Sonic Attack -No Ducking!

[Darrin McKeehen]

Dennis here......HA!HA!HA!  (said w/ the most menacing voice...)

Actually, it's Darrin. And NO attack here ;)

First off, Andy G. you are one cool dude. Great responses!

OK, so here goes!

I did a little Sound Quality test last night between:
(1) Kings of Speed
(2) Glastonbury '90
(3) Milton Keynes '99

All 3 are audience recordings of would be bootleg "nature". So, it's apples
and apples.

For reference, these CD's were played through my stereo:
12 year old ADCOM GPF-555 amp and preamp
5 year old California Audio Lab ICON mkII
9 year old Boston Acoustic speakers

Kings of Speed sounds the best of the 3. Actually, quite a bit. This is
obviously from analog source and quite possible not 1st generation. There is
some noise and hiss in the high end, possibly from a generation or 2 before
making it to disc or dirty or misaligned heads. This is not really any
distraction, however. All in all, this is a fine recording despite one minor
cut.  If you want a scale: it's a 9 or a solid A. Get it, if you can! Could
be a tough one to find....

Glastonbury '90 and MK '99 are actually comparable in sound quality, if you
have MK' 99, but have been holding out on G'90. So I'll compare them.

G'90 has plenty of bottom end, but it's a little muddy. There seems to be a
bit of compression in the vocals. This makes them sound a little weird. I
know, I know.... you guys like things of the weird. So lets say, the vocals
don't sound quite natural sometimes,probably from the mike and not fixable.
But not too bad.

The vocals come across a little better on MK'99. The instruments are a
little easier to distinguish on MK '99, as well. Both recordings probably
came from cassette. Hand held cassette recorder? Stereo mike?

Assuming that the PA system for G'90 was better than the MK'99 PA (I was not
at these shows, sadly) The equipment used for MK'99 was probably better than
the equipment for G'90. It would be interesting to find out the source info.
Anybody?

There's a bit of talking on both. Maybe more on G'90. Not too bad in that
area, however. Obviously, both recordings were made for personal enjoyment
and not originally intended for public consumption.

I would say that G'90 sounds like MK'99 would if it were run through a phat
studio mixer /soundboard w/ nice parametric equalizers, but that's not
really fair. I think that if that were the case MK'99 would get the nod.
Dan, did a great job w/ this one. Only the taper of MK'99 could say if the
CD-R sounds better than his master recording.

So G'90 has a little more presence and punch that come from it's
"professional" release. MK'99 is a little clearer w/o quite as much  punch.

If you want a scale: G'90 is a 7 or B. MK'99 is 7.5 or B/B+.

If you are happy w/ MK'99, you should be happy w/ G'90.

Different musicians, different songs etc. Different topic.

I hope this helps any fence riders.

Any source info would for any of these shows would be appreciated.

Also, what is the actual date and venue for Kings of Speed?

Darrin

np: Djam Karet -Live At Orion
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