Miles Davis - CD, Lp, pressings comparisons

Interesting stuff. I have Cookin' and Steamin' on a Fantasty twofer and just love it. Fat and juicy, more metal in the horn that most recordings of this deliver, as the Harmon mute tends to deephasize this characteristic. My King Japanese pressing of Something Else is good, but not as good. And my Columbia six-eyes of Kind of Blue and Sketches of Spain kill the later Columbia (non-digital) LP reissues. I have a Capitol second pressing LP of The Birth Of The Cool which is nowhere near as good as the same record in the Van Gelder "Great Sessions" CD box. Second Volume 1 and Volume 2 which sound quite a bit better in the box than the Japanese LP versions. Tough though, I am dealing with different recordings. In the end, any Miles is just great. I can vividly remember seeing him at Carnegie Hall in the late 70s.

More comparisons to report on my end: I compared an early Bitches Brew Lp to the recent version of Bitches Brew on CD (from the Complete Bitches Brew sessions set). Both were very good, very listenable. The Lp had a bit less bass, and the treble was softer, very natural, and easy on the ears. The soundstage was wide, and there was good midrange warmth. The CD, on the other hand, was as good as CDs get. As with the later Prestige release of Bag's Groove, described above, it was as if the engineers/producers recognized the ways in which CDs can annoy, and "tuned" the production to avoid that. The treble was crisper than the Lp, but not annoying. The bass on the CD was better grounded than the Lp. The soundstage was a hair narrower, but quite good, and the midrange was warm and cozy. The highs on CDs can sound somewhat artificial and "splatty" (to me)...there was almost none of that on this CD. Finally, if this CD was missing the detail of the Lp, it was not particularly noticeable. I just got caught up in the music. (What I did was started Pharoah's Dance on the Lp and CD at the same time, and just switched back and forth. Not very scientific, but good fun.)

Try the hybird SACD of blue. Amazing sound in that it recreates the original master tapes three channel mono capture, no mixing. This assumes you have a three channel set up. You play it as it was. I have the other cd's and lp's and they all do not match the hybird. The sound stage, depth of image is so real.

Oh yes, Bitches Brew, I have both the standard and Quad LP pressings and the Quad has pretty much more of everything.

The Mosiac 200 gram Vinyl box set from the Bitches Brew Sessions are outstanding too.