Before listening to this 5.1 mix, this album is probably his most hit or miss for me. I loved half this album while the other half could have just gone away. There were a couple of surprises that I didn’t think would be great and they are. Now I love just about the whole record.
To The Bone: The low end sounds just awesome on this entire album. Starts off with a GREAT track that is probably my favorite on this album. There’s shakers and bongos going on in the surrounds and harmonica comes peeking out of the SR from time to time. This one doesn’t have a ton of super discrete things happening but the mix sounds just perfect. There’s a part at the vocal breakdown which is coming out of the 4 corners, but it doesn’t blur where anything is. You are just surrounded by them perfectly.
Nowhere, Now: This was a song that I was not sold on during my listens of the stereo release. Those “heartbeats” that start off the song in the surrounds and move towards the fronts are awesome and ear catching. The backing vocals sound really full and are just mixed perfectly. I LOVE the foreshadowing to the main Permanating piano riff. Another wonderful song that made it much more enjoyable in 5.1
Pariah: Love the sequencer starting off in the surrounds, while a synth is up in the fronts. Ninet’s performance in this song is something that just has to be heard. That synth that comes on after her scream is just so powerful and combines with her voice so well. It gives me goosebumps every time I listen to it.
The Same Asylum As Before: His Falsetto here in the beginning doesn’t really work for me. I feel he could have just sang it normally and it would have been better. Mostly acoustic sitting back in the surrounds for this one. When the distorted guitars come in (SW singing the title over and over again), the synth in that was in rears get thrown to the fronts as well and works like the vocal breakdown in TTB. Honestly, probably the best moment of this record comes with the distorted guitar solo. It’s being panned EVERYWHERE chaotically and really took me by surprise! It them mellows out to a Gilmour-ish solo, which I just love. The end of this song is really crazy with what was in the mix and one of the only real moment of feeling overwhelmed by what I was hearing.
Refuge: As far as placement goes, there’s a synth that sits in the surrounds for most of the song. There’s also a small point where a sequencer that starts on the right side (fading to the RS), and then a different beat comes in on the left side (and fades to the LS). It doesn’t last long, but it’s a really cool ear catching moment when not much is happening. This song gets really epic with that harmonica and guitar solo and then just goes into overdrive with those piercing and soaring Gilmour-like notes, which I wasn’t expecting from the start of it. At the end, there are those child chants coming from the phantom surround that keep my attention. That lonely harp in the Surround Right at the end is just lovely as well. This is just a lovely song, which I would usually skip before and now thanks to this mix, It’s one of my favorites.
Permanating: Whoa, the kick drum is thumping on this one! Was not expecting a straight up dance hit, especially after the soft-ish song beforehand. There are some synths moving around in the surrounds a bit, but the first half is very front heavy. Once the guitar solo comes in, some piano gets shifted mainly to the rears. There is a great vocal delay during the break and it makes this mix. It really feels like i’m swimming in the vocal delays/verb. Those synths at the fadeout in the surrounds just sound really nice to me as well.
Blank Tapes: This album has a great push and pull between exciting and soft songs. This is another soft one but it’s mix works! Instruments pop up in all sort of speakers as the song continues. I like the guitar and piano being opposites in the FR and SL. There’s some bells hiding in the SL and the female vocal also gets shifted back there at the end as well.
People Who Eat Darkness: Two vocal delays (“The Wall” and “Stairs”) gets thrown around at the beginning. It’s a great start to probably the most active song on this record! A guitar riff gets thrown around the field in a really great way (every note is in a different speaker) which is another great ear catching moment! There’s a nice synth note that goes “flying” off as well. The vocal moment with the backing vocal in the phantom surround sounds awesome! Especially with the heavy amount of reverb happening.
Song of I: This is the first song I heard off this album and at the time, I was highly unimpressed. Kept me from listening to anything else from SW in general for quite some time. I’ve come to like it a lot more with this mix! I like how the claps/drum samples are on the right and the keyboard/synth is on the left. There’s a creepy vocal coming up from SR a couple of times, which surprised me. I love that build up of everything halfway through the song. The vocal reverb at the end really sounds wonderful (with said creepy vocal still there from time to time!)
Detonation: And now we get to the point of this album that mentally, I am just done. It’s funny that it comes at a pretty progressive song, but it doesn’t really do anything for me until the second half of the song. There are some good moments with some of the sound effects moving around and some backing vocal work but once the drums come in, It’s just kind of bland. Once the synths in the rears with some percussion and guitars in the fronts start, it’s wonderful compared to the first half of the song. I love how it keeps building up with a solo and extra instruments until it’s a chaotic, overwhelming mess by the end of it! And I love every second of that.
Song of Unborn: Theres a couple of tom fills that happen during the song and they are great! I can definitely hear it thundering into the room. There’s that circulating sound effect that starts to make its ay from the front left back across the surrounds to SR. The chanting vocal part is awesome! Backing vocal sections are yet again awesome because they sound so damn full. The vocal fade from the front to the surrounds just ends this album perfectly as well.
I have to say, this is not an active mix. But it is a phenomenally mixed album. Everything is placed perfect and there is so much blending going on, but doesn’t mask anything important. The records I've heard that do that, do not do it well, but this one is just exceptional. This one is just perfect and the end result is that everything is so full and lush sounding. I’ve listening to this four different times while tweaking my system’s setup (With a couple more spins after that) and this last one just hit it perfectly. With how he is blending things across the spectrum, it is vital that everything is phase aligned the best it can be (and I don't have it perfect yet!). This is the best “immersive” mix i’ve ever heard. The quality of the whole frequency spectrum cannot be doubted here. It’s like you are surrounded in a sonic blanket of greatness. I know I said it before, but the low end is INCREDIBLE on this album.
If I had to say one bad thing about this record is that it is just a bit too long. I just about like every song on this record now, but 1 or 2 of them could go to get this album around 45 minutes instead of an hour. I also don’t like how he uses the mids (400-800hz) on pretty much all his albums. His center channel vocals stick out like a sore thumb to me. They definitely could be a little clearer and using a little parametric EQ to that region helps it out.
I’m going to give this a 10. I have come back to this album so many times because it just sounds so damn good. I have this weird theory that in 2017, SW’s really figured out what a phenomenal 5.1 mix should be fidelity wise (This, Marillion’s Brave, Misplaced Childhood and Rush’s AFTK are all just fantastic from the lows to the highs). Everything after this year that he’s put out I have been a huge fan of while before 2017, some of his mixes left a little to be desired. (Raven and HCE are great, but they are not this record). Musically, I’m not sure if its better than Raven of HCE, but i’ve weirdly played this one way more than those and I don’t really know why. This is just a really fun record to listen to.
He mentioned recently in an interview that he’s remixing his whole catalog in Atmos and this is the record that I am very curious to see if he will be a bit more adventurous.
Mix Highlights: To The Bone, The Same Asylum As Before, Refuge People Who Eat Darkness, Second half of Detonation