Also, I noted in another post that Parade was issued on CD in April 1986, the same year it came out on the vinyl, or at least that's what the New York Times announced at the time:

http://www.nytimes.com/19...arity.html

I don't think I started buying Prince music on CD until the very end of the decade. But Prince and his engineers were certainly aware of CDs by the time SOTT was released. The vinyl may still sound better, but that doesn't mean that the original SOTT CD is a completely inauthentic version of the album.

Sorry to keep going on about this if others aren't interested... This discussion reminds me of the talk about whether certain albums from the late 1960s are better in mono or stereo. It partly depends on what you want to hear. Do you want to hear what most people heard in 1967 when mono was still the dominant format? Or do you want to hear what sounds better to those of us who have grown up listening to stereo? Would you even like to hear a remix that sounds more like the music was recorded yesterday? If your preference is for the latter, you're not hearing what the artists intended you to hear when they released the record. But if you like it better, maybe you don't care.

Take the example of Frank Zappa. The original CD pressings of his 1960s albums (particularly "We're Only In It For the Money") are mercilessly trashed by those who grew up hearing muddy censored versions on vinyl. He not only remixed the album but re-recorded certain tracks because he wasn't satisfied with the original performances. But I got interested in his music when it was released on CD, and I didn't know I wasn't supposed to like them until later. When they came out with a new CD version that sounded like the original 1968 version, with some parts censored and some sloppy playing, I bought it, and it was interesting to hear. But I kept my original pressing CDs and I still listen to those.

With regard to Lovesexy, if you listen to the original CD pressing today, you might think it sounds too thin and is missing the rich sound of vinyl. But maybe that's what Prince wanted? Digital music was the cool new thing in 1988. He starts the album by noting how clear his voice sounds (though he attributes that to something other than the mastering ). Maybe he wanted the album to sound sort of digital. We might want to hear a different Lovesexy now, and maybe Prince should give it to us. But if Lovesexy was released in a CD format in 1988, the CD may reflect Prince's original vision of the album just as much as the vinyl. So Prince's CD pressings from the second half of the 1980s may be the equivalent of the original mono mixes of late 1960s albums. They may sound bad to us but that may be, at least in part, because our tastes have changed.

Now, when you talk about the albums that were released initially on vinyl and cassette and only came out on CD a few years later, there's no question in my view that the vinyl versions are more authentic. That may explain why the vinyl reissues in the pipeline are DM, Controversy and 1999 and not the post-Purple Rain albums.

Dirty Mind

electricberet said:

Sorry to keep going on about this if others aren't interested... This discussion reminds me of the talk about whether certain albums from the late 1960s are better in mono or stereo. It partly depends on what you want to hear. Do you want to hear what most people heard in 1967 when mono was still the dominant format? Or do you want to hear what sounds better to those of us who have grown up listening to stereo? Would you even like to hear a remix that sounds more like the music was recorded yesterday? If your preference is for the latter, you're not hearing what the artists intended you to hear when they released the record. But if you like it better, maybe you don't care.

Take the example of Frank Zappa. The original CD pressings of his 1960s albums (particularly "We're Only In It For the Money") are mercilessly trashed by those who grew up hearing muddy censored versions on vinyl. He not only remixed the album but re-recorded certain tracks because he wasn't satisfied with the original performances. But I got interested in his music when it was released on CD, and I didn't know I wasn't supposed to like them until later. When they came out with a new CD version that sounded like the original 1968 version, with some parts censored and some sloppy playing, I bought it, and it was interesting to hear. But I kept my original pressing CDs and I still listen to those.

This is why I want SOTT to stay how it is and would rather have 1999 remastered.

SOTT.

electricberet said:

I'm not sure that we will ever get any CD remasters, or at least ones that I would want to buy. If Prince is in charge all by himself, we may get edited, censored, or re-recorded versions, which would not interest me at all (unless they came with cool artwork or previously unknown bonus tracks).

Prince is not going to do that (change them).

electricberet said:

Sorry to keep going on about this if others aren't interested... This discussion reminds me of the talk about whether certain albums from the late 1960s are better in mono or stereo. It partly depends on what you want to hear. Do you want to hear what most people heard in 1967 when mono was still the dominant format? Or do you want to hear what sounds better to those of us who have grown up listening to stereo? Would you even like to hear a remix that sounds more like the music was recorded yesterday? If your preference is for the latter, you're not hearing what the artists intended you to hear when they released the record. But if you like it better, maybe you don't care.

Take the example of Frank Zappa. The original CD pressings of his 1960s albums (particularly "We're Only In It For the Money") are mercilessly trashed by those who grew up hearing muddy censored versions on vinyl. He not only remixed the album but re-recorded certain tracks because he wasn't satisfied with the original performances. But I got interested in his music when it was released on CD, and I didn't know I wasn't supposed to like them until later. When they came out with a new CD version that sounded like the original 1968 version, with some parts censored and some sloppy playing, I bought it, and it was interesting to hear. But I kept my original pressing CDs and I still listen to those.

With regard to Lovesexy, if you listen to the original CD pressing today, you might think it sounds too thin and is missing the rich sound of vinyl. But maybe that's what Prince wanted? Digital music was the cool new thing in 1988. He starts the album by noting how clear his voice sounds (though he attributes that to something other than the mastering ). Maybe he wanted the album to sound sort of digital. We might want to hear a different Lovesexy now, and maybe Prince should give it to us. But if Lovesexy was released in a CD format in 1988, the CD may reflect Prince's original vision of the album just as much as the vinyl. So Prince's CD pressings from the second half of the 1980s may be the equivalent of the original mono mixes of late 1960s albums. They may sound bad to us but that may be, at least in part, because our tastes have changed.

Now, when you talk about the albums that were released initially on vinyl and cassette and only came out on CD a few years later, there's no question in my view that the vinyl versions are more authentic. That may explain why the vinyl reissues in the pipeline are DM, Controversy and 1999 and not the post-Purple Rain albums.

From what I understand it was not Prince's decision to have the pre Batman albums sound that way. It was because Warners didn't use a correct master format for the CD's. They used the same master that was used to make the records. At least that's the lore.

In my opinion the most muddy mid-toned album is Black Album. It is in need of remastering more than SOTT. And I mean even listening to the Warners issued vinyl! In this case, yes maybe Prince was trying to make it sound a certain bootleg way, since the vinyl sounds off too.

SOTT...........is this a trick question?

Sign O' The Times

gyoung said:

Sign "O" The Times hands down.

I must go with SOTT.

Has DMSR been remastered yet? If not...that'd be the one, thank you.

funkycoolmasina said:

Has DMSR been remastered yet? If not...that'd be the one, thank you.

DMSR was apparently mastered for CD at a different time than the rest of 1999. My CD of 1999 was missing DMSR, but later pressings included it. I seem to recall some who owned the later pressing saying that DMSR sounds louder than the rest of the album.

electricberet said:

funkycoolmasina said:

Has DMSR been remastered yet? If not...that'd be the one, thank you.

DMSR was apparently mastered for CD at a different time than the rest of 1999. My CD of 1999 was missing DMSR, but later pressings included it. I seem to recall some who owned the later pressing saying that DMSR sounds louder than the rest of the album.

Oh...okay.

Prince

Planet Earth or "Rave"

xlr8r said:

electricberet said:

Sorry to keep going on about this if others aren't interested... This discussion reminds me of the talk about whether certain albums from the late 1960s are better in mono or stereo. It partly depends on what you want to hear. Do you want to hear what most people heard in 1967 when mono was still the dominant format? Or do you want to hear what sounds better to those of us who have grown up listening to stereo? Would you even like to hear a remix that sounds more like the music was recorded yesterday? If your preference is for the latter, you're not hearing what the artists intended you to hear when they released the record. But if you like it better, maybe you don't care.

Take the example of Frank Zappa. The original CD pressings of his 1960s albums (particularly "We're Only In It For the Money") are mercilessly trashed by those who grew up hearing muddy censored versions on vinyl. He not only remixed the album but re-recorded certain tracks because he wasn't satisfied with the original performances. But I got interested in his music when it was released on CD, and I didn't know I wasn't supposed to like them until later. When they came out with a new CD version that sounded like the original 1968 version, with some parts censored and some sloppy playing, I bought it, and it was interesting to hear. But I kept my original pressing CDs and I still listen to those.

This is why I want SOTT to stay how it is and would rather have 1999 remastered.

I have done some more research and learned that Purple Rain was the first Prince album to be released on CD the same year as its vinyl release. So, your initial intuition regarding 1999 makes a lot of sense: it was the last Prince album that we know for certain was mastered exclusively with analog formats in mind.