Also, it strikes me for the first time, listening to this really carefully and critically for the first time in a good while (possibly scrutinising everything more closely than ever) there's not an awful lot going on instrumentally from song to song, so maybe that's why things like strings are upfront in the mix in Front L&R rather than the more logical (preferred) rears.. because without them there it'd be too sparse upfront??
Why did they not showcase George's voice by having it hard into the centre on "This Masquerade"?
Or they could have gone for a more discrete Quad-like approach by having George's guitar phantom-centre image really strongly and have the rhythm section solely front L & R, there's too often too much bass going on in the centre channel here for my liking. There's occasional tambourine bashes & other percussion in the rears which is nice but its all a bit tame. It needs a crazy old quad pan round the room kinda mix to really liven it up..!!
How I wish Elliot Scheiner had got his hands on this instead and performed the surround wonders he did with Grover Washington Jr.'s "Winelight"... now that's how to do smooth surround and keep it exciting..!!
I think I'll shove that on next :friday:
