HiRez Poll Emerson Lake & Palmer - BRAIN SALAD SURGERY [DVD-A][2000 WB]

I didn't care for this as a record or the CD except for " Still you turn me on". But this DVD-A is now one of my favorites. Surround sound really enabled me to appreciate the rest. "Lucky man" was an excellent bounus track. This is a very solid 10!

StPete

I have just discovered the most peculiar thing about this disc. Tracks 3, 4, and 6 have no LFE channel. Yet all other tracks do. That's very weird.

Maybe not; think about the material and instrumentation on these tracks. Still You Turn Me On is guitars and Moog plus it's arranged like a ballad. Benny The Bouncer certainly contains bass guitar but is a light throw away track. Karn Evil 9 1st Impression pt 2 is where Lake switched to electric guitar and Emerson throws in some Moog bass.

The remaining tracks are where the bulk of the bombast is and Mr. Kellogg applies his technique of generating sub-bass synthetically from the existing bass (ELP, Chicago tracks exhibit this and I really like the way he did it).

I submit that he likely tried it on every track and then made decisions to take it off some because it drew attention to itself or didn't work musically for some other reason.

It's an OK quality recording. Even on vinyl, the highs are boosted at some unspecified notch and the sound is harsh and tinny. As for the surround aspect, bravo. As many others have said this was made for surround and it doesn't disappoint there. But you can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear and the master tapes just don't have what it takes.

And the HUGE disappointment was the mislabeling that says there is a stereo hi-res mix, but there isn't. I don't always listen hi-res and was looking forward to good headphone session with DVD-A stereo and I was sad.

I'm glad this disc is still being chatted about. I thought I would add my thoughts.

I have the original DVD-A. My first DVD-A purchase. It's one of my favorite surround discs.
I tried to buy the SACD also from Music-Wow but they went out of business and kept my money.

Greg and company did a fantastic job producing this for surround.

I know some folks don't like the adventurous and aggressive mix with all it's pans, sweeps and spins. I assure however it sounds exactly as it should, it's as if you were sitting in the sound booth in the venue during the tour.
They traveled with a quadraphonic sound system.
I saw them several times during the 73-74 tours, the first was Madison Square Garden in NYC around Christmas '73. They had two large JBL speaker stacks on each side of the side, two more equally large stacks in the back behind the audience for quad.
During "Karn Evil 9" the synthesizers would sweep and pan around the stadium and several times it would shoot up over your head to the nest of horns on the ceiling that is the Garden's P.A. system for basketball games ( 5.0 quintaphonic even ) . Greg's guitar solos, Carl's Moog drum solo, Keith's end-over-end piano solo all swirling around. A fantastic circus of sound, the largest surround system I ever heard.

They finished the show with a choir singing Silent Night while a snow machine covered the stage in a fresh layer of fake snow from above.
....See the Show!

I found this site about it. See the snow.
http://www.brain-salad-surgery.de/1973_12_17_New York .htm

The only detraction about the DVD-A for me is the inclusion of "Lucky Man". It shouldn't be there, it should be on a proper surround release of the first ELP album. They should have included the single "Brain Salad Surgery" or "Tiger in the Spotlight" instead.

I'm still waiting for the first album and Tarkus, Trilogy, etc. C'mon Greg, hop to it.
I'll buy them all.

Very, very good MC mix. Very fun to hear and the album is, of course, a classic.

strat54 said:

.....
I saw them several times during the 73-74 tours, the first was Madison Square Garden in NYC around Christmas '73. They had two large JBL speaker stacks on each side of the side, two more equally large stacks in the back behind the audience for quad.
During "Karn Evil 9" the synthesizers would sweep and pan around the stadium and several times it would shoot up over your head to the nest of horns on the ceiling that is the Garden's P.A. system for basketball games ( 5.0 quintaphonic even ) . Greg's guitar solos, Carl's Moog drum solo, Keith's end-over-end piano solo all swirling around. A fantastic circus of sound, the largest surround system I ever heard.
....

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Wow, I just read this and thanks for the extra info about them using the overhead speakers...
maybe Tomita was there because that was his vision of surround sound too...
check out the "Bermuda Triangle" LPs...
that's where I have seen it...

Anyone noticed that the vocals seem "cleaner" on the 5.1 DVD-A mix compared to the original stereo mix. Or is it just my old CD copy?

I really like the mix of Toccata...I couldn't stand this track in stereo but now its one of my faves

Toccata was clausterphobic in stereo, robbed of it's power. DVD-A undid that injustice....

Love this disc. Listening to all the sounds shooting through my room just makes me happy. 11 points (if that was possible...)

anyone knows where the heck i could buy this?

timbre4 said:

Maybe not; think about the material and instrumentation on these tracks. Still You Turn Me On is guitars and Moog plus it's arranged like a ballad. Benny The Bouncer certainly contains bass guitar but is a light throw away track. Karn Evil 9 1st Impression pt 2 is where Lake switched to electric guitar and Emerson throws in some Moog bass.

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IIRC it's the 2nd Impression (not 1st impression part two) that lacks LFE. And there is plenty of bass guitar on the 2nd impression -- indeed i'm not sure there's any Moog bass at all on it. You can even watch Greg laying some of the bass part down in the studio in archival footage on one of the ELP DVDs.

Not that I mind the lack of LFE on any tracks -- there is usually no reason for music releases to have LFE content anyway. It's for explosions and such -- extremely loud, extremely low bass -- in movie soundtracks. That's what it was meant for.

inkubuzz said:

anyone knows where the heck i could buy this?

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It's out of print and they're all gone by now. There's always that auction site and amazon sellers. There is also a SACD version, same mix, which is also out of print but probably easier to find if you're not hung up on the dvd audio format.

inkubuzz said:

anyone knows where the heck i could buy this?

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cupboy said:

It's out of print and they're all gone by now. There's always that auction site and amazon sellers. There is also a SACD version, same mix, which is also out of print but probably easier to find if you're not hung up on the dvd audio format.

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May the Force be with you!
OTOH, it's one of the best MCH mixes ever!!!
I'd recommend the DVD-A version in spite of its clumsy authoring...but IT IS worth it!
I also have the SACD version....which I'm not very fond of...

I wonder if SW will bother to remix this into 5.1, if Sony ever release anymore ELP in surround after the first two that are on their way emerge, that is..!?

As wonderful as it is, it might be worth hanging out a bit before you lay down serious spondoolicks on the OOP DVDA, just to see what happens.

Meantime the SACD (in the UK Universal Deluxe Edition of BSS) is the same mix as the DVDA, the only difference being it's missing the "Lucky Man" bonus.. and that it has some of the worst typo's and gibberish I've ever seen on an album!

One day I might find out what an "Audio 5.1 STS" is..?!?
And CD 2 in the set is the shortest CD ever released.. It has a Total Running Time of 00:00.. Sheesh!

One thing that has intrigued me since the UK SACD came out, is where on earth did Universal/Sanctuary get the SACD pressed!? The set says it is "Made in the E.U." (although that could be wrong, just like the rest of the sleeve info!).

Also, how was this set viable, in 2008, as an SACD, retailing at £15.99 when I bought it at HMV back then.. and yet Universal couldn't find the money (or wherewithal) to release anything else on Multi-Channel SACD in the West, post-2004..??? Bizzar-O..!!

fredblue said:

I wonder if SW will bother to remix this into 5.1, if Sony ever release anymore ELP in surround after the first two that are on their way emerge, that is..!?

As wonderful as it is, it might be worth hanging out a bit before you lay down serious spondoolicks on the OOP DVDA, just to see what happens.

Meantime the SACD (in the UK Universal Deluxe Edition of BSS) is the same mix as the DVDA, the only difference being it's missing the "Lucky Man" bonus.. and that it has some of the worst typo's and gibberish I've ever seen on an album!

One day I might find out what an "Audio 5.1 STS" is..?!?
And CD 2 in the set is the shortest CD ever released.. It has a Total Running Time of 00:00.. Sheesh!

One thing that has intrigued me since the UK SACD came out, is where on earth did Universal/Sanctuary get the SACD pressed!? The set says it is "Made in the E.U." (although that could be wrong, just like the rest of the sleeve info!).

Also, how was this set viable, in 2008, as an SACD, retailing at £15.99 when I bought it at HMV back then.. and yet Universal couldn't find the money (or wherewithal) to release anything else on Multi-Channel SACD in the West, post-2004..??? Bizzar-O..!!

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The BIZARRE factor could be because of the extra super over the top art of the great H.R. Giger....beyond weird!

kap'n krunch said:

The BIZARRE factor could be because of the extra super over the top art of the great H.R. Giger....beyond weird!

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haha! you're on a roll today, kap'un! the artwork is extraordinary! uncannily Alien-esque, you might say..

still.. it'd be nice to know how come Universal released this half-baked set of BSS on SACD four years after they killed off my beloved Elton & Steely Dan 5.1 SACD reissue programmes..!?!?!?

fredblue said:

still.. it'd be nice to know how come Universal released this half-baked set of BSS on SACD four years after they killed off my beloved Elton & Steely Dan 5.1 SACD reissue programmes..!?!?!?

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I think someone pulled a fast one on Universal. There is no mention of SACD on the packaging and there wasn't even a place to put it in the package, which was designed for only 2 disks instead of 3.

Could we get them to pull a few more fast ones like that?

cupboy said:

I think someone pulled a fast one on Universal. There is no mention of SACD on the packaging and there wasn't even a place to put it in the package, which was designed for only 2 disks instead of 3.

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sounds most likely cupboy, I agree there didn't seem to be much provision for it in the packaging (although other 3 disc Deluxe Editions have also had their 3rd disc nastily stuffed into the sleeve..) still I don't understand whom involved would have managed to get it under UMG's noses by stealth - and how!?

Rock/Pop Multichannel SACDs even at that point were pretty much dead in the water, it just seems very odd that it wasn't simply plonked on a DVDV, like the abysmal Quad transfer on the Black Sabbath Paranoid Deluxe Edition that Universal released subsequently.

Just about everything else I can think of in 5.1 by UMG ever since (Caravan, Layla box, Tubular Bells, Ommadawn, Hergest Ridge) with the exception of the Rush DVDA/BD Deluxe Ed's & Tom Petty BD, has been in lossy DTS or Dolby D.

I'm guessing the Rush & TP BDs are the exception because they were projects which were produced & assembled in the U.S., where the teams may be more enlightened/knowledgable about the formats (or be given bigger budgets to make it happen in High-Res) whereas all the other Deluxe Ed's (BSS & Paranoid included) were produced & co-ordinated by UMG UK..?!?