[Sasha]

If you want to know how transparent and neutral a piece of gear is (CD player, amp, etc.), take Amy Winehouse?s Back to Black album on CD, it must be one of the most compressed ones out there.
If it sounds any good your system is not.

[racerxnet]

 Who's Amy Winehouse?

I've got wine and a house. Does that count. 

[ricmon]

I'll give the lp a spin tonite to see if it's compressed as well.  Obviously I haven't listened to it in a while.  BTW has she totally crashed and burned?

[werd]

Yah i know what you mean Sasha about that release. But lousy recordings sometimes work and make for good listening. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs 2003 release Fever to Tell is horribly recorded but one of the best cd releases of that year imo.

[Sasha]

Lousy recording are one thing if you are referring to those old noisy ones, I can listen without objections to very old recordings, it is those presumably good and modern ones that are intentionally messed up that end up being unlistenable.
BTW I love Amy Winehouse?s music, it is unfortunate that she ended up the way she did.
Racerxnet give her a listen, I do not know anyone who did not find her music at least interesting.

[Fido2]

lol...I agree. Terrible recording but the music is good. The album sounds OK on my portable iPod/Voyager amp/Denon AH-D1001 headphones, but it sounds terrible on my better rig(s). Amy's "Frank" album doesn't fare much better.

[racerxnet]

Sasha,

All I can do today is listen on Pandora for Amy Winehouse. I'll see what some friends have for a listen on CD. I get fatigued pretty fast when the recording is crap. About 15 minutes and I've had enough. When done right I can listen for several hours. No fault of the system. Crap in = Crap out.

MAK

[Sasha]

lol...I agree. Terrible recording but the music is good. The album sounds OK on my portable iPod/Voyager amp/Denon AH-D1001 headphones, but it sounds terrible on my better rig(s). Amy's "Frank" album doesn't fare much better.

Sounds OK? Sound great in my car!
But put it on half decent rig and as you say the result is terible.
Wonder what is psycho acoustic scientific explanation for such perception?

[Stu Pitt]

I don't know why, but compression sounds worse than any other bad recording type to my ears.  I can deal with an album that's got a ton of pops and clicks for so much longer than compressed music.

Maybe its more the digital clipping than anything else.

For example, Metallica's Death Magnetic sounds respectable in my car.  Through my iPod (lossless) and Etymotic 'phones, I can get through about 4 tracks. Through my home rig, I'm done after about 5 minutes.  Its really too bad, because its a pretty good album.

I've got an old copy of The Wall on Vinyl.  Its loaded with pops and clicks, yet I can listen to both sides without much complaint.

BTW, how come Pink Floyd never re-issued The Wall on vinyl?

[Fido2]

lol...I agree. Terrible recording but the music is good. The album sounds OK on my portable iPod/Voyager amp/Denon AH-D1001 headphones, but it sounds terrible on my better rig(s). Amy's "Frank" album doesn't fare much better.

Sounds OK? Sound great in my car!
But put it on half decent rig and as you say the result is terible.
Wonder what is psycho acoustic scientific explanation for such perception?

Hey Sasha, I don't think it's psychoacoustic but just simply that the recording was mixed and mastered to sound good on mostly car stereos and iPod type devices. It was never mixed or mastered to a true audiophile standard. Therefore when played on a revealing system the resulting mixing/mastering techinique is truly shown. Too bad too because a recording that sounds good on a nice rig will also sound good on a lesser rig but not always the other way around. Could also be just a not so good engineer at the helm and/or not very high quality mixing/mastering equipment etc etc