New Opeth 'Watershed' special edition with 5.1 DVD

[scorgiman]

Under the discography section of opeth.com it lists two versions of the upcoming album "watershed". In addition to the standard version, there will be a special edition which comes with a DVD which includes a 5.1 mix of the album.

I'm not sure if there are many Opeth fans here, but I for one am greatly looking forward to this.

 

[Ge Someone]

two versions of the upcoming album "watershed". [..] a special edition which comes with a DVD which includes a 5.1 mix of the album.

Hmm, seems this (death metal) band is really embracing surround .
Good for the fans that it is released at the same time as the CD version. Also good that it's not one of those "limited" editions.

I just ordered the new 5.1 version of the 1999 album "Still Life", I read that Jens Bogren who did the 5.1 mixes has improved since "Ghost Reveries", so I'm hoping for the best. Past results predict a DTS track with almost no use of the center channel

 

[PossumPete]

Good news everybody!

I liked their last album and I like anything that's 5.1. I'll pre-order that bad boy. Thanks for the heads up!

 

[Coren]

So, it's out. What does everyone think?

I for one am again disappointed with the surround mix. Their producer may do a terrific job with stereo material, but it looks like he just doesn't "get" surround music.
And the file formats present on the disc, well... Does anyone know if it's normal that the DTS tracks only have half the bitrate of what you usually get for DTS (i.e. ~750kbps instead of ~1500kbps)? Not that it sounds bad, but it still bugs me.
Oh, and the bonus tracks are in stereo AC3 only. What were they thinking? They could at the very least have included LPCM.

The music in itself is different, but interesting. You won't here me complain about that.

Really, really disappointed with the surround mix, though. Granted, it's not as bad as Ghost Reveries, but still.

 

[scorgiman]

I would have to say that the mix is somewhat disappointing. It has a few nice moments and is generally pretty good, but for a band whose music is as dynamic and intricate as Opeth's you just know that there was so much potential for a really great mix.

1,536 kbit/s is the highest legal bitrate for DTS on a DVD, it is quite common for the author to instead choose a bitrate of 768 kbit/s in order to conserve space on the disc. I think it is mostly in non-music material where the lesser bitrate is used. In this case the only thing that matters is the audio, so it is disappointing that not only did they choose not to include a dvda layer but they have also only used half the possible bitrate.
I personally think it sounds a little thin suring the heavier moments, but does hold up well during the softer sections.

Final verdict: Passable. Obviously a lot of room for improvement. I'm glad I have it, I enjoy it, but I get get rid of the feeling that I could be enjoying it so much more.

 

[MC Maniac]

Really, really disappointed with the surround mix, though. Granted, it's not as bad as Ghost Reveries, but still.

Boy same here..

I question whether this was even mixed using the multitracks..

I'm guessing that some lame upmix program was used - why even bother?? you can get similar results playing the stereo CD with DPLii..