Friday, March 11, 2011

Vol. I No. 8

I would like in this entry to give the reader a sort of guide to distinguishing all-analog recordings from recordings that have been digitally processed at some point during production.

The critical year, as best I have been able to determine, seems to be 1984. Prior to that year, one could buy vinyl and cassette offerings from major labels with a pretty good probability that one was getting a record that had never been digitalized.

It would be nice to be able to know what the specific practices were at the manufacturing facilities of the various major labels. What year was it that each manufacturer for the first time began using a digital signal processor at some point in the process of the cutting of the master stamper? Likewise in regard to the production of the master tapes: at what time did each studio or re-mixing or post-production facility incorporate digital processing gear as a matter of course in the sequence of production processes?

The reader needs to understand that the vinyl or cassette you buy at the second-hand shop may have markings to indicate it was produced in 1972 or 1981, and yet that particular copy of the recording might very well be a re-released or re-issued version produced at a much later date and therefore subjected to processing by digital equipment. Likewise in your own present collection and among recordings in analog format that you may have heard while out and about, you may not have been dealing with truly analog audio.

Conveniently, in many cases a determination can be made by means of the packaging of the record. Re-issued versions will lack the elaborate artwork on the inner sleeve or J-card which characterizes the original releases.

In the case of vinyl and cassettes currently being produced, I urge readers to petition the labels to certify their products are all-analog.

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