Search - Bob Dylan :: Dylan (Bonus CD)

NOTHING IS REVEALED

Remaster Bob | Hong Kong, China SAR Hong Kong | 01/17/2010

(3 out of 5 stars)

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Hi. In case anyone out there is curious (as I was) about the sound reproduction of these "digitally remastered" discs, you need not be. Nothing has been newly digitally remastered.



I ran a series of A/B listening tests with half-decent ears and a fairly decent system and the results were quite puzzling. In all cases, nothing has been remastered anew, in fact on a few tracks there seemed to be less weight in the bass compared to earlier compilation and album editions.



I compared this box with all the previous "Greatest Hits" volumes (1-3), 1997's "Best Of", and 2000's "Essential". Every time it is exactly the same mastering; I cannot discern any improvements and I usually can if there are any. As well as concluding "You cheapskate b***ards Sony/Columbia" I wonder why there are so many different "Mastering Engineers" credited across those releases - Vic Anesini, Mark Wilder, Greg Calibi, Bob Irwin. Are they actually all the same person? Or is someone taking the mickey out of Columbia/Sony? Or maybe just out of us? What are they all being paid for?



So far my range of tests was between 1997 editions and this 2007 release. Imagine my surprise then when I pulled out 1985's Biograph and compared Quinn The Eskimo there with this 2007 release; exactly the same! This all smells a funny color.



There was however a very minor improvement in presence and lower end strength I felt between these discs and 1991's The Bootleg Series Vols. 1-3 box set. But I think these finite variations are the result of the pressings. The weird but unavoidable conclusion is that Columbia/Sony have remastered each of these songs once - starting as early as 1985 - and they have never bothered to touch them again since. Then they flog a new box set with the sticker "Digitally Remastered"...and forget to add "...since 1985". (That's twenty-two years before this release, you miserable cloth-eared scumbags!)



One other curious discovery: the Brownsville Girl version here is a different mix from every earlier version I have. Not a different remaster, just a different mix; there is an extra element of Spanish/classical guitar playing away quite noticably (in the first couple of miuntes alone you will notice it) which has appeared without any mention in the booklet. It's not worth getting excited about even for the fiercest of completists; it's just more dumb record company imbeciles playing little mind games with the people who pay their salaries. Either that or just good ol' fashioned incompetence.



Thankfully I am wary of Sony as a record label - very untrustworthy in my experience - so I only bought this box when my local store dropped the price w-a-y down in their New Year Sale. The booklet is all pictures and big font size, worth about three minutes of your time, and the postcards are spoilt by being numbered for some unfathomable reason. The first thing you notice is how spacious the inside of the box is for the volume of the contents. I was able to ditch the plastic jewel cases for several other Dylan discs and store the CD's and booklets inside this vacuuous box. So some good came from this purchase. Ha.



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DYLAN!!!

Merle E. Gifford | Shreveport, La | 02/03/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Dylan! This, sort of best hit goes "way" back to the sixties to today. And is....Dylan! This is a hell of a recording. Buy it!



Gif

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