In the late 80's a band I was with did some recording at a little studio located in Hollywood. The studio was 24 track, state of the art to us. At the time we were laying down 5 tracks over a 2 week period. The sounds were awesome and they were on tape. Today they record digitally with 0's and 1's and wow what a difference in sound quality. For the first time you could hear the clarity of the guitar, drums, keyboards and horns without hiss. Today you can actually hear where a song would be overdubbed with a take from another version of the same song. One of my favorites is The Beatles song She Loves You, listen to the Lp version and then listen to the Digital CD version you can clearly hear the overdubbed edit onto the original version. On the video side the pictures are crystal clear. Example look at Jurassic Park where the dinosaurs look so real and then look at an original 60's movie where the dinosaur looks so fake. I am not saying that I don't appreciate the originals. I love the old movies and music. Digital has given us a new look and sound. Let me know what you think?
I remember LP records and cassette tapes :-)
ReplyDeleteI remember many years ago reading that some people prefer the analog sounds because they say the instruments sound more natural than from digital music. I could never tell the difference.
Video wise, I think digital definitely beats analogue (e.g. VHS tapes).
Every time I read your article, it makes me feel fresh and new. This kind of article about music and graphics always makes me learn a lot! Thank you very much.
ReplyDeleteIts kind of crazy cause I have a few friends that are DJs in this city and they was talking about how LPs are coming back.
ReplyDeleteYes, digital has given us a new look and sound. I think I prefer how we view videos and listen to music nowadays because it's just a few clicks away.
ReplyDeleteI love it when my kids watch old movies with me and question why it looks so "fake" compared to movies from today. The quality of video and sound has evolved so much in just a few short years.
ReplyDeleteI love and appreciate original recordings but there have been a lot of instances where I wished a remastered digital version was released. I randomly got into Marilyn Monroe last year and a lot of her songs were amazing but they were too muffled.
ReplyDeleteI loved your post. I completely agree with you about being able to hear when a song has been overdubbed with another version of the same song. But I love the nostalgia sound quality of Cassette Tape and Vinyl Records mainly because my grandfather's band's music were all cassettes and vinyl's.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree. Thank you for the post.
ReplyDeleteI am in the entry level enthusiast audio scene with a budget friendly set of headphones from Sennheiser the "HD650"s with its own dedicated digital to analog amplifier. The clarity one can hear from lossless audio vs .mp3 is very noticible with a good set of headphones.
ReplyDeleteOldies vs. newbies. hmm.. I enjoy both, especially original music and records. I appreciate that new music eliminated the hiss, but it also took away the nostalgia of it all. As for movies, one of my hidden hobbies is to compare old movies to newer movies and explain the atmospheres, diegetic and nondiegetic sounds, the types of framing used and how many cuts are made for one simple scene.
ReplyDeleteYour Jurassic Park comparison! Too funny. You know what else is going extinct, CDs!
ReplyDeleteI completely agree. Very interesting post.
ReplyDelete?.? Jurassic park was made in the 60's? Also THATS SO COOL! I had no idea about sound quality or design thanks for the information.
ReplyDeleteI agree, video and audio quality has come a very long way now.
ReplyDeleteI personally don't remember much about the older styles of music and video but I'm glad that technology has come as far as it has,
ReplyDeleteI have one of the biggest collections of LP's. Everyone from Earth Wind and Fire, all the way to Average White Band. The authentic sounds of the LP's are absolutely natural and vibrant. Although, today's sound have much more depth, LP's remain number one in natural sound.
ReplyDeleteIt's true that with today's technology, it's simple to alter movies, videos, photos, and sounds to make them sound more lifelike.
ReplyDeleteI definitely love digital. I like the example you gave with Jurassic Park I was recently showing my children the difference and they absolutely hated the original movie.
ReplyDeleteDigital has definitely take things to a whole other level. The amount of control you have in terms of timing, sound levels, visual cues, picture quality, and so forth is unfathomable compared to the days of analog.
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