An audiophile approach to the Tears For Fears - Songs for a Nervous Planet bluray, comparison with Streaming in stereo, 5.1 and Dolby Atmos

[Jean.Francois]

Hello,
Tears For Fears' “Songs for a Nervous Planet” is their first official live album, released on October 25, 2024. This album includes not only live recordings from their “The Tipping Point Tour”, but also four new studio tracks
A limited Blu-ray audio edition contains Steven Wilson's mixed versions in stereo, 5.1 and Dolby Atmos, in addition to the original stereo version.
Tears For Fears' “Songs for a Nervous Planet” is their first official live album, released on October 25, 2024. This album includes not only live recordings from their “The Tipping Point Tour”, but also four new studio tracks
A limited Blu-ray audio edition contains Steven Wilson's mixed versions in stereo, 5.1 and Dolby Atmos, in addition to the original stereo version.

After the blu-ray of The Pineapple Thief “It Leads To This”, which featured a track with less dynamic compression than the CD and streaming versions, the blu-ray of this Tears For Fears album offers two stereo versions in addition to the 5.1 and Dolby Atmos TrueHD versions:
The original mix with its DR6, but above all Steven Wilson's mix with its DR12.
The difference between these two versions is impressive, and I invite you to listen to the extracts for your own comparison.

The review will be completed soon with the vinyl versions.

The graph below compares the waveforms of the original and Steven Wilson's stereo mixes. The visual difference also has a strong impact on the rendering, as can be seen when listening to the samples.

Dolby Atmos in TrueHD is much more precise in terms of sonic finesse and spatialization than the Tidal Dolby Atmos version (or other Amazon and Apple streaming versions).

Always present in Steven Wilson's mixes, the 5.1 version is an extension of the very successful stereo version, bringing a beautiful sptialization and a very fine restitution with the lossless DTS HDMA format in 24-bit 96 kHz.

To listen to and compare the different versions, you can find all the samples and measurements (Dynamic Range, waveform, spectrogram, spectrum, spatialization...) here.

You can also find reviews of other Tears For Fears albums:
Tears For Fears – The Tipping Point
Tears For Fears – Live At Massey Hall Toronto, Canada
Tears For Tears – The Hurting

Enjoy listening,
Jean-François

 

[Timmy]

[From the linked website]
This is the Tidal Dolby Atmos presented in Dolby Digital Plus or AC-4 (link).

As I Tidal Premium subscriber, I don’t even know how to get access to any Dolby Atmos tracks there.

 

[Jean.Francois]

As I Tidal Premium subscriber, I don’t even know how to get access to any Dolby Atmos tracks there.

The Tidal Dolby Atmos version can be accessed via phone (in binaural) or via the Tidal app on the Amazon Fire TV Stick or Nvidia SHIELD TV.
I've updated the link with the direct link to the Dolby Atmos version.

 

[Timmy]

Tidal app on the Amazon Fire TV Stick

Seem’s I am not able to install any suitable Tidal app on my Amazon Fire Stick. Never mind.

Another »new thing« to me here is the chapter Blu-Ray Audio / Blu-Ray Player. Never had any of it. Could it make sense for me to dip my toe into it by purchasing any Blu-Ray Audio disc I like (so not »Songs for a nervous planet«) plus an $80 Blu-Ray Player?

Is any cheap Blu-Ray Player capable of reading Blu-Ray Audio discs at all and to put out decent analog signal from it?

 

[Doctors11]

Seem’s I am not able to install any suitable Tidal app on my Amazon Fire Stick. Never mind.

Another »new thing« to me here is the chapter Blu-Ray Audio / Blu-Ray Player. Never had any of it. Could it make sense for me to dip my toe into it by purchasing any Blu-Ray Audio disc I like (so not »Songs for a nervous planet«) plus an $80 Blu-Ray Player?

Is any cheap Blu-Ray Player capable of reading Blu-Ray Audio disc at all and to put out decent analog signal from it?

If you're considering getting your feet wet with high resolution, high dynamic range multi channel discs keep in mind there are three competing formats. As mentioned above, BluRay Audio, but also SACD and DVD-Audio. As far as I know all BluRay players will play the BluRay Audio discs but very few will play the other two. I would suggest getting the

Sony UBP-X800M2​

as it's the least expensive model which plays all three formats.

Sony UBP-X800M2

4K Ultra HD Blu-ray player with Wi-Fi® and Bluetooth®

www.crutchfield.com

 

[Timmy]

Sony UBP-X800M2

Nice! All digital outs – so no DAC on board, I guess. Which I see as a pro.

 

[Doctors11]

Nice! All digital outs – so no DAC on board, I guess. Which I see as a pro.

I'll let others chime in on that as I'm not sure.

Just to give you a sampling of discs that have been available in these formats...

QuadraphonicQuad - Surround Polls

Find the best Surround Music releases on Blu-ray, DVD-A, SACD, Quad LPs and Tapes

www.quadraphonicquad.com

 

[Timmy]

www.quadraphonicquad.com

Wow, thanks! Quite a chunk of fine albums!

 

[Jean.Francois]

It only has digital outputs. The HDMI output allows all formats to be output. To get Dolby Atmos, you need an external decoder via a preamplifier or integrated amplifier.
The audio blu-ray is seen as a video blu-ray for the player, Dolby Atmos is encoded in the Dolby Digital TrueHD stream, so if you don't have a Dolby Atmos-decoding amp, but your amp (preamp) is Dolby Digital TrueHD compatible, you'll get 7.1.

 

[Timmy]

Well, I actually waved good-bye to all surround playback modi a short while ago. So all I’m interested in here as basically 2-channel based stuff.