Search - Pretenders :: Pretenders

Review for the Audio Fidelity release

Timmothy R. Acheson | Denver, CO | 11/19/2009

(2 out of 5 stars)

"The Pretenders - The Pretenders (AFZ 052)



This CD has two issues:



1. A "phone ring" sound effect is missing from the song "The Phone Call".



Steve had stated that the master tape did not have the sound effects on it. The sound effects were to be "flown in" using a digital workstation.



From an email that I received from Marshall:



"As to the ringtone, we used the original English master, which did not have the phone ring. The ring was added later."



2. The disc has compression on it that is not found on the original Sire CD. Regardless of ones opinion of the sound, AF CDs should not have compression on them, per the statement on each CD "The original dynamic range of this recording has not been maximized, brickwalled, limited or compressed in any way during remastering".



Steve was not around the forum during the discovery of the issues by forum members. A few weeks prior to the discovery, he had stated that his PC "blew up" and that he wouldn't be around for awhile. He came back to the forum after a few days of discussion regarding the issues on this CD and said this:



"Hi everyone,



So how do we like the Pretenders so far?



Kidding.



Obviously I can't talk about it.

If you like the sound of the disk, keep it and enjoy it.

If you are on the fence and sort of like it or are a collector, keep it as a unique item.

If you don't like what happened to it, just return it as defective, it's sold out of the run anyway.



Trust me, this FUBAR situation won't happen again on anything I master. This is not AF's fault.



Once again, if you like it, keep it, if you don't, return it as defective.



Please don't ask me any more questions as I can't answer them.""