One of the (very few) quibbles about BACCH processing in the past was that it seemed to cause a subjective "thinning" of the tonality of instruments or vocals placed dead center in recordings. I particularly noticed the phenomenon on recordings of solo piano and piano concerti, but for most users, it comes up when listening to rock music, in which the lead singer and the kick drum are often located dead center. Pianos could sound treble-heavy and bass-light, and some recordings of rock music seemed to lack proper impact. On other recordings I sometimes noticed a subjective lack of control in the bass that disappeared with BACCH switched off.
I assumed that these pathologies resulted from deficiencies in the recording process, which were being ruthlessly revealed by BACCH. It turns out that that assumption was incorrect. Dead-center signals in a stereo mix can be tonally affected by crosstalk cancellation processing, even processing as sophisiticated as earlier versions of BACCH.
How did I learn this? A new update to the BACCH software is rolling out to users, and it includes a "mono correction" button with four settings: off, low, normal, and high.
After I installed the update and set mono correction to the recommended "normal" setting, the tonal thinning and other problems with center-mixed recordings were gone--just gone. Because the effect can be toggled on and off immediately, it was easy to notice the difference. Some popular music recordings (e.g., Joni Mitchell's Mingus) now have the same vocal tonality and bass drum impact that I'd hear with my Dutch & Dutch 8Cs.
The effect of the mono correction button in the software prima facie seems like a "bass boost" button, especially when listening to certain pop recordings. It becomes clear, however, that something else is going on when one listens to an exquisitely mixed stereo recording that sounds fundamentally right through prior versions of the BACCH software. (I used this.) I thought sounds located near the middle of the mix might undergo alterations in tonality with mono correction engaged (i.e., a "bass boost" for sounds that did not need it), but they did not. And somehow the bass drum hits seemed tighter and more controlled with mono correction engaged.
And crucially, for BACCH users, there seems to be no penalty in the spatial effect of BACCH from engaging the button. The same spectacular spatial retrieval of BACCH-processed music is still present with the feature engaged.
Thomas heard it a bit and seems to have liked it, too.
Another technical problem vanquished, entirely in software. My apologies for the subjective impressions above, but I don't know how to measure BACCH.
I assumed that these pathologies resulted from deficiencies in the recording process, which were being ruthlessly revealed by BACCH. It turns out that that assumption was incorrect. Dead-center signals in a stereo mix can be tonally affected by crosstalk cancellation processing, even processing as sophisiticated as earlier versions of BACCH.
How did I learn this? A new update to the BACCH software is rolling out to users, and it includes a "mono correction" button with four settings: off, low, normal, and high.
After I installed the update and set mono correction to the recommended "normal" setting, the tonal thinning and other problems with center-mixed recordings were gone--just gone. Because the effect can be toggled on and off immediately, it was easy to notice the difference. Some popular music recordings (e.g., Joni Mitchell's Mingus) now have the same vocal tonality and bass drum impact that I'd hear with my Dutch & Dutch 8Cs.
The effect of the mono correction button in the software prima facie seems like a "bass boost" button, especially when listening to certain pop recordings. It becomes clear, however, that something else is going on when one listens to an exquisitely mixed stereo recording that sounds fundamentally right through prior versions of the BACCH software. (I used this.) I thought sounds located near the middle of the mix might undergo alterations in tonality with mono correction engaged (i.e., a "bass boost" for sounds that did not need it), but they did not. And somehow the bass drum hits seemed tighter and more controlled with mono correction engaged.
And crucially, for BACCH users, there seems to be no penalty in the spatial effect of BACCH from engaging the button. The same spectacular spatial retrieval of BACCH-processed music is still present with the feature engaged.
Thomas heard it a bit and seems to have liked it, too.
Another technical problem vanquished, entirely in software. My apologies for the subjective impressions above, but I don't know how to measure BACCH.
