Got a Powerbook and was checking the quality of different ripping
resolutions within iTunes. I had a CD player and the G4 patched into a
SSL console to match levels.
I noticed that "The Pearl" CD sounded strange, and saw on the SSL phase
meter that L-R were predominantly out of phase with each other,
throwing the meter into the negative side more often than the positive.
Switching one G4 channel 180 degrees out of phase made the tracks
sound much fuller overall.
That record is especially washy and deep with ringing reverbs that
throw the phase meter all over the place, but the melody piano notes
were swinging negative on the attack and sounded very thin when
listening in the "zone".
I checked also Nerve Net and Another Green World, and those tracks
sounded horrible through my phase-flipped channels. So did any of the
other albums already im****ted into iTunes, so the conversion to mp3 is
not to blame. The Pearl is the oddball. It sounds great with one
channel phase reversed.
I need to now compare the LP Pearl and see if that is the same as CD or
"in relative phase", and rip the rest of my Eno discs for comparison.
Any other Eno listener in a recording studio ever notice this? I
realize now that I am always doing something else when a Eno disc is
playing, and never really actively listening in the sweet spot.
Strange. . .
