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Topic: Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered (Read 29520 times) previous topic - next topic
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Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Iron Maiden have announced that their new upcoming album titled "A Matter of Life and Death" will not be mastered in any way. This means that there will be no processing done-best of all NO COMPRESSION.

I hope more and more artists realize the futility of engaging in the "Loudness Race" and start producing some good sounding CDs. As for me, I am ecstatic!!!

UPDATE: You can check out the music video of their first single here. Well, this is a streamed video and the sound might be encoded at very low bitrates, however, I love the way it sounds. You can hear Bruce's amazing voice clearly and I swear Nicko's drums never sounded better on any of their previous albums. If this video is an indication of the sound quality of the upcoming album, I can safely say that we finally have a GREAT sounding Iron Maiden album!

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #1 –
Wow a new Iron Maiden album AND they even say they didn't use dynamic compression.  Its like Christmas!

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #2 –
Quote from: rohangc on
Iron Maiden have announced that their new upcoming album titled "A Matter of Life and Death" will not be mastered. in any way. This means that there will be processing done-best of all NO COMPRESSION.



Actually, it means there will be no ADDED EQ, fx, etc beyond what was applied during tracking and mixdown.
This does not rule out compression  by any means.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #3 –
Sounds like a terrible idea.  I'm no fan of current commercial CD mastering practices, but that does not mean all mastering is bad.  What they should do is just get a good mastering engineer and tell him that he doesn't need compete on volume.  Good mastering can make an album gel together and frame an album to make it a cohesive whole.  There's a huge gap between what sounds good in the studio and what sounds good at home or in headphones.  Good mastering can help make the minute details that are easily resolvable in $25k studio monitors apparent to the boombox listener.  I appreciate IM's intent but there are better ways to get where they want to go.  And as an engineer, I'll be the first to tell you that heavy compression is one of the cornerstones of the rock n' roll sound.  It used to be done with tubes and tape, but nowadays everyone thinks they can run a turd thru a Finalizer and have a golden egg.  Nevertheless, I hope you enjoy it.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #4 –
Embarassingly, I've never really heard Iron Maiden. However, I've thought about buying some stuff by them before and this new album will probably be where I start - if only to hear what it sounds like!

About the compression, the page did say: "[. . .] you will get to hear the new album exactly as it sounded in the studio, no added EQ, compression, analog widening, etc. [. . .]"

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #5 –
I guess this means that the automatic compressor devices that all broadcasts are routed through at the radio stations (are there any still play Iron Maiden?) will be working overtime? 

-brendan

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #6 –
Quote from: dv1989 on
Embarassingly, I've never really heard Iron Maiden. However, I've thought about buying some stuff by them before and this new album will probably be where I start - if only to hear what it sounds like!"

If you're interested in hearing Iron Maiden, either Number of the Beast or Piece of Mind would be the best place to start IMO, but I like the first two albums just as much.  I've had a really hard time getting into anything after Seventh Son although the one before it, Somewhere in Time, has got to be one of their weakest releases.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #7 –
Cool, thanks for the tip.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #8 –
ugh, I hope you won't be unpleasantly surprised.
a real unmastered hardrock recording sounds godawful
at best you will get something like The Misfits "Earth A.D." or Black Flag "Wasted.. Again"

To the person who never heard Maiden: listen to "Piece of Mind" or "Powerslave" first
Iron Maiden is not for everyone I guess, it was a kinda 80's youth thing when you hung around with friends drinking beer, where one half wore Maiden T-shirts and the other half Motörhead.
Looking back I wonder how many really liked those bands. I can't stand listening to that "cool" stuff anymore, while real quality acts like Metallica, Sabbath, AC/DC etc still live up.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #9 –
needs more cowbell

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #10 –
Will this be somehting like live broadcast recordings ? (sorry if this is not the right term) Porcupine Tree's broadcast albums XM, XMII and Warszawa sound very good without mastering. But maybe i'm mistaken and this is a different situation

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #11 –
Hhmm... I hope they mean 'good old quality as it was before the loudness war' and not 'completely uncompressed' or 'completely unmastered'. The latter two usually mean irritating-sound-that-is-very-tiresome-to-hear-for-more-than-15-minutes-and-needs-the-hand-permanently-on-the-volume-knob-during-listening.
Every night with my star friends / We eat caviar and drink champagne
Sniffing in the VIP area / We talk about Frank Sinatra
Do you know Frank Sinatra? / He's dead

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #12 –
Quote
needs-the-hand-permanently-on-the-volume-knob-during-listening.

Well, that's what replaygain for

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #13 –
Quote from: LaserSokrates on
Quote
needs-the-hand-permanently-on-the-volume-knob-during-listening.

Well, that's what replaygain for

No, RG won't help because it doesn't compress. Within the same song intro's will probably be too soft and loud parts too loud if you don't keep adjusting it by hand while playing. Too much dynamics is just as undesirable as too little.
Every night with my star friends / We eat caviar and drink champagne
Sniffing in the VIP area / We talk about Frank Sinatra
Do you know Frank Sinatra? / He's dead

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #14 –
Quote from: sony666 on
ugh, I hope you won't be unpleasantly surprised.
a real unmastered hardrock recording sounds godawful
at best you will get something like The Misfits "Earth A.D." or Black Flag "Wasted.. Again"


Haha.  I doubt it will be as bad as Earth A.D.  Thats unlistenable, but mostly because they appear to have recorded it in someone's garage using a casaset tape and a pair of headphones jammed in a mic jack.

I think this will be a little better then that since they have a real studio, better source material, etc.

Quote from: Maurits on
Quote from: LaserSokrates on

Quote
needs-the-hand-permanently-on-the-volume-knob-during-listening.

Well, that's what replaygain for

No, RG won't help because it doesn't compress. Within the same song intro's will probably be too soft and loud parts too loud if you don't keep adjusting it by hand while playing. Too much dynamics is just as undesirable as too little.


You ever listen to concert bootlegs?  I do and I don't have a real problem with it.  Its not that big of a deal for most music.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #15 –
Quote from: greynol on
If you're interested in hearing Iron Maiden, either Number of the Beast or Piece of Mind would be the best place to start IMO, but I like the first two albums just as much.  I've had a really hard time getting into anything after Seventh Son although the one before it, Somewhere in Time, has got to be one of their weakest releases.


You can also try listening to their last two albums "Brave New World" and "Dance of Death". The album is supposed to sound more like these two albums than the vintage ones mentioned above. Don't get me wrong-the new albums are different but they are AMAZING imo.

Don't even think of getting "No Prayer for The Dying" and "Fear of the Dark". They are the band's worst albums.

Quote from: sony666 on
Iron Maiden is not for everyone I guess, it was a kinda 80's youth thing when you hung around with friends drinking beer, where one half wore Maiden T-shirts and the other half Motörhead.
Looking back I wonder how many really liked those bands. I can't stand listening to that "cool" stuff anymore, while real quality acts like Metallica, Sabbath, AC/DC etc still live up.


Well, contrary to what you say, Iron Maiden was never about being 'cool'. There was a time when they were famous but the fame was well deserved.

Metallica still lives upto your expectations? Well, they sure didn't live up to anyone's expectations when they released St. Anger. I hope their upcoming album is better than that. However, I have seen more people being fans of Metallica, Sabbath and AC/DC than Iron Maiden although it is difficult to tell which band is better than the rest. Hence for me, 'Cool' is Metallica. We all have a right to our own opinions. No harm intended.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #16 –
Yeah I'm not sure how 20 minute tracks about  Samuel Coleridge poems or other sorts of obscure historical stuff made them cool.  It definately made the interesting, but cool doesn't sound right.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #18 –
Quote from: Maurits on
No, RG won't help because it doesn't compress. Within the same song intro's will probably be too soft and loud parts too loud if you don't keep adjusting it by hand while playing. Too much dynamics is just as undesirable as too little.


True, but mixing is the stage where that issue should be addressed. As long as it was mixed properly, the intersong dyanmics should be ok.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #19 –
I guess I'm the only one here that really loves Earth A.D. despite the flawed quality of the recording.
"Have you ever been with a woman? It's like death. You moan, you scream and then you start to beg for mercy, for salvation"

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #20 –
Quote from: Societal Eclipse on
I guess I'm the only one here that really loves Earth A.D.


No.
You would be surprised how many Ghouls there are everywhere you go

About Iron Maiden and Metallica etc.
I can still listen to Kill 'em All or ...Justice and enjoy them today after 20 years.

Just a little ago I really tried to listen to Maiden again after years so I re-ripped Piece of Mind.

"where eagles dare" is some cheesy hooray England world war 2 song (I think)
"revelations" is an even more cheesy Christian song
"flight of icarus" is decent, some fanatasy/greek mythology stuff
"die with your boots on", "the trooper" more hooray for England militaria
after that I remember there were some juvenile fantasy songs, one about the movie Dune, and aborted the mission back into my youth. What was I thinking back then

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #21 –
Quote from: rohangc on
Well, contrary to what you say, Iron Maiden was never about being 'cool'. There was a time when they were famous but the fame was well deserved.

Metallica still lives upto your expectations? Well, they sure didn't live up to anyone's expectations when they released St. Anger. I hope their upcoming album is better than that. However, I have seen more people being fans of Metallica, Sabbath and AC/DC than Iron Maiden although it is difficult to tell which band is better than the rest. Hence for me, 'Cool' is Metallica. We all have a right to our own opinions. No harm intended.


I would agree with you. I think Iron Maiden were quite good. I still listen to their albums quite often (Powerslave, Number Of The Beast, Piece Of Mind, Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son are faves). Metallica were great, but lately their albums really haven't been much to write home about. Metallica by Metallica and ...And Justice For All can be listened to without ever getting bored 

audiomars

edit: typo (as usual)
Reason is immortal, all else mortal
- Pythagoras

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #22 –
Quote from: sony666 on
Just a little ago I really tried to listen to Maiden again after years so I re-ripped Piece of Mind.

"where eagles dare" is some cheesy hooray England world war 2 song (I think)
"revelations" is an even more cheesy Christian song
"flight of icarus" is decent, some fanatasy/greek mythology stuff
"die with your boots on", "the trooper" more hooray for England militaria
after that I remember there were some juvenile fantasy songs, one about the movie Dune, and aborted the mission back into my youth. What was I thinking back then

Actually it's about the book Dune, which I believe is still appraised by many. Otherwise you are right, of course

I actually think I might enjoy the upcoming Iron Maiden release. I've listened so much unmastered black metal that no mere Iron Maiden recording can scare me.

I don't agree that unmastered hard rock/metal sounds horrible. I rather enjoyed the overall sound when I played guitar in a metal band and found our rehearsal tape recorded with one room mic to have superior sound to 90% of my metal collection. Not superior sound quality, but superior sound. The kind of stuff you find on the Burzum/Aske album or Led Zeppelin's Houses of the Holy. It's a sound I might characterize "organic" or "ambient"

It's kind of fun to think that nowadays they have high-sampling rate, high-resolution multitrack digital recording gear, powerful postprocessing computers and advanced microphone technology and still 30 years ago with their ancient gear they made rock albums that sounded infinitely better than today. Yay to technology!

Edit:

I forgot to mention: it seems that Iron Maiden is now officially the first (and hopefully not the last) pop/rock band that used the lack of mastering as a marketing gimmick. These guys always surprise me, you'd think that this band would be dead by now but still year after year they always come up with something to keep them on the charts. It's the Band That Wouldn't Die.

Upcoming Iron Maiden album will not be mastered

Reply #24 –
Quote from: Mike Giacomelli on
Haha.  I doubt it will be as bad as Earth A.D.  Thats unlistenable, but mostly because they appear to have recorded it in someone's garage using a casaset tape and a pair of headphones jammed in a mic jack.

Funny that you should mention this. A lot of beginner bands in my neighbourhood actually used The Mighty Earbuds Hanging From The Ceiling technique. Some stuff that they came up with actually sounds better than modern studio albums