Lousy Sound on Pearl Jam Avocado CD

moonlightdrive2112

For all you audiophiles out there (or anyone with a good ear), you will notice that the sound on the last Pearl Jam CD (Avocado) is not so great. When you put it loud, the rockers do not sound full bodied and musical and get noisy. Makes you want to turn down the volume or look to lower the treble.

Like many modern recordings, this Pearl Jam recording suffered from the problem described here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ

It's really sad how much sound quality has gone to shit in the music industry. I hope Pearl Jam realizes it and does not repeat this mistake again in the future. Most of their older CD's actually have much better sound in my opinion.

Dedvw

I hear it and it drives me crazy.

dontgimmenolip

I never experienced a problem with my copy of the Avocado CD. Sounds plenty punchy through my system and my headphones. However, if I were to play it on my son's boombox, I'm sure the sound quality would suffer. I can see the future now - digitally demastered.

AmentsChick

I'm just glad you spelled "Avocado" right. I got so sick of it spelled "Avacado".

NMyTree

moonlightdrive21 wrote:

For all you audiophiles out there (or anyone with a good ear), you will notice that the sound on the last Pearl Jam CD (Avocado) is not so great. When you put it loud, the rockers do not sound full bodied and musical and get noisy. Makes you want to turn down the volume or look to lower the treble.

Like many modern recordings, this Pearl Jam recording suffered from the problem described here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ

It's really sad how much sound quality has gone to shit in the music industry. I hope Pearl Jam realizes it and does not repeat this mistake again in the future. Most of their older CD's actually have much better sound in my opinion.

I've never truely been happy with their recording/mastering standards.

While some albums sound better then othere; generally speaking most of their albums don't have good quality sound. It's always been a disappointment for me. I find I have to tweek down the treble on a lot of their recordings.

In my opinion, their best recording is Live at Benaroya Hall. But that bit of feedback right smack in the middle of Man Of The Hour and two really terrible mistakes by Mike and Stone, in two different songs; kind of ruins it for me. That pisses me off so much! Finally a great recording and they and make trainwreck mistakes in their playing:rolleyes:

This trend (for the last 12-15 years) to "Brickwall" the gain levels/dynamic levels and compress the fuck out of recordings; makes me sick to my stomach. I hate it!!!

DiRtyFranK38

i do notice this a bit, but i don't really care. doesn't bother me. it is crisp, clear production, just a bit trebley and such like you said. however, as long as the music is good and it isn't bad quality, i do not care. i dont mind avocado's production at all. but i do agree that some of their older records sound better in this category.

NMyTree

One more note.

I really wish Sony and Pearl Jam would hire Steve Hoffman to remaster/master their whole current catalogue of albums/CDs, from the original analogue master tapes; and also hire him to do all of their future albums.

No one, and I mean no one masters/remasters like Steve Hoffman!!!!!

When he masters for CD, from the original analogue master tapes; the CDs sound amazingly beautiful!!! It's like listening to a beautifully mastered 180gram vinyl record, but with all the advantages of digital......with the smoothness, warmth and richness of good analogue; but none of the flaws of vinyl or the nastyness of poorly mastered digital.

Steve Hoffman Rules!

We should get a petition started to have Sony and Pearl Jam hire him!!!!:D

Hire Steve Hoffman To Master and Remaster All past, Current and Future Pearl Jam albums!!!!

NMyTree

I will tell you one thing, several years ago I started buying and adding stereo components which utilize vacume tubes in their design and that made an improvement to how the Pearl Jam CDs sound through my system.

I have three systems in my house and all three utilize a pre amp with a vacume tube design. And two of my power amps are hybrid tube designs.

Of course I also was able to get my hands on some sweet, vintage 1950s/very early 1960s NOS tubes by Raytheon, RCA, Phillips (from their Holland facility), Tesla, Amperex and a few Mullards, too (from their Holland facility); so that makes a huge difference, too. What a sweet and musical sound!

Dirty Hank

I've actually posted this exact same topic before. So you're definitely not alone on this. I think it's fairly poor recording and yes I am a bit of an audiophile:)

MasterFramer

anyone know if they are at least still recording to tape?

Kilgore_Trout

go back to brendan o'brien! (i know exactly what you're talking about)

Kilgore_Trout

MasterFramer wrote:

anyone know if they are at least still recording to tape?

they seem to appreciate classical audio techniques... im sure they probably have everything on tape... it could be remastered down the road

LikeAnOcean

sgossard3 wrote:

go back to brendan o'brien! (i know exactly what you're talking about)

I don't know. Riot Act has one of the best sound production. I agree that the production on Avocado sucks.

glasshouse

LikeAnOcean wrote:

I don't know. Riot Act has one of the best sound production. I agree that the production on Avocado sucks.

i absolutely agree.

thing is i've always thought the crass sound of s/t was on purpose.

gfraser

NMyTree wrote:

No one, and I mean no one masters/remasters like Steve Hoffman!!!!!

i second you on the hoffman thing. example, white stripes "icky thump" cd sounds terrible! however hoffman matered the vinyl and its a night and day difference. he completely saved the sound of that album.

Come Back in Black

NMyTree wrote:

One more note.

I really wish Sony and Pearl Jam would hire Steve Hoffman to remaster/master their whole current catalogue of albums/CDs, from the original analogue master tapes; and also hire him to do all of their future albums.

No one, and I mean no one masters/remasters like Steve Hoffman!!!!!

When he masters for CD, from the original analogue master tapes; the CDs sound amazingly beautiful!!! It's like listening to a beautifully mastered 180gram vinyl record, but with all the advantages of digital......with the smoothness, warmth and richness of good analogue; but none of the flaws of vinyl or the nastyness of poorly mastered digital.

Steve Hoffman Rules!

We should get a petition started to have Sony and Pearl Jam hire him!!!!:D

Hire Steve Hoffman To Master and Remaster All past, Current and Future Pearl Jam albums!!!!

I'm a noob when it comes to sound quality. To help me hear the difference, in your opinion please rank the worst sounding studio album of theirs and their best. Maybe i can tell between these two extremes. BH is live so rather not include that. Just the eight studio albums.

woundedorgan

Although one of their best albums the Avocado does have a little lower quality a higher decibals. I would have to say that Brendan O produced records sound the best turned way up. But Comatose cranked is sick!

audiodave

I've never noticied that, mostly for the fact that I rarely listen to the album...

jonbond1779

Probably happens in the mastering process. Alot of albums these days are way too loud.

NC_Irie

NMyTree wrote:

I've never truely been happy with their recording/mastering standards.

While some albums sound better then othere; generally speaking most of their albums don't have good quality sound. It's always been a disappointment for me. I find I have to tweek down the treble on a lot of their recordings.

In my opinion, their best recording is Live at Benaroya Hall. But that bit of feedback right smack in the middle of Man Of The Hour and two really terrible mistakes by Mike and Stone, in two different songs; kind of ruins it for me. That pisses me off so much! Finally a great recording and they and make trainwreck mistakes in their playing:rolleyes:

This trend (for the last 12-15 years) to "Brickwall" the gain levels/dynamic levels and compress the fuck out of recordings; makes me sick to my stomach. I hate it!!!

never noticed any "trainwreck mistakes" by stone/mike. listening to BH now and it sounds pretty flawless and fucking amazing to me.

but what do I know? im just another obsessive PJ fan.

luvnmuzic

NC_Irie wrote:

never noticed any "trainwreck mistakes" by stone/mike. listening to BH now and it sounds pretty flawless and fucking amazing to me.

but what do I know? im just another obsessive PJ fan.

You must have noticed the mistake on Thin Air??? Ed comments about it after the song.

audiodave

luvnmuzic wrote:

You must have noticed the mistake on Thin Air??? Ed comments about it after the song.

I've heard so many people talk about that...and i've never noticed anything. What specifically is it?

luvnmuzic

audiodave wrote:

I've heard so many people talk about that...and i've never noticed anything. What specifically is it?

I happens after the first chorus when Mike and Stone do that little guitar fill. It sounds like Mike plays it in the wrong key. Listen to the album version and compare it to BH. You can't not notice it after that.

2-feign-reluctance

my favorite sounding album is Vs. it just rocks.

2-feign-reluctance

luvnmuzic wrote:

I happens after the first chorus when Mike and Stone do that little guitar fill. It sounds like Mike plays it in the wrong key. Listen to the album version and compare it to BH. You can't not notice it after that.

yeah, that was very obvious. i mess it up when i play it on guitar too. just a nice weird little sequence of notes.

NMyTree

NC_Irie wrote:

never noticed any "trainwreck mistakes" by stone/mike. listening to BH now and it sounds pretty flawless and fucking amazing to me.

but what do I know? im just another obsessive PJ fan.

All Or None:

Even the first short, bluesy guitar lead, after the first verse and chorus; is flat. But that's not the real fuck up.

At 3:20 of the song time display, is when Mike goes into the extended guitar solo. Horrible. Flat...out of key and he picks a few really bad notes, there. Listen at 3:20 ........3:46 .....and 3:48.


Man Of The Hour:

Listen for the bridge which starts a crescendo at around 2:18-2:20.

There's this annoying high-pitched feedback that starts at a very low volume, then slowly builds and peaks at the 2:28 mark of the song's time display; then kind of subsides but lingers for another 10 seconds or so as a high frequency distortion.

Annoying as hell! Such a beautiful song, played in an acoustically perfect venue and ruined by that:(



Thin Air:

Right after the first verse there's a pause (guitar break), at 0:56 on the song time display where Stone does this little riff; which leads into the next verse where Ed sings the " byzantine is reflected in our pond " verse.

Stone completely fucks up that riff and for the most part misses it. He made what seems like a desperate effort to fill something in; then decided to just wait out the timing pace. The audience even cheers the fuck up...lol.

Then right after the song ends, Stone actually plays the riff twice; as if to say..."See I can play it, I just fucked up...that's all" And Ed makes the comment about how the Hall is well known for revealing even the smallest fucks ups and that there was no way you weren't going to notice that one, lol.

NMyTree

luvnmuzic wrote:

I happens after the first chorus when Mike and Stone do that little guitar fill. It sounds like Mike plays it in the wrong key. Listen to the album version and compare it to BH. You can't not notice it after that.

No, not after the first chorus, after the first verse at the 0.56 mark on the song time display.

guertin32

good call...

NC_Irie

luvnmuzic wrote:

You must have noticed the mistake on Thin Air??? Ed comments about it after the song.

yeah, i did hear that one. but the others must be minor.

NC_Irie

NMyTree wrote:

All Or None:

Even the first short, bluesy guitar lead, after the first verse and chorus; is flat. But that's not the real fuck up.

At 3:20 of the song time display, is when Mike goes into the extended guitar solo. Horrible. Flat...out of key and he picks a few really bad notes, there. Listen at 3:20 ........3:46 .....and 3:48.


Man Of The Hour:

Listen for the bridge which starts a crescendo at around 2:18-2:20.

There's this annoying high-pitched feedback that starts at a very low volume, then slowly builds and peaks at the 2:28 mark of the song's time display; then kind of subsides but lingers for another 10 seconds or so as a high frequency distortion.

Annoying as hell! Such a beautiful song, played in an acoustically perfect venue and ruined by that:(



Thin Air:

Right after the first verse there's a pause (guitar break), at 0:56 on the song time display where Stone does this little riff; which leads into the next verse where Ed sings the " byzantine is reflected in our pond " verse.

Stone completely fucks up that riff and for the most part misses it. He made what seems like a desperate effort to fill something in; then decided to just wait out the timing pace. The audience even cheers the fuck up...lol.

Then right after the song ends, Stone actually plays the riff twice; as if to say..."See I can play it, I just fucked up...that's all" And Ed makes the comment about how the Hall is well known for revealing even the smallest fucks ups and that there was no way you weren't going to notice that one, lol.

man, thanks for taking the time and pointing out all these fuckups! now I hate BH!

just kidding. still think it rules.

deadmosquito

NMyTree wrote:

All Or None:

Even the first short, bluesy guitar lead, after the first verse and chorus; is flat. But that's not the real fuck up.

At 3:20 of the song time display, is when Mike goes into the extended guitar solo. Horrible. Flat...out of key and he picks a few really bad notes, there. Listen at 3:20 ........3:46 .....and 3:48.


Man Of The Hour:

Listen for the bridge which starts a crescendo at around 2:18-2:20.

There's this annoying high-pitched feedback that starts at a very low volume, then slowly builds and peaks at the 2:28 mark of the song's time display; then kind of subsides but lingers for another 10 seconds or so as a high frequency distortion.

Annoying as hell! Such a beautiful song, played in an acoustically perfect venue and ruined by that:(



Thin Air:

Right after the first verse there's a pause (guitar break), at 0:56 on the song time display where Stone does this little riff; which leads into the next verse where Ed sings the " byzantine is reflected in our pond " verse.

Stone completely fucks up that riff and for the most part misses it. He made what seems like a desperate effort to fill something in; then decided to just wait out the timing pace. The audience even cheers the fuck up...lol.

Then right after the song ends, Stone actually plays the riff twice; as if to say..."See I can play it, I just fucked up...that's all" And Ed makes the comment about how the Hall is well known for revealing even the smallest fucks ups and that there was no way you weren't going to notice that one, lol.

not to mention how badly offcourse "Masters of War" gets