Dolby Atmos Upmixing on the Streaming Services (Unacceptable!)

[FlavioRR]

Warner did it again Now it was the turn of the Mexican band, Maná. That maybe some know them or maybe not, but it is a well-known Latin band. I emphasize that I listened to the albums through TIDAL, because I don't have Apple Music, but I don't think there is a difference. There are 4 or 5 albums with the ATMOS label. I only had to listen to a couple of songs to know that they would all be the same. A mix that is just copy/paste of the front channels but with less volume. Disappointing...

I checked it by extracting the tracks and importing them into audacity

 

[fredblue]

Warner did it again Now it was the turn of the Mexican band, Maná. That maybe some know them or maybe not, but it is a well-known Latin band. I emphasize that I listened to the albums through TIDAL, because I don't have Apple Music, but I don't think there is a difference. There are 4 or 5 albums with the ATMOS label. I only had to listen to a couple of songs to know that they would all be the same. A mix that is just copy/paste of the front channels but with less volume. Disappointing...

I checked it by extracting the tracks and importing them into audacity

View attachment 86164

unbelievably, Maná are Apple Music's Spatial Audio Featured Artist right now..

 

[humprof]

unbelievably, Maná are Apple Music's Spatial Audio Featured Artist right now..

The cluelessness. Maná deserves a spotlight, for sure, but those mixes don't. It makes you wonder what exactly the marketing geniuses at Apple Music understand "Spatial Audio" to be...

 

[popshop]

Just want to share these sites again (thanks @humprof). Any complaint comment on this thread should also have emails going to Apple, Dolby, and (usually) Warner. If we don't tell them, they don't know. It's hard to say, but it sure seems like our complaints from a couple months ago have resulted in some positive changes.
Dolby:

Email Us - Dolby Atmos - Dolby Professional​

professional.dolby.com

Warner Music (I couldn't get the links in posts 1 & 4 of this thread to work, but I think this one does):

Contact - Warner Music Group​

We want to hear from you! You can send us a message for any comments or inquiries by using the...

www.wmg.com

Apple Music:
Feedback - Apple Music - Apple

 

[Perp]

I just finished reading this entire Thread for the first time. Damn! You guys are heroes!! No wonder why I cancelled my subscription to Apple Music. Deep fakes, abound!

 

[humprof]

Ugh. I really like this singer-songwriter, and this album could've been really good in Atmos. (Favorite track: "Water Me Down.") Unfortunately, as with so many Nonesuch titles, it's Schmatmos.

 

[fredblue]

unbelievably, Maná are Apple Music's Spatial Audio Featured Artist right now..

mercifully, the Spatial Audio Featured Artist's changed to The Beatles & their solo projects in Atmos

 

[humprof]

Thanks to @Cheezmo's post in the Atmos Streaming Listening thread, we can be optimistic that the Schmatmos list keeps shrinking. It seems another dozen-plus tracks previously reported as "fake" have now reverted to stereo; with these latest retractions, the list is maybe 1/8 as long as it was at its height last summer. So maybe somebody at Warner (or Apple, or Dolby) is slowly, belatedly, paying attention or even--gasp--investigating and responding to complaints?

One sour note: if there's a secret internal memo going around, it still seemingly hasn't made its way to WEA's Nonesuch division, as they keep issuing brand-new albums with fake-and-bake mixes. A shame, as the material they're earmarking for Atmos--Caroline Shaw, Cecile McLorin Salvant, Lake Street Dive, Steve Reich, Vagabon--deserves more thoughtful treatment.

Here are legacy tracks previously reported as "fake" that may still be marked Atmos. If anyone wants to check and report back, I'll update my list once again. (Edit: I ran a quick check. Updates reflected below.)

Aretha Franklin - “Respect” (I Never Loved a Man...(Mono Version) only!), “Baby I Love You”
Badfinger – Love Is Gonna Come At Last
Ben E. King – Stand By Me (The Very Best and the non-mono ver. of Don't Play That Song! only), others (?)
Boz Scaggs – I’m Easy, Loan Me a Dime
Carly Simon – You’re So Vain (No Secrets version only)
Charles Mingus, Reincarnation of a Lovebird (The Clown version only), E’s Flat Ah’s Flat Too (Blues & Roots alt. take/bonus track version only), Moanin’
Chris Rea – On The Beach (On the Beach and The Very Best Of versions), The Road to Hell, Pt. 2 (The Very Best Of version only)
Cornership – Brimful of Asha (When I Was Born for the 7th Time Expanded Ed. only)
Curtis Mayfield, Move On Up (Keep On Keeping On and Playlist: The Best Of versions only)
Donald Byrd – Love Has Come Around (Love Bird version only)
Duran Duran – A View to a Kill (Decade version only)
Frankie Valli - Can't Take My Eyes Off You
Goo Goo Dolls – Slide, Iris
Maná - [several albums]
Puff Daddy – I’ll Be Missing You (2014 remastered edition only)
Ritchie Valens – We Belong Together
The Beau Brummels - Laugh Laugh
The Drifters - Under the Boardwalk
The Mamas & The Papas – California Dreamin’
The Proclaimers – I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)
The Rembrandts – I’ll Be There For You (Theme from Friends)
Third Eye Blind – Semi-Charmed Life (s/t album version only)
Tom Tom Club – Genius of Love

 

[fredblue]

For metal heads like myself, this one really irritated me after I got excited. Completely fake. Not even some sort of reverb, just copy paste with lower volume. Silver living again though - I was able to get a proper DR version of the album, which is exceptionally rare for metal.

wow.. did Nuclear Blast ever fake any 5.1's back in the day?

 

[pat bateman]

wow.. did Nuclear Blast ever fake any 5.1's back in the day?

I'm not sure. Off the top of my head, I know Opeth is Nuclear Blast, but SW does all their mixes. Here is the fake Behemoth in all its visual glory. I normalized to -1.0 DB for the purposes of better seeing the waveform.

 

[Monkish]

Unfortunately, you can add Peter Schilling's Major Tom to the list, both the German and English versions. The English version is titled Major Tom (Coming Home) [Director's Cut].

 

[tlake6659]

wow.. did Nuclear Blast ever fake any 5.1's back in the day?

Opeth - Sorceress

 

[tlake6659]

Are these fake upmixes still available on Tidal?

 

[humprof]

Are these fake upmixes still available on Tidal?

Not sure--though if anyone cares to investigate. . . .

 

[LennonCobain]

Are these fake upmixes still available on Tidal?

Yes

 

[~dave~~wave~]

Nina Simone is a current Apple Music Spatial Audio Feature.
These albums are straight up UpMixes and they don't even try to attempt to hide it.

There's an old expression that comes to mind that surely has made the rounds in Texas as well as Nebraska.
It is a three-word question starting with "No" that makes reference to manure and Sherlock.

IMHO the world is a better place with this historic collection of albums available in alternate room-filling Atmos mixes.
Anybody who prefers to listen in stereo can easily switch.

Front channels not withstanding, I'm definitely hearing variations in instrumentation and ambience around the sound field on the Little Girl Blue album, for example.
I don't really care how the sausage was made, or that it didn't get the expensive Giles Martin Abbey Road stem de-mix treatment.

And please, nobody needs to stand on their furniture listening to ceiling speakers in a misguided effort to contradict my observations.
YMMV.

 

[heavensolid98]

There's an old expression that comes to mind that surely has made the rounds in Texas as well as Nebraska.
It is a three-word question starting with "No" that makes reference to manure and Sherlock.

IMHO the world is a better place with this historic collection of albums available in alternate room-filling Atmos mixes.
Anybody who prefers to listen in stereo can easily switch.

Front channels not withstanding, I'm definitely hearing variations in instrumentation and ambience around the sound field on the Little Girl Blue album, for example.
I don't really care how the sausage was made, or that it didn't get the expensive Giles Martin Abbey Road stem de-mix treatment.

And please, nobody needs to stand on their furniture listening to ceiling speakers in a misguided effort to contradict my observations.
YMMV.

100% Agree with you -Nebraska for me, if the experience is welcoming and fulfilling, I do NOT care how the mix was done. I don't solo each of my speakers and start judging/complaining about the mix because there is no discrete channel that ONLY has one instrument - Totally wrong way to judge a mix. I do feel for those folks though since I get bummed if there is no height channel content..

There is another thread where people didn’t even perform fact checks and started calling mixes “fake” “unadventurous” “AI mix”. And even name dropping, witch hunting engineers who they ‘think’ did the mixes. Calling anything that has that engineer’s name “fake” without even listening to the record. Telling people to contact Dolby, apple, tidal, labels. by the way, I ran the same tests I did in previous comment on that LIST this person gathered.. guess what, they not even close to same as Nina Simone up mixes.

I work in post not music but I love listening to music because I have the system that allows me to listen to atmos content. I met a friend in LA during listening party hosted by speaker brand. He's job was doing tape transfers for old catalogue and digitize them so they can be re-mixed in Atmos. He was excited for few of the new transfers he did. (he doesn't have atmos system so he listens with AirPods spatial audio). I was happy to see some of his work.. well he didn't mix but he did the transfers came out in the world and those recordings were immediately flagged in QQ as 'fake'. I could imagine how much my friend would have been upset to see those comments - fortunately for him I don't think he knows QQ.

anyway, I saw a trend here when if mix comes from one label, it gets marked as fake but if other labels do it, they call it a style.

Calling “playing old recordings through bunch of speakers and re-recording them (which by the way is unbelievably stupid way to do Atmos mix in my opinion, think about phase shift, distortion, adding speaker cabinet resonances.. just wrong) a “special technique developed by such and such” instead of calling it fake or upmix. It is an upmix. if anyone in post do this kind of process to do up mix, (there is tons of people doing up mixes in post by the way) you get a slap in the face - probably will get fired.

I just dropped that UMG did a massive catalogue of work 'fake' way (as they call it) and proved it not by just saying it is but doing fact check and printed audio. Why are these people not asking people to contact Dolby, apple, label? oh because.. its a style all of sudden? where are you angers?

Apologies for being upset here but reason I read forums is because I value other's opinions and I learn new things. If there is a mix I like, I want to see how others think and I genuinely appreciate different perspective of view. Seeing my friend's work and some of my favourite mixes getting mocked and getting fake stamp really triggered my inner fighter boy.

Now it does not really matter honestly because thanks to QQ I learned a way to verify what I felt about those recordings I felt for was real in fact by seeing the WAVEFORMS!! YOU GOTTA SEE TO BELIEVE IT. or is it.. you gotta hear to believe?

 

[~dave~~wave~]

100% Agree with you -Nebraska for me, if the experience is welcoming and fulfilling, I do NOT care how the mix was done. I don't solo each of my speakers and start judging/complaining about the mix because there is no discrete channel that ONLY has one instrument - Totally wrong way to judge a mix..
...Seeing my friend's work and some of my favourite mixes getting mocked and getting fake stamp really triggered my inner fighter boy.

A quality, thoughtful personal perspective, thanks for sharing.
And for taking my "joshing" in the spirit in which it was offered.

 

[zeppelindude93]

Unfortunately, you can add Peter Schilling's Major Tom to the list, both the German and English versions. The English version is titled Major Tom (Coming Home) [Director's Cut].

That's a real shame - fantastic, underrated track that would be very well served in surround

 

[zeppelindude93]

I got excited when I found Foo Fighters in 360RA. Its all fake. They have 2 albums and many of their popular singles. It's so badly fake, they didn't even bother to add reverb or anything. Just simply copy/paste the L/R to Surround L/R, made the center channel a mono version of L/R and lowered the volume, and then copy/paste the front L/R to surround back channels and lowered the volume. (360RA is a 7.1 bed).

Really disappointing. I heard there were a bunch of singles that went up on Tidal, as well as the new album "But Here We Are" - what's the other one?

I know there's a couple studio albums that were officially released in surround (One By One on DVD-A, In Your Honour Disc 2 on DVD, Sonic Highways sort of, as the songs are on the Bluray of the show, but it's apparently not a discrete mix, just a 4.1 almost enhanced stereo) along with a lot of live stuff (Skin & Bones, Hyde Park, Everywhere But Home, Live At Wembley, iTunes Festival (possibly?), the Studio 606 performance of Wasting Light), but outside of "But Here We Are" (which I've seen mixed reviews on - some people say all the surround mixes are BS, others say it's only the RA360, others still say the Atmos mix is better, but still not good), I don't know of any that are officially released on streaming.