are you disappointed of some of your old favorite songs that sound like crap on you new hi fi equipment?

[DSJR]

Sgt Pepper and many of their singles apparently used multiple tape generations to 'bump' all the sounds together over and over before the final master was made (some bootlegs and Anthology discs show a lot of what was done). Since I believe most or all of the original masters exist, some enterprising soul with a computer may well do a full faithful/identical remix of all the elements into a better stereo master, but I suspect it'd take time and very much money.

Something else, it seems recordings of contemporary music have low bass frequency levels up to 10dB higher than say, in the 70's, this following a trend to ever smaller slimmer speaker boxes as used domestically. Small speakers distort badly at low bass frequencies and just one sub-woofer isn't enough when the room is taken into account. I have to say I hanker for the 'old days' when loudspeakers were BIG LOUDspeakers with proper bass drivers and low distortion power below 100Hz. You'd probably find 'Year of the Cat' rather better sounding then if played on such larger boxes.

 

[DSJR]

Late to the party here, but no from me as well. If your expensive gear makes everything but pristine recordings sound bad, the reason is likely:

• The system doesn't have enough bass (flat response in-room is not the goal)
• The system has excessive amounts of treble (in order to sound "detailed" in the show room)
• The system has an uneven frequency response, making some frequencies stand out, resulting in an unpleasant listening response and listeners fatigue.

Most of these problems are due to the speakers. Less often, it could be a bad match with the amplifier due to an amplifier that is forced into clipping and/or matched with a speaker that is a difficult load. Speakers that are "unforgiving" to bad recordings are simply bad speakers.

So your speakers aren't "revealing" to bad recordings, the "bad" recordings are revealing to your bad speakers.

There are surely lots of older records with a lot less bass and omph than newer recordings. But recordings that are downright unpleasant to listen to on a balanced system are few and far between.

Another set of reasons why audiophiles disliked 'digital' when it came along, as the three scenarios above were common in domestic vinyl systems back then and still linger today I fear....

 

[aedagnino]

Sgt Pepper and many of their singles apparently used multiple tape generations to 'bump' all the sounds together over and over before the final master was made (some bootlegs and Anthology discs show a lot of what was done). Since I believe most or all of the original masters exist, some enterprising soul with a computer may well do a full faithful/identical remix of all the elements into a better stereo master, but I suspect it'd take time and very much money.

Something like that was done by Giles Martin in 2017... it isn't faithful to the stereo mix, instead trying to go with the 'feeling' of the mono mix, but it did use earlier generations of tape, which resulted IMHO in a better sounding master. I know a lot of people (many here I assume) hate Giles Martin's version but I for one really dig it. It's my go to stereo version these days, although my favourite is the mono mix.

 

[concorde1]

I've always felt that the Beatles music, IMO some of the greatest music ever recorded, never had any detail or transparency.

Interesting, I've only ever tried the early 1987-released CD's, of which I have Abbey Road, Sgt Pepper, White Album, and Magical Mystery Tour. They all sound fantastic to me. And I actually can't stand their music, yet I acknowledge the CD's sound good.

 

[MattHooper]

I find a number of my Beatles discs, from CDs to a recent LP release of Sgt Pepper's, to sound astoundingly good!

 

[MaxBuck]

I've found that the musical genres that most often appeal to me are the ones in which the recording engineering is the best: classical and jazz. Also, the popular musicians I most like (Bruce Hornsby, Mark Knopfler, Sting) have been recorded and produced with great care. So I have been pleasantly surprised at how my favorite music sounds on my excellent system.

A couple of exceptions: Beach Boys and Steely Dan. Both groups IMO were not well served by their productions, by and large.

 

[khrisr]

I heard an interesting argument that a lot of older recordings mastered on tape don’t sound so good because tape fidelity reduces with each recording pass … so bands that were aiming for perfection in the studio were penalized whereas albums like “Kind of Blue” which was recorded in just two sessions still sounds good. Is this true?

 

[Hipocrates]

Almost all STP, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains CD's that I own.

 

[OWC]

I am actually very big on Flamenco music .
Unfortunately, most older records of the famous guys (Paco Peña etc) , are just really bad.
Not only on good audio equipment.

What I sometimes do, is just put a custom EQ on to make it a little better.

 

[Jack B]

I tend to agree: A lot of my old favorites don't sound as good on my modern system as they seemed to sound on my 70's and 80's systems. Part of it may be imperfect sweet memory, part of it is likely that many recordings were made using boom-and-sizzle JBL speakers of the era (and listened to on similar speakers!)...mea culpa. Dynamic range compression was very common, and they tried to make up for it by being LOUD!

Many classical recordings from the 50's and 60's hold up very well today...a tribute to the talented engineers involved (and master tapes freed from the constraints of LP disk technology). Oh-oh, I can already hear the roar from LP fans, coming with axes and pitchforks. Sorry, enjoy what you will!