If you've ever noticed how the audio in VT just doesn't sound right, this is for you.
http://www.prorec.com/prorec/articles.nsf/articles/8A133F52D0FD71AB86256C2E005DAF1C
Little something about RUSH's Vapor Trails
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loverickbass
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spencer
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jwr2
Vapor trails has some excellent music but I can't stand to listen to that CD ... everything is clipping ... it is embarrassingly bad ... I was just listening to an old recording of me playing in Dave Griggs blues band from 1980 and it was recorded with a cassette recorder and 2 mikes ... and it was better quality than vapor trails ...
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atomic_punk
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jwr2
there is no excuse for a band as big as Rush to put out a piece of **** excuse CD like vapor trails ... it is not in any way professional quality ... If I went into a studio and came out with **** like that I would spend the next week kicking the butt of the engineer for being incompentent ... every single track is clippling ... the honest thing for Rush to do would be to either refund the money to every one who bought that bad sounding CD or record it again and offer their fans an exchange ...
Rush sold us **** and took the money ...
How can a band so good produce something so bad???
Rush sold us **** and took the money ...
How can a band so good produce something so bad???
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loverickbass
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atomic_punk
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I didn't buy it, I burned it, so I guess I got what it was worth. Interesting that they want to put out a remaster of it.
Jeff, the songwriting, playing and arranging on the CD are Rush quality. The sound on the master is bad. Seeing them perform these songs live is the way to go.
Jeff, the songwriting, playing and arranging on the CD are Rush quality. The sound on the master is bad. Seeing them perform these songs live is the way to go.
"They make great f***'n basses". - Lemmy, NAMM 2009
The overall sound quality on that album is harsh, I have to agree.
Rush is a quality act with few/no peers.
However, the sound quality of this CD is different from the rest of their collection (IMHO).
That was an interesting article to read; if true, it explains a lot.
I do hope they remaster it and rerelease 'Vapor Trails'. I would enjoy hearing it in a more natural mix.
Rush is a quality act with few/no peers.
However, the sound quality of this CD is different from the rest of their collection (IMHO).
That was an interesting article to read; if true, it explains a lot.
I do hope they remaster it and rerelease 'Vapor Trails'. I would enjoy hearing it in a more natural mix.
Yeah I was pretty amazed at how Vapor Trails sounded. For my own personal use (and amusement) I did a hack "remaster" by ripping the tracks and runnng them through a couple "clean up" plugins on my home studio DAW. That eliminated about 90% of the crackling and digital distortion and made it somewhat less fatiguing to listen to, but man, that album is the worst case of ultra-squashed hard limiting I've ever heard. I'm looking forward to the proper remaster.
It's too bad because it's one of my favorite Rush albums of all time, songwise.
It's too bad because it's one of my favorite Rush albums of all time, songwise.
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loverickbass
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jwr2
I think the real story with vapor trails is that Neil was still grieving from the loss of family members and Alex and Geddy had limited access to him as a drummer ... they did the master tracks but the tracks were too hot ... they were all clipping ... so they did the best they could with the tracks ... so any remastering won't fix a clipped track ... the only thing to do is re-record it ... but then the original moment and energy of the original tracks will be lost ...
if you take your vapor trails cd and re-record it with eq setting all negative like -12db or so it will get better ... but it is almost impossible to listen to that CD and not get a headache ... bummer ... because underneath the clipping mess there is some good playing ...
if you take your vapor trails cd and re-record it with eq setting all negative like -12db or so it will get better ... but it is almost impossible to listen to that CD and not get a headache ... bummer ... because underneath the clipping mess there is some good playing ...
This was the first Pro-Tools style recording that Rush did as a band. I also burned VT off the 'net before it's release, and I thought the same thing--gritty. My store-bought copy sounds ever-so-slightly better....
I dunno if Geddy used Pro-Tools for 'My Favorite Headache', but it is a great mix, if not a little bass-heavy..nothing wrong with that..LOL
I dunno if Geddy used Pro-Tools for 'My Favorite Headache', but it is a great mix, if not a little bass-heavy..nothing wrong with that..LOL
Jeff,
IMHO, I can assure you that Rush don't have to go back to the recording studio to record the album again.
All they need to do is pay another $3000 (or none) to the mastering studio and engineer, and have the album's original mixes re-mastered. Simply put, nothing went wrong in the recording and mixing stages. The harshness in sound was not a result of bad recording and mixing and certainly had nothing to do with Neil's losing family members.
As a matter of fact, I don't think Rush was that "earless" and clueless to hire incompetent recording and mixing engineers for the production of "Vapor Trails". It takes only a few hours for an incompetent engineer to show his lack of professionality early on in the process. That could not escape the eyes and ears of each member of Rush and the producer of the album. A bad engineer would get fired by a big band like Rush on the very first day in the studio.
On the other hand, since the album was totally recorded on ProTools whose level metering system is so sensitive (red light warning at 3 or 6 dB before clipping as you specify in the setup preference page) and less tolerant to excessive levels (an excessively hot kick or bass signal sounds like garbage in ProTools and other digital formats while it sounds full and punchy on analog tapes), it's virtually impossible that the engineers were recording "too hot", causing sonic distortion and harshness, without knowing it, if he has eyes and ears.
Sometime last year, someone was playing the "Vapor Trail" CD in my studio, in the room where I mix actually, whose main Dynaudio M3 monitors could really reveal every nuance in sound. It was not a pleasant listening experience. I only listened to 3 songs and had to leave the room! The harshness and lack of dynamics in sound was a result of over-limiting as a way of pushing the overall level to be very loud on CD during the mastering stage (like forcefully squeezing 1000cc of water into a glass that could only contain 500cc. You either spill 500cc on the table or end up with undrinkable "heavy water" in the glass!)---the record company wanted it to be so LOUD that it could not have a chance of going "unnoticed" when any of the album's songs were played among music by other artists/bands on the radio, in record stores or in supermarkets. All the transients in the music were shaved off and harmonic distortion was occuring all over the place causing ear fatigue and even headaches to the listeners.
Wait for the re-mastered CD, Rush fans!
IMHO, I can assure you that Rush don't have to go back to the recording studio to record the album again.
All they need to do is pay another $3000 (or none) to the mastering studio and engineer, and have the album's original mixes re-mastered. Simply put, nothing went wrong in the recording and mixing stages. The harshness in sound was not a result of bad recording and mixing and certainly had nothing to do with Neil's losing family members. As a matter of fact, I don't think Rush was that "earless" and clueless to hire incompetent recording and mixing engineers for the production of "Vapor Trails". It takes only a few hours for an incompetent engineer to show his lack of professionality early on in the process. That could not escape the eyes and ears of each member of Rush and the producer of the album. A bad engineer would get fired by a big band like Rush on the very first day in the studio.
On the other hand, since the album was totally recorded on ProTools whose level metering system is so sensitive (red light warning at 3 or 6 dB before clipping as you specify in the setup preference page) and less tolerant to excessive levels (an excessively hot kick or bass signal sounds like garbage in ProTools and other digital formats while it sounds full and punchy on analog tapes), it's virtually impossible that the engineers were recording "too hot", causing sonic distortion and harshness, without knowing it, if he has eyes and ears.
Sometime last year, someone was playing the "Vapor Trail" CD in my studio, in the room where I mix actually, whose main Dynaudio M3 monitors could really reveal every nuance in sound. It was not a pleasant listening experience. I only listened to 3 songs and had to leave the room! The harshness and lack of dynamics in sound was a result of over-limiting as a way of pushing the overall level to be very loud on CD during the mastering stage (like forcefully squeezing 1000cc of water into a glass that could only contain 500cc. You either spill 500cc on the table or end up with undrinkable "heavy water" in the glass!)---the record company wanted it to be so LOUD that it could not have a chance of going "unnoticed" when any of the album's songs were played among music by other artists/bands on the radio, in record stores or in supermarkets. All the transients in the music were shaved off and harmonic distortion was occuring all over the place causing ear fatigue and even headaches to the listeners.
Wait for the re-mastered CD, Rush fans!
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jwr2