MEGADETH - Remasters

[MR NINE]

Hi there!
Talking about mastering & remastering?!?!

I'm not sure if someone had already covered this subject or something on it?!?

What do you think about the sound of the Megadeth remasters?
Do these albums sound better than previous editions?...

 

[vile_ator]

Im going to pick one up. But god, I cant tell you how many times I get a re-master and am dissapointed. They often crank them so loud that they lose the feel of the original. I REALLY like the re master of Steely Dan, Aja. But what would you expect from Roger Nichols?

I tried Rush Moving Pictures, Iron Maiden Piece of Mind, Queensryche Rage for Order, Metallica, and others and I didnt like any of them. And thats even considering that the original CDs were transfered from the masters that were intended for LP's! With shit converters! Woah! And they always mastered LP's with the understanding of the limitations of the LP itself. The problem is now that every label demands that they get them LOUD and BRIGHT!

And the mastering engineers, just go ok cause they want the business and the label will go elsewhere. At least this is what I think happens. Or do you think that these great mastering engineers are so used to cranking everythig to the wall that they just do it and send it out? Could it be that we have come to this?

Colin

 

[SickBoy]

What do you think about the sound of the Megadeth remasters?
Do these albums sound better than previous editions?...

First, you should be aware that Megadeth released not just plain remasters but complete REMIXES of their albums and that's a whole another pair of shoes!
Dave Mustaine himself took all the original tapes and mixed them from scrap.
The result...well, I don't know really if it was worth it that much...

Peace Sells sounds absolutely fabulous IMO, now the guitars are meatier, the mix as a whole has a certain in-your-face quality, as opposed to that over-reverberated mush on the original recording. Needless to say, everything sounds much clearer, but I really couldn't extend my praises to the rest of the remixes...

Dave obviously triggered the drums, but did a very crappy job IMO. The hits have no dynamics whatsoever, it all sounds like a programmed machine with human played cymbals, awful.... It's the thing that bothers me the most on the new mixes, I really can't stand the triggered drums with all of the dynamics removed! Otherwise, it's not that bad, even some previously missing bits and pieces have now entered the mixes (intro to "In My Darkest Hour", for example). It's a bit too obvious and totally kills the feeling of a human drummer....

 

[MR NINE]

First, you should be aware that Megadeth released not just plain remasters but complete REMIXES of their albums and that's a whole another pair of shoes!
Dave Mustaine himself took all the original tapes and mixed them from scrap.
The result...well, I don't know really if it was worth it that much...

HI there Sickboy!
Well as far as I'm concerned I love the drumsound from "Peace Sells..." they sound big and raw!!! And I agree with you that the (original) global mix sounds a bit with too much reverb on it! But hey! That was the eighties sound! If you take Metal Church's "The Dark" and have a listen to that drums sound, heh?! Sounds big or what!?!?!
Anyway! I heard a mp3 file from "The Conjuring" and that drum intro that I love so much is completely dead!!! Fuck that! Where is the drummer? Where is Gar Samuelson??? Not there for sure!!!
That's why I'm an analogue fan and that's why I hate those recordings where there's triggered drums all over the place and sometimes even out of sync with the rest of the kit! (I mean overheads here)
So I leave a question here:
I'snt recording an art form?
And where is the natural sound of the instrument captured with a microphone?...
I know that metal is a particular kind of music, and I think its the hardest kind of music to record and mix, and that we use the new technologies to make it faster and easier, but hey! Don't loose the organics and the human feeling!

Just me thinking!... Correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

I'm just not very sure when you say that Metal is the hardest kind of music to record and mix. More accoustic sounding stuffs (where you can't trig a drumkit or layer 4 guitars tracks) seem much harder in my opinion, though I've never done any...

 

[Hopkins-WitchfinderGeneral]

I thought RiP sounded ok... as did Countdown...

I'm only saying OK tho.

 

[Nitronium Blood]

I wonder if Andy has had the time to have a listen to the remixes/remasters.

I wonder what Andy thinks of them.

 

[egan.]

I'm just not very sure when you say that Metal is the hardest kind of music to record and mix. More accoustic sounding stuffs (where you can't trig a drumkit or layer 4 guitars tracks) seem much harder in my opinion, though I've never done any...

It's all relative, but I've heard more than a few pros say that modern heavy music is a bitch to mix b/c of the mix desity. Certainly the mechanical nature of the music lends itself to more tricks than sparse acoustic stuff, but new problems are created. You have to find room for everything where in acoustic music here is much more 'space' to work with and the goal generally isn't the larger-than-life sound we've come to expect in metal productions.
All and all I'd say it's not a matter of difficulty so much as different goals and different techniques. Pardon my rant.

 

[DIOBOLIC5150]

With all that said, I think it's the most enjoyable music to mix and record. Look at the outcome. All you guys know what I mean... when you start with some dirty ass guitars, flat drums, dodgey vocals, muddy bass.... and turn it into something (at least in your own mind) that is totally epic sounding. The rewards seem greater than if you were to mic up an acoustic guitar and mix in some jazzy drums, ect. That's an easy task because you have so much space to fill. When you have 4 tracks of gained-out guitars, it's hard to find ENOUGH room to fit everything. I seem to spend more time making room than filling it up. That could be because I don't have a clue what I'm doing though.. hehe.

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

With all that said, I think it's the most enjoyable music to mix and record.

At least it's the most enjoyable music to listen to

 

[DIOBOLIC5150]

At least it's the most enjoyable music to listen to

Amen, brother!

 

[MR NINE]

It's all relative, but I've heard more than a few pros say that modern heavy music is a bitch to mix b/c of the mix desity. Certainly the mechanical nature of the music lends itself to more tricks than sparse acoustic stuff, but new problems are created. You have to find room for everything where in acoustic music here is much more 'space' to work with and the goal generally isn't the larger-than-life sound we've come to expect in metal productions.
All and all I'd say it's not a matter of difficulty so much as different goals and different techniques. Pardon my rant.

That's very right!!! There's a lot of things happen at the same time!
So, we can have 4/6 guitars, 1 lead guitar, 2 bass tracks, 10/14 tracks for drums, 2 vocals, keyboards (2 if stereo), maybe 1 acoustic guitar, 2 tracks for special stereo efx, etc, etc... you can end up with 32 tracks or more!!!... Then mix it and control everything in his right place and must sound good!
For my recording experience, recording and mixing metal it's hard work! that's for sure!
I've recorded, pop, rock, acoustic sets (ex: 2 guitars, 1 bass and singer -that's 4/6 tracks!) and as a metal fan myself, when I mix, I always take much more time to put it right and sounding good!!!

Cheers, Brett and Egan!

 

[Hellalpha]

I am pretty sure all the drums and cybals are actually Samuelson/Behler/Menza/deGrasso, apart from a replaced snare sample that seems to be prevalent through all records. Again I think there are traces of the original snare tracks on all the albums, whether he has just run the replaced snare simultaneously with the original or not.

I do think mustaine did a good job, because for me the snare sound seemed to be my biggest beef with ALL the records, exception c2e. So stylistic...especially that horrible 80's transposed noise snare thing they used on SFSGSW!!!

My beef with the remixes; you can hear the archetyping brought on by time stretching...you can hear this through youthanasia quite a bit!

 

[Hopkins-WitchfinderGeneral]

It's all relative, but I've heard more than a few pros say that modern heavy music is a bitch to mix b/c of the mix desity. Certainly the mechanical nature of the music lends itself to more tricks than sparse acoustic stuff, but new problems are created. You have to find room for everything where in acoustic music here is much more 'space' to work with and the goal generally isn't the larger-than-life sound we've come to expect in metal productions.
All and all I'd say it's not a matter of difficulty so much as different goals and different techniques. Pardon my rant.

Thats exactly why I've always said that metal mp3s should be as high a bitrate as possible, the density and outright volume means that a low rate encoded mp3 is going to compress the shit out of the high end and squelch the cymbals and what-not.

But re: what I said in your forum a few minutes ago... if needs must...

 

[the alumnus]

definetly the remastered killing is my business is worth getting. i kept my original version because it has the uncensored "these boots", but overall the sound is vastly different. the guitars are there where previously they fell out completely.

 

[Kazrog]

Dave made some interesting choices on some of these remixes. On the Poland/Samuelson era stuff it's great. After that things are far more questionable. I'm very happy that I own all of the originals and I would like to see them re-introduced at some point.