't had a chance to check out the album one yet. I personaly have never noticed any serious loss in volume on converting to mp3 only on clarity. but after I do some comparisons I'll get back to you on that.
Unfortunatly my hearing is little different in that I hear high frequencies a lot stronger than the avarage listener and less mids and it tends to trip me up a lot when mixing , I've gotten used to doing comparisons to other pro mixes to compensate for this. Its a good practice anyway, it teaches you a lot.

I think all that compression may be the fault of the mastering house that the pressers have the option of doing a final compression on it for some kind of standard CD volume level or something, I can't recall but I think I read this some where last time I was shopping for a pressing company to have a big run made, up till now I've just been producing my own stuff on a smaller scale. Its just that with everything gone the way of downloads and IPODs now its not realy worth doing a bunch of hard copy distribution.
Your better off with downloads and an interactive website.

I agree in that I'd like to see the format go higher res, but ya know , a lot of music marketed is old classic stuff, where the quality/clarity in comparison to todays standards was just shit anyway, and the average music listener is not an audiofile and doesn't know or care about the difference. The bulk of the marketplace is young kids, so I doubt that many people in the industry are very concerned overall. I would think that it would cost more to produce /press the higher res stuff, and if there isn't a big demand and people can't make money, its not goin to happen.

But I'll check it out the thing on the mastering, I'm on the scent now but I'll have to do some more sniffing....
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Post by moomaaman » Fri Feb 01, 2008 10:53 pm

Its also possible that a reason for the ' muddiness' on mourning sun may be something to do with the inclusion of a good deal of reversed samples.... as much as an artist tries to make instrument and voice sounds sit in different places in both the stereo and frequency spectrum, it becomes very difficult when those sounds are no longer naturally harmonic due to them being played backwards... i.e. the digital soundwave being physically reversed ...
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Post by James Blast » Fri Feb 01, 2008 11:50 pm

I don't look at music I listen to it
granted, MS does sound somewhat "rushed" in production terms
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Bau
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Post by Bau » Sun Feb 03, 2008 6:25 am

POINT


Image

I did some comparisons shown in the graph and this is what I found

Certainly converting to MP3 didn't affect the levels of sound only the clarity mainly in the high frequencies, a well know issue

Obviously there is a big difference in levels from the downloads to the CD version of STTL . The sections highlighted in blue are 2 of the 'same' sections of the songs . When doing my test I had to lower the album clip to get it to the same listening level as the download. notice the nice curves in the download version as apposed to the nasty square shape of the album?

The difference in sound was marked and a real shame. The biggest difference I noticed was in bass. On the album version you lose all the 'grind', also there is a marked degridation in the punch on the drums especialy the kick. The clarity of the cymbals realy suffer too. Listening fatique was noticeable on the album version as well especialy where mid highs were concerned.

This certainly bares up with what I've read of certain personal reviews on the album, a lot of critisism on the sound of the drums on this album, no doubt this is why.

Now She on the other hand because its a softer song with a quieter build up, the bass sounds great in the intro the drums better on this track , but there is still some clipping later in the song and the cymbals lose some of thier flavor, as does the bass as the levels come up .

Well its all a damn shame is what it is. There's been so much lost all the way around. But the future lies ahead, things can be right if one has the courage to make it so, whatever it takes. You reading this Carl? easier said than done I know, but is it not worth it?


for every problem there is a solution
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjVBchcSowo



From what I've been reading mastering/pressing houses do offer that final compression as an option. Possibly a final decision was made at the time of pressing for this. I might wager that the record company would ok this , possible as a standard practice with all their releases , who knows. I haven't got that far. I have other prey to chase.

here's another interesting article on this subject of mastering levels verses clarity and the sound of that slippery slope of trying to find your ballence, walking the wire, the fine line and all

http://www.drtmastering.com/elektor1.htm



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obYE4sFBmPg
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