David Bowie: Ziggy-era Box out in June; Dolby Atmos Blu-Ray out in Sept!

[Dynamic Editor]

"Even on headphones, it's all around you. Blew me completely away."

Ok, so that's him acknowledging there's stuff behind the listener. That's good.

 

[kenm]

PLEASE. Aladdin Sane, Dolby Atmos !

 

[Mcallister]

Well that got me quite excited

 

[madscot]

Two weeks on Friday

 

[privateuniverse]

New video for "Starman". Let all the children boogie....

 

[humprof]

$18.99 pre-order at DeepDiscount:
https://www.deepdiscount.com/the-ri...rdust-and-the-spiders-from-mars/5021732238757

$19.95 at ImportCDs:
https://www.importcds.com/the-rise-...rdust-and-the-spiders-from-mars/5021732238757

 

[JulesRules]

If this standalone Atmos Blu-ray is indeed completely different from the one in the box—and the one in the box doesn't have the new Atmos mix—then it is a truly cynical move that would be the envy of Pink Floyd Records, or even EA Games. The box set should be comprehensive: if there's a new mix available, then it belongs in the box, too. Forcing fans who want everything to double-dip on concurrent releases is just disrespectful. At least Pink Floyd have the decency to wait a couple years before fleecing again.

It's pretty similar to what has happened with several releases now - One Deep River, Diamonds and Pearls and The Age of Consent spring to mind. I guess the difference is that those didn't include any multichannel audio in the box sets.

And in the case of Lexicon of Love, Lament, The Harmony Codex and Jailbreak/Johnny the Fox, the standalone blu-ray has different content compared to the version included in the box set. So these sorts of shenanigans are in full force right now.

 

[dabl]

The two recent videos are presumably using the 2024 stereo mixes which sound ok.

 

[Guitmark]

Not to put the cart before the horse, but the only skepticism I have is that on a recent Bobby Owsinski podcast with Ken and Emre, they revealed that they replaced every one of Woody Woodmansey’s drums with samples. The video snippets sound pretty good, but I almost wish I didn’t know about that because it’s all I’ll be listening for, haha.

 

[Willie Wilson]

Not to put the cart before the horse, but the only skepticism I have is that on a recent Bobby Owsinski podcast with Ken and Emre, they revealed that they replaced every one of Woody Woodmansey’s drums with samples. The video snippets sound pretty good, but I almost wish I didn’t know about that because it’s all I’ll be listening for, haha.

Whoa…wondering if this was a one-shot thing out of necessity, the start of a coming trend or if this has happened many times before and we aren’t aware. I’m with you, my antennae are now up.

 

[Dynamic Editor]

I’m with you, my antennae are now up.

Mods, I think we have an alien in chat here.

 

[H.A.L.]

Mods, I think we have an alien in chat here.

Maybe he still uses rabbit ears.

 

[admsh]

Not to put the cart before the horse, but the only skepticism I have is that on a recent Bobby Owsinski podcast with Ken and Emre, they revealed that they replaced every one of Woody Woodmansey’s drums with samples. The video snippets sound pretty good, but I almost wish I didn’t know about that because it’s all I’ll be listening for, haha.

It's a really interesting podcast. We should brace ourselves because it sounds pretty crazy. It's not just the drums. He even said he insists on a title change when he does something like this because it's not the same as the original. Some highlights:

• "If there was a single acoustic guitar I thought It'll be better with double track, I'd go to another take that had acoustic guitar, fly it in and elastic-audio it so it's in time and all of that kind of thing".
• "The glam rock sound was fine for the 1970s but we're in the 2020s now and it needs to be modernised a bit".
• "First thing I changed was the drums because that dry drum sound is so much a part of the glam rock sound and so I used samples for snare, kick, some toms and then eventually finished up, came to doing cymbals and hi-hats as well which is slightly painstaking going in and moving every single hi-hat bit for the sample to make sure it's exactly in-sync with the original."

Not sure what to make of this, I'd say I'm usually a purist but I do absolutely adore Graham Nash's remixed Songs for Beginners, for example, which is the first thing I thought about when I heard him talk about his process. So I guess we'll see. I'm more excited than worried but it's definitely a mix of both...

 

[fredblue]

It's a really interesting podcast. We should brace ourselves because it sounds pretty crazy. It's not just the drums. He even said he insists on a title change when he does something like this because it's not the same as the original. Some highlights:

• "If there was a single acoustic guitar I thought It'll be better with double track, I'd go to another take that had acoustic guitar, fly it in and elastic-audio it so it's in time and all of that kind of thing".
• "The glam rock sound was fine for the 1970s but we're in the 2020s now and it needs to be modernised a bit".
• "First thing I changed was the drums because that dry drum sound is so much a part of the glam rock sound and so I used samples for snare, kick, some toms and then eventually finished up, came to doing cymbals and hi-hats as well which is slightly painstaking going in and moving every single hi-hat bit for the sample to make sure it's exactly in-sync with the original."

Not sure what to make of this, I'd say I'm usually a purist but I do absolutely adore Graham Nash's remixed Songs for Beginners, for example, which is the first thing I thought about when I heard him talk about his process. So I guess we'll see. I'm more excited than worried but it's definitely a mix of both...

oh gawd... that dry drum glam sound is a part of Ziggy's.. allure!? hopefully it's a sympathetic spruce up and not a hamfisted ultra revisionist hatchet job! not long to go now til we know either way..

 

[Guitmark]

oh gawd... that dry drum glam sound is a part of Ziggy's.. allure!? hopefully it's a sympathetic spruce up and not a hamfisted ultra revisionist hatchet job! not long to go now til we know either way..

The glam rock sound is the whole ethos of Ziggy. I’m starting to have visions of that horrible “remix” of Don’t Stand So Close To Me on the Police The Singles SACD. Might as well add lots of reverb to a Steely Dan album and say “that dry jazz sound isn’t really in fashion anymore.” But hey, we’ve got Alan Parsons tuning vocals and fixing timing for the Pyramid Atmos, so I have the feeling it’s gonna get a lot more prevalent.

 

[J. PUPSTER]

oh gawd... that dry drum glam sound is a part of Ziggy's.. allure!? hopefully it's a sympathetic spruce up and not a hamfisted ultra revisionist hatchet job! not long to go now til we know either way..

Golly, I may need a few dry Martini’s to help get over that Freddie Blue!
AKA… my kind of spruce-up!

 

[JulesRules]

But hey, we’ve got Alan Parsons tuning vocals and fixing timing for the Pyramid Atmos, so I have the feeling it’s gonna get a lot more prevalent.

At least in that case it wasn't revealed until the mix was out. I fear this is going to colour a lot of people's enjoyment before they even got to listen to the mix. Although one could say it's good to know beforehand.

I know there was also some talk about Pink Floyd's Animals 2018 remix and a few people (or maybe just one) thought that the drum sound was spruced up via samples. Not sure what to think about it either way. Obviously it's gotten a lot better, technologically, than what was done with the early ZZ Top albums in 1987 (horrible drum replacement) but is it still the original performance?

 

[admsh]

At least in that case it wasn't revealed until the mix was out. I fear this is going to colour a lot of people's enjoyment before they even got to listen to the mix. Although one could say it's good to know beforehand.

I know there was also some talk about Pink Floyd's Animals 2018 remix and a few people (or maybe just one) thought that the drum sound was spruced up via samples. Not sure what to think about it either way. Obviously it's gotten a lot better, technologically, than what was done with the early ZZ Top albums in 1987 (horrible drum replacement) but is it still the original performance?

If I understand this correctly the drums weren't replaced but rather enhanced with these samples. So it's not really a ship of theseus situation. I'm actually excited to hear it, although I have a feeling I'll like the stereo better. Everything they were saying in the podcast about the atmos mix makes it seem like they were going for a live performance type of soundstage, "not gimmiky" is something they kept saying over and over again. Or in other words: very unadventurous. Not promising.

Anyway... We'll know very soon.

 

[Wagonmaster_91]

Remember when the first 6 ZZ Top albums were "upgraded" with electronic drums on the "6-Pack" box so those albums would sound like the Eliminator album (Sharp Dressed Man, Legs, Gimme). God awful! Huge mistake.

 

[JulesRules]

Remember when the first 6 ZZ Top albums were "upgraded" with electronic drums on the "6-Pack" box so those albums would sound like the Eliminator album (Sharp Dressed Man, Legs, Gimme). God awful! Huge mistake.

That's what I referred to in my previous post. To be precise, only 4 1/2 of those albums were remixed; El Loco (the 7th album; Degüello was not included in the set) was left as-is and the same goes for the live side of Fandango! I also think the drums on the debut only got some reverb added. But yes, Rio Grande Mud, Tres Hombres, the studio side of Fandango! and Tejas were all subjected to a partial or complete drum replacement - partial in some cases where the technology was simply too bad to pick up on all the nuances of Frank's playing ("El Diablo" has his original snare still in the background). It really killed the grooves.