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Thread: Live performance v HiFi

  1. #21
    Join Date: Jan 2019

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bourneendboy View Post
    Union Chapel - amazing venue!

    If you rely on mates going with you, you will end up missing out - go on your own. I've had to do this many times as none of my mates like my music or don't like the live experience.
    I think you are right, but its usually better to share the good things in life.


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  2. #22
    Join Date: Apr 2008

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    Default Live performance v HiFi

    Quote Originally Posted by Bourneendboy View Post
    Union Chapel - amazing venue!

    If you rely on mates going with you, you will end up missing out - go on your own. I've had to do this many times as none of my mates like my music or don't like the live experience.
    Being an extreme metal fan as a kid, but no metaller friends, I hear ya! Loved going to gigs and festivals solo. Same with restaurants, funny how many people don’t feel comfortable on their own...
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  3. #23
    Join Date: May 2008

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    I have found that "Live" studio albums (sometimes with a small invited audience) can be very good and give a "being there" experience. No, they are not like the real thing, but as a few have said the real thing can be awful and painful in equal measures.

    I used to use an old Cambridge surround sound processor for watching DVDs (rear surround is not for me), but to take advantage of the Dolby processing and the Centre channel. Some music DVDs are really good IMO The Corrs Live (or not whatever your take on Live is) and Two Against Nature - Steel Dan (Live in a studio). They really come alive and the balance of musicians/voices is really good. I have played these from the stereo audio outs of a DVD player and they sound rubbish.

    Best live sound I have heard was at the Shepherds Bush Empire back in 2000.
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  4. #24
    Join Date: Feb 2014

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    Just have to say i have seen Alice Cooper many times over the years and always thought the sound was great and I can compare it to all the so called big names

  5. #25
    Join Date: Jun 2015

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    I'm Lawrence.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Macca View Post
    Except for pub gigs I must have been lucky because most of them I've been to the sound was pretty good. I think the main difference is volume and dynamics. At a Clapton gig back in '86 my mate turned to me as they kicked off the first tune and shouted 'I don't think I can take it if it is going to be this loud.' It was ludicrous, my ears were ringing for 3 days afterwards. It was so loud it was actually disorientating but it was a clean sound.

    If you could get that concert on CD what equipment would I need to get even close to replicating that level of clean volume? Of course the dynamics and sound pressure level could be done but you would need a big room and very big speakers and very powerful amps - kilowatts. And no neighbours nearby. Some people do run such systems domestically.

    But I think when people say they want a 'live' sound they don't mean loudness and dynamics. I think they mean that they want a bit of 'bite' to the sound. I'm talking rock or pop music here, classical or any totally acoustic music is another ballgame. I think we would all agree that the sound of a live rock band will have that bite.


    But what about when the band go in the studio an record and album? Do they aim to replicate their live sound? Mostly, no. And ironically when they do the sound quality of the album tends to get criticised for being poor - 'Definitely Maybe' by Oasis being a classic example. Their first attempt was a typical polished studio effort which they rejected because they sounded like 'fucking Dire Straits'.

    So they started again and attempted to get more of their live sound onto the record. Result: roundly slagged off by audiophiles for being a shit recording. These same audiophiles who are chasing a 'live sound'.


    So they want a live sound but they don't want the recording to deliver that. They want the recording perfectly clean with bell-like clarity. Then they use underpowered amplifiers that will be clipping half the time with a load of harmonic distortion and speakers that have no low bass (so they sound fast) and a big hump in the midrange so they have 'presence'.


    Any less than perfect recording will then sound unlistenable but really clean recordings like Dire Straits, Blue Nile etc will sound 'live' and still be listenable Cue many years of complaining about poor recording quality, bad production, cloth eared engineers and so on. And having the equipment dictate your music choices.


    Fact is most recordings are not of live performances and are not recorded or produced to sound like live performances. They are recorded and produced to sound good when you play them back on your hi-fi. That's what the supposedly cloth-eared engineers are aiming for. And 99.99% of the time they achieve it. So why have a system that tries to turn them into something they are not supposed to be?
    Good post

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  6. #26
    Join Date: Aug 2009

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lawrence001 View Post
    Good post
    I'm glad someone gets it. Seems like all I read on forums is people talking about 'poor recordings' when the reality is there are hardly any poor recordings. There's a variation in quality but that's not the same thing.
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  7. #27
    Join Date: Feb 2013

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    a good live recording can be decent and a poorer one pretty grim. The recent Carole King one in london, for an open air one is fairly good for instance, but it will never sound like an all studio production; and wont be any worse for it, just different..
    One of the best live gigs was the Jeff Goldblum one, but it was recorded in the studio with a live audience, hence the reason I guess.
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  8. #28
    Join Date: Aug 2009

    Location: Staffordshire, England

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    Sinatra Live at the Sands is the best live recording ever. Only one where I have felt like I am 'there' although that was after a few drinks. And even that is stitched together from various different nights.
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  9. #29
    Join Date: Feb 2013

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    Quote Originally Posted by Macca View Post
    Sinatra Live at the Sands is the best live recording ever. Only one where I have felt like I am 'there' although that was after a few drinks. And even that is stitched together from various different nights.
    ah, yes its terrific too as is the rat pack one
    Regards,
    Grant .... ؠ ......Don't be such a big girl's blouse

    I've said it before and I'll say it again: democracy simply-doesn't-work
    .... ..... ...... ...... ................... ..... ..... ..... ..... .....
    FIIO K7 BT, M11 PLUS, BTR7, KA5 - OPPO BDP-103D - PANASONIC UB450 - PANASONIC 4K ULTRA HD TV - PIXEL 6 - AVANTREE LR BLUETOOTH - 2* X600 SOUNDCORE - HEADPHONES INCLUDE, FIIO, NURAPHONES', FOCAL, OPPO, BOSE, CAMBRIDGE, BOWER & WILKINS, DEVIALET, MARSHALL, SONY, MITCHELL & JOHNSTON - 2*ZBOOK'S- MERCURY BD ROM, ROON, QOBUZ, TIDAL, PLEX, CYBERLINK, JRIVER - MULTI HDD'S -

    Oh my god! There's nothing wrong with the bidet is there?

    “Nothing discloses real character like the use of power. It is easy for the weak to be gentle. Most people can bear adversity. But if you wish to know what a man really is, give him power. This is the supreme test. It is the glory of Lincoln that, having almost absolute power, he never abused it, except on the side of mercy".

    “You see these dictators on their pedestals, surrounded by the bayonets of their soldiers and the truncheons of their police ... yet in their hearts there is unspoken fear. They are afraid of words and thoughts: words spoken abroad, thoughts stirring at home -- all the more powerful because forbidden -- terrify them. A little mouse of thought appears in the room, and even the mightiest potentates are thrown into panic.”

    "You don't have free will. You have the appearance of free will.”

    “There's a war out there, old friend. A world war. And it's not about who's got the most bullets. It's about who controls the information. What we see and hear, how we work, what we think... it's all about the information!”


    ***SMILE, BE HAPPY***

  10. #30
    Join Date: Oct 2008

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    Joe Bonemassa Live at Carnagie Hall is another really good live recording.

    Cello player, backing singers and Joe centre stage sound like they are playing in a live environment.
    A great listen.
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