Review of the Michael Jackson's album Dangerous between 13 versions (Vinyls, Picture Disc, CDs, cassette, Qobuz, Amazon, Tidal, DAT)

[Jean.Francois]

Hello,

Here's the comparison of album Dangerous between 13 versions included Vinyl (1991, 2015, 2021, Picture Disc), CD (1991, 1991 Japan, 2001, 2009), Cassette, Streaming Hi-Res (24 bits 96 kHz), and a special cassette DAT from master.

In this test, the picture disc vinyl is really beautiful, but it is not made to be listened to because of its very important surface noise (you can listen the sample).

For the other editions, there are two main families, the 1991 version and the remastered versions. There are differences on the sound balance of the versions, and also on the dynamic compression (DR11 vs DR7).

The compression and limitation of the dynamic range makes a clipping phenomenon appear on the signal as shown in the detailed analysis :

The red areas show the clipping (horizontal line) on the 2009 CD that is not present on the 1991 CD, this introduces distortion.

CD 2009

CD 1991

The detailed display of waveforms for all media allows you to see the distortions brought by the different media and mastering processing.

There are two different sounds between the original versions (1991) and the remastered versions which are equalized and limited in dynamics. The DAT tape is distinct with a very nice dynamic.
You will find the samples to listen to in order to get an idea of the differences and all the measurements (DR, Spectrum, waveform, detailed waveform...) here

 

[Jimi Floyd]

I read the whole report on your site and subscribed immediately. Just like ASR is my main resource to have objective information on audio hardware, your site is the best one I know which has the same approach to analyse the audio software. Fantastic job, keep up the good work, thank you.

 

[Jean.Francois]

Hello Jimi,

Thank you very much for your feedback, it is very encouraging. I will continue to review albums and I hope to be able to present other reports on the techniques used to make music.

 

[Phorize]

@Jean.Francois that's very interesting, thank you for your efforts. Of course when I saw this I started running through lists of recordings to that interested me, easy when I'm not doing be the work!