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JohnVo
Inspiring
June 17, 2017
Question

is there a way to fix a bad studio recording?

  • June 17, 2017
  • 1 reply
  • 1940 views

hi

i bought as soon as it was release the last radiohead's A Moon Shaped Pool  in a local store

and after i bought even the vinyl

listening it with Sennheiser HD598 & grado SR225e i can head lots of cracks and the audio is clipped on my cd player

i tried to rip with several software like eac and audition cc too

i don't know if i have a bad copy because i bought as soon as it was released

does somebody own this album?

is my cd or i was recorded badly?

and is there a way to fix it? (i don't expect micracle   )

i pretty sad because it's one of my favorite album

i just ripped to flac and look the wave and spectral view

look the screenshots ,it's the first track

thanks

iFv7SM0.png

OQtBndS.jpg

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

SteveG_AudioMasters_
Community Expert
Community Expert
June 17, 2017

I'm afraid that if this is a legitimate CD release, they're all going to be like it. It's not necessarily the studio's fault at all - it's the way a lot of 'popular' material is 'mastered' - basically to make it as loud as possible so that it stands out on the radio, or whatever. And even if you could remove it, there's no way you can restore the peaks on that much clipping without reducing the overall level of the track significantly.

Mind you, it's not that clever a recording, and clearly somebody has had to do some work to it before it was released. If you look on the spectral display at the point where 16kHz is (near the top), you'll notice that there's a slightly darker band right across the track. This means that somebody's run a filter across the whole thing. A few years ago I discovered (the hard way) that if you have something like an iPad or other medium-sized display anywhere near an open mic, the backlight power generator is perfectly capable of generating and radiating interference at around that frequency - in just the same way that the line oscillators in old-style TVs did. And people tend to take them into studios... Generally it doesn't become apparent until much later, often at the mastering stage, and it's virtually impossible to remove this invisibly (the reason is technical and boring, and relates to the way digital filters have to work).

Often, your best bet is to get somebody to make a recording of the track from the vinyl release using good equipment. They have to take a lot more care with clipping and peaks on this, or it simply won't track correctly on the player. If it still sounds crap after that, then somebody blew it completely at the mastering stage, and there's nothing that can be done except complaining like stink to the record label, and getting them to remix it properly. Personally I think you should do that anyway!

JohnVo
JohnVoAuthor
Inspiring
June 17, 2017

if this is a legitimate CD release, they're all going to be like it. It's not necessarily the studio's fault at all - it's the way a lot of 'popular' material is 'mastered

hi SteveG , yes it is , i bought in a local store

i google A Moon Shaped Pool bad recording and there are lots of users with a bad copy some own a different copy without crackle and clipping

If you look on the spectral display at the point where 16kHz is (near the top), you'll notice that there's a slightly darker band right across the track. This means that somebody's run a filter across the whole thing

yes i see , at the first glance i tought it was caused by the cd ripped by me

i could buy it again online , there is 24-bit WAV download but i don't know how burn it

and they are the radiohead , i mean a long waited album

thanks

Inspiring
June 19, 2017

Perfect timing. I came up with a process in audition scientific filters a couple years ago. I need someone to try it and advise what they think. I became frustrated and use it to "reverse" the effects of the volume wars.

Convert the audio file to wav

Open audition and open the wav file

Reduce the volume to just under -6 db

open
Effects->Filters->Scientific Filters

Select the group delay button

Select Chebychev for Types
select Band Pass for mode

Master gain 0

set the following parameters:

Cutoff=4, High Cutoff=22050  for 44.1k audio, 24000 hz for 48k audio

Order=18.

transition bandwidth unchecked

pass ripple 0.00

press apply

then magic

Rick


vinyl rip

before cd

after scientific filter