Desire Avenue

Back on 6th February 2007 the Capital label in the US re-released the soundtrack to the movie 'Wiiliam Shakespears Romeo & Juliet'.

With added tracks and a new design (& slipcase), the cd is now entitled 'Romeo & Juliet (10th anniversary edition).

The album of course includes Stina's 'Little Star' so lets hope new purchasers of the album are encouraged to check out Stina's other works.

Oh I'm glad it's been reissued, I love that remix of 'Talk Show Host' so I'll probably pick it up just for that.

the new purchasers better hurry up and buy Stina's catalogue before all of it is deleted.

It has already happened to "larger" artists like Suzanne Vega - in the US. That surprised me.

A sign of the times unfortunately.
With the decline in compact disc sales a lot of artists catalogue will be deleted as far as physical formats are concerned but no doubt will be made available as downloads.

This may well be the case with Independiente and the 'This Is Stina Nordenstam' album.....they could just be in the midst of changing over between physical and digital formats.

could be interesting for record companies : much less cost with only digital format... less interest for me also, but I think I'm already old fashioned now.

Franck wrote:t... less interest for me also, but I think I'm already old fashioned now.

same with me too.

The only thing i've ever dowloaded onto cd-r is Emma Nordenstam's My Space tracks and simply because they've not available to buy commercially.

But i don't like downloading stuff.........I'd always prefer factory manufactured (to a high quality) compact discs which I can then playback on my hi-fi equipment for bext possible sound reproduction.
Plus you get the professionally produced booklets/artwork too.

But sadly 'pop music- has been so dumbed down in recent years that most of todays younger generation don't care about sound quality so much as convenience. So long as they can listen to music on the move,they're more than happy to put up with sub-standard sound being pumped through crappy little ear pieces or tinny sounding PC speakers.

It would be nice to have both options so that everyone is happy but sadly it seems the majority of younger buyers and their preferred downloads are over shadowing the 'in the minority' old generation and their physical formats.

I can't blame the record companies because the profit margin must be a lot higher through their focusing on downloading.

I can quite see the time in the not too distant future where I will simply stop buying new music and instead simply only listen to my old collection of cds and tapes and records.

.............. none of which has beggar all to do with Romeo & Juliet.

RobB wrote:

Franck wrote:t... less interest for me also, but I think I'm already old fashioned now.

same with me too.

The only thing i've ever dowloaded onto cd-r is Emma Nordenstam's My Space tracks and simply because they've not available to buy commercially.

But i don't like downloading stuff.........I'd always prefer factory manufactured (to a high quality) compact discs which I can then playback on my hi-fi equipment for bext possible sound reproduction.
Plus you get the professionally produced booklets/artwork too.

But sadly 'pop music- has been so dumbed down in recent years that most of todays younger generation don't care about sound quality so much as convenience. So long as they can listen to music on the move,they're more than happy to put up with sub-standard sound being pumped through crappy little ear pieces or tinny sounding PC speakers.

It would be nice to have both options so that everyone is happy but sadly it seems the majority of younger buyers and their preferred downloads are over shadowing the 'in the minority' old generation and their physical formats.

I can't blame the record companies because the profit margin must be a lot higher through their focusing on downloading.

I can quite see the time in the not too distant future where I will simply stop buying new music and instead simply only listen to my old collection of cds and tapes and records.

.............. none of which has beggar all to do with Romeo & Juliet.

Rob,you know you can play the music on your computer through your HiFi system ?A lead out from the headphones jack and into the back of your amp works grand..I'm listening to mp3 stuff right now and it sounds fine to my old ears. [music]

Yeah, exactly. I don't really get this 'inferior sound' argument - you don't have to listen to downloaded music purely on your computer. I have quite a lot of downloaded music, but I still listen to it mainly on my hi-fi. And maybe my hearing is really bad or something, but I can't detect significant difference between 'official' CDs and burned CDs of high-rate mp3s. They sound the same, to me.

Personally I like the convenience of downloading music. I don't have a great need for official artwork, I'll only buy CDs now if it's an artist I really love and feel I should support. But if I can support them equally by buying a download, I'd prefer to do that. I think this is something that is still being negotiated by artists, how much they get paid for downloads, it's an issue that's part of this general evolution in how we consume music and how artists and record companies work with it.

Put it this way: if, when the new Stina album is released, there was an option to buy it as a download and Stina would receive the same payment for that as she would if I purchased a physical CD, I'd happily choose the download. To be honest, I wish that artists didn't have to get involved with record companies at all, cos they get ripped off massively. I'd love it if you could just go to an artist's own site, and pay them directly for a download.

barrett wrote:Rob,you know you can play the music on your computer through your HiFi system ?A lead out from the headphones jack and into the back of your amp works grand..I'm listening to mp3 stuff right now and it sounds fine to my old ears. [music]

I didn't know that but I really shouldn't be surprised,almost anything is possible today with technology.
But quite apart from the fact that my hi-fi system and computer are opposite ends of the house from each other,I think i'd still rather be an old stick in the mud and stick to my cds.

Nothing wrong with that, as you say the ideal situation would be if people continued to have both options - I'm sure lots of people feel the way you do, Rob. It remains to be seen whether CDs will survive as a format in the long run, I think much depends on how sensible the record companies decide to be. At the moment, they don't seem to grasp that by refusing to give up a percentage of their profits from CD sales (by significantly reducing the retail price, a move which I'm sure would do a great deal to revive interest), they stand to lose all those profits because the format itself will die back the way vinyl did, to the point where only a very small minority of people are still willing to pay for it.

The only thing that will save CDs now is a big reduction in the retail price of new releases, I suspect.

There IS a difference between an mp3 and a conventional CD sound file,eg WAV which is used for CDs.
An mp3 is compressed-ie a significant amount of sonic information is taken off to reduce the size of the file.This is usually at the extremes of the frequency range-low and high,so that it appears at first that there's no difference.But you would notice it on very good hifi,or more particularly through big speakers,especially at the bass end,which appears to be lacking in sheer physical clout.If you play an LP,on superior hifi,of ,say,Harry Partch's 'Delusion of the Fury',for which he invented instruments capable of playing frequencies below the lowest notes on a keyboard,for instance,the bass sound is spectacularly different from an mp3 of the same.
Here's an article I've copied from a sound expert:-
'MP3s are good files to use for the uploading of your audio discs. These compressed files are small in comparison to WAV files, thus making them ideal for uploading, please note however the MP3s are ½ the sample rate of CD quality. The audio reproduced from an MP3 file is difficult for the average ear to differentiate from the same audio played back from a standard CD. The best reproduction is accomplished by using WAV files. These files are generally 40 to 50 MB in size each. Uploading 4 or 5 WAV files is quite feasible.

There is a difference in quality between the two audio formats. The .mp3 format was designed for quicker file transfers over the internet. It is lossy data compression; meaning "insignificant" data is removed thereby decreasing the file size to approximately 1/7th of the original file size.

To the common ear, the difference in audio quality is negligible. To an audio engineer, or someone who listens intently to music often, there will definitely be a significant/noticeable loss in quality. There is normally a degradation in:

1) the clarity of the upper frequencies and

2) the "punchy-ness" of the lower frequencies.

Also, depending on the quality of the conversion, and bit-rate and sample-rate used, sometimes a noticeable "phaser" effect is introduced.

The downside to working with. wav files is the significant increase in file size. Uploading this type of a file will result in a much longer transfer time when uploading.

The answer to the question, "Is there a difference between the two formats?", is "yes". Is the difference noticeable? That depends on the listener and how "good" their speakers and listening environment are.'

The other thing about mp3s is-if you've ever been to a party where the dance music is coming from someone's iPod,it just doesn't hack it in the bass thrutch division.

Anyway,all of this is,as RobB said,a long way from R + J.

Oh I'm not disputing that there is a technical difference between CD quality and mp3, Dave, just saying that I don't really hear it. I have average hearing and a reasonable, but not hugely expensive/advanced hi-fi system, and the difference in audio quality is not apparent to me. Given that most people don't have very high-end systems, or an acute interest in the technicalities of sound, I'd imagine most are not overly bothered by the issue, as is evidenced by the huge growth in downloading digital files. If the mp3s I'm listening to on my hi-fi sound the same as the official cd, does it bother me that there's a technical difference? Well, no. As long as I'm enjoying listening to my music, I don't care about the finer points that would distress an audiophile.

The only difference I can actually hear between formats is vinyl v. cd. I can even hear it in the leaked mp3s of Tori's new album - the ones I have were recorded from the vinyl release which is apparently very high quality vinyl, and even converted to mp3 they sound fuller and richer somehow than the CD tracks ripped to mp3. So much so that I prefer them to the official CD.

Well yes,were it not for a) the inconvenience, and b)the 'noises off' (scratches,dust etc),records win over CDs every time insofar as sound goes,to these ears.Although it kinda depends on the music a bit-anything using acoustic or orchestral instruments invariably sounds better on LP,but then,so does heavy metal.
I'm no audiophile either,and am happy to use mp3s for much of the time,but I CAN tell the difference,and I like to have CD quality available for favourite music.Plus I do like nice artwork etc-another area where LPs win hands down.

But then I too am old-fashioned,and listening habits and practices are changing at an incredible rate.Even the terminology-everything is described as a 'song' these days,be it a classical piano concerto movement or a piece of industrial noise.

robb wrote: But quite apart from the fact that my hi-fi system and computer are opposite ends of the house from each other

Ah ha ,thats why i bought a laptop,so i can move it to whereever its needed-a moveable feast of sound [music] ,and ,of course,so i could see the swirly smoky bit around the DA logo