Jean.Francois
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- May 31, 2022
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Irish artist Sinéad O’Connor, whose recent death has left the music world in mourning, made a stunning international breakthrough with her second album “I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got”, unveiled in 1990. The critically acclaimed opus included the iconic single “Nothing Compares 2 U”, a poignant cover of a Prince song.
For this review, you will find 6 versions tested: vinyl, CD, Qobuz, Qobuz Deluxe Version, Amazon and Tidal.
This test compares the quality of an album on a physical support (CD, vinyl) and streaming. Are we sure we’re getting the best possible quality from the album when we listen to it via streaming?
The curves below compare waveforms for the song “The Emperor’s New Clothes”. CD and vinyl are the most dynamic versions. For the streaming versions (standard and Deluxe), we can clearly see the effect of the limiter, which caps the maximum peak level. The Deluxe version is the one most affected by the use of a limiter. All 4 waveforms are adjusted to the same sound level of -16.7 LUFS.
Waveform CD vs Vinyl vs Streaming vs Streaming Deluxe version
Here are the waveforms for the whole album in CD and Amazon streaming versions (same for other streaming services):
Waveforn: CD
Waveform: Amazon
The limiter is constantly used to increase the overall sound level. This is particularly noticeable on the last track.
Curve analysis is confirmed by the Dynamic Range measurement with a DR15 for the CD and a DR10 for the streaming version.
But what's most striking is that we've taken the CD master and applied dynamic compression to increase the overall level for streaming the Deluxe version, as shown by the superposition of the two spectra below:
Spectrum: CD (blue) vs Qobuz Deluxe Version (white)
Unlike the normal version, which uses the new 2009 mastering.
If you want to find the original recording, you'll have to opt for CD or vinyl. This is not an isolated case, there are other albums in the same situation, and also others that don't have this problem. It is therefore impossible to guarantee the quality of a streaming album.
You can listen to the samples and find all the measures here.
Enjoy listening
Jean-François
For this review, you will find 6 versions tested: vinyl, CD, Qobuz, Qobuz Deluxe Version, Amazon and Tidal.
This test compares the quality of an album on a physical support (CD, vinyl) and streaming. Are we sure we’re getting the best possible quality from the album when we listen to it via streaming?
The curves below compare waveforms for the song “The Emperor’s New Clothes”. CD and vinyl are the most dynamic versions. For the streaming versions (standard and Deluxe), we can clearly see the effect of the limiter, which caps the maximum peak level. The Deluxe version is the one most affected by the use of a limiter. All 4 waveforms are adjusted to the same sound level of -16.7 LUFS.
Waveform CD vs Vinyl vs Streaming vs Streaming Deluxe version
Here are the waveforms for the whole album in CD and Amazon streaming versions (same for other streaming services):
Waveforn: CD
Waveform: Amazon
The limiter is constantly used to increase the overall sound level. This is particularly noticeable on the last track.
Curve analysis is confirmed by the Dynamic Range measurement with a DR15 for the CD and a DR10 for the streaming version.
But what's most striking is that we've taken the CD master and applied dynamic compression to increase the overall level for streaming the Deluxe version, as shown by the superposition of the two spectra below:
Spectrum: CD (blue) vs Qobuz Deluxe Version (white)
Unlike the normal version, which uses the new 2009 mastering.
If you want to find the original recording, you'll have to opt for CD or vinyl. This is not an isolated case, there are other albums in the same situation, and also others that don't have this problem. It is therefore impossible to guarantee the quality of a streaming album.
You can listen to the samples and find all the measures here.
Enjoy listening
Jean-François