First things first, OH HELL YEAH!
I listened to the supposedly new mixes on Tidal and hated them. This ain't those. This is about the 5.1 mix, I haven't done the ATMOS yet
The initial thing I notices was air and space. It feels bigger and the parts have much better separation. The 2015 mix had a wall of sound feel for me, not as bad as 2112 but still far too dense for my taste. The rears are initially being used to embiggen and wrap the sound from the fronts around.
In Tom Sawyer they also get some use to add synth effects and the expected parts there do travel around the room quite enjoyably. They also get some use with what sounds like doubled guitar parts. But a lot of the time they are just pulling elements of the main sound around the corner. Kinda the same for Red Barchetta,
But it really works, Good Spoiler, there is a ton more discrete stuff as you get deeper into the record but the first two songs play it fairly straight. But they did it really well. It is not just a reverbed up version of the fronts.Sometimes it's a single part or sometimes multiple with different volume levels. They mixed and picked to emphasize different parts and it makes the songs really, really good, Like very pleasant to listen to. They definitely listened to what the full effect would be and I think chose very well.
My main reason for loving surround is to give all the parts room to breathe, but still mostly as if the band was playing in front of me. The first two songs are just musically awesome in a way any previous version I've heard is not.
YYZ, Camera Eye and Vital Signs take full advantage of the rears for all the fun sounds in them. I'll write some more tomorrow, but I'm going back in for a third run through.
Oh and the Red Barchetta is pretty slick.
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