Dark Side Of The Moon 50th Anniversary

[Tony L]

I have an old 1973 copy so would the latest Amazon offering be any good?

If you have a 1973 copy in nice condition you are done. Nothing will beat it. If it is a solid blue triangle 1st press you are fairly rich too (Discogs)!

PS If you have any really good condition 1970s UK vinyl you are done IMO. You’ll only beat it by going for a lower matrix number (A2/B2 is the 1st), and the gains are pretty small. It was a very consistently manufactured record IMO.

 

[Seeker_UK]

So can I ask which is the best new version of DSOTM to get? Is the current remastered any good?
I have an old 1973 copy so would the latest Amazon offering be any good?

From reading around a bit on this, the consensus is the 2011 is probably the best sounding.

The red book layer of the SACD hybrid from 2003 is rather good too. https://www.discogs.com/release/378824-Pink-Floyd-The-Dark-Side-Of-The-Moon

 

[Seeker_UK]

Here are the three CDs I have to hand (the silver-face is in the shop). The ‘black face’ is unquestionably ‘the one’, almost certainly the quietest CD I own, the level really is feeble, but it sounds how it should to my ears, very like original UK vinyl. The ‘TO’ black-triangle and UK silver-face are identical. Exactly the same mastering, which isn’t bad, but it does have a spike in the treble which doesn’t sit well with me.

Mine is like the silver face CD (no 3) w/out barcode.

I don’t know that one at all. World market Floyd confuses the hell out of me, e.g. why are the first issue Japanese DSOTM and Meddle (also available as a black triangle) on EMI/Harvest, but WYWH CBS/Sony? I think the same is true in the USA too, though the EMI stuff is Capitol there. I know the ultra-collectable WYWH is a CBS with only two tracks, but I can’t remember much more than that.

The WYWH is the one I referred to a few posts back, gold face and made in 1982.

As for ASFOS I’ve got ‘70s ‘two-box EMI’ UK Columbia vinyl and the UK silver-face CD. I don’t think I’ve even played the CD, I just filed it away when I found it for a quid or two as I’m trying to get a good early set of CDs. Is the Japanese CD you refer to mono or stereo?

It's stereo - the mono version has never been released on CD.

The Japanese CD to look out for are the second and third issue. (http://pinkfloydarchives.com/DJaCDPF.htm#SOS2)

I desperately want one because I think it is the best chance of getting "Set The Controls" on CD without the clumsy edit.

 

[Tony L]

The Japanese CD to look out for are the second and third issue. (http://pinkfloydarchives.com/DJaCDPF.htm#SOS2)

Interesting that they started with the UK master and then changed to another. It isn’t an album you see a lot on CD at all so I bet that is a tough find! More is another, I’d like to find a nice copy of that as my vinyl is a bit crackly (I’ve had it forever, certainly since school, and it was second hand then).

PS Reading the Pink Floyd Archives DSOTM page again there is a 3rd issue Japanese ‘black-face’ I’d not noticed with the ‘TO’ (louder and bright) mastering the same as the UK silver-face and my later ‘black triangle’, so it just isn’t possible to buy these blind without analysing the matrix if you want to be sure of getting the first ’black triangle’ pre-emphasis mastering.

 

[MotelBlues]

The red book layer of the SACD hybrid from 2003 is rather good too. https://www.discogs.com/release/378824-Pink-Floyd-The-Dark-Side-Of-The-Moon

Not wishing to be argumentative, but I thought the general consensus was that the red book layer of the CD was dreadful, conspiracy theorists suggesting a deliberate ploy to make the SACD layer sound (even) better.

(I suppose I could, y’know, listen to it myself, it’s only about three feet away, but I’m too stoked that the LP of DSOTM I got in Vinyl Exchange thirty years ago in a straight swap for the UK black-on-silver CD turns out to be a circa 1977 A9/B9 HTM.)

 

[Seeker_UK]

Not wishing to be argumentative, but I thought the general consensus was that the red book layer of the CD was dreadful, conspiracy theorists suggesting a deliberate ploy to make the SACD layer sound (even) better.

It was better than my EMI Swindon CD I bought in 88 (no barcode).

(I suppose I could, y’know, listen to it myself, it’s only about three feet away, but I’m too stoked that the LP of DSOTM I got in Vinyl Exchange thirty years ago in a straight swap for the UK black-on-silver CD turns out to be a circa 1977 A9/B9 HTM.)

I got an A5/B5 and an A10/B10. Not worth much at all.

 

[Woodface]

Just had a look at my copy, no etchings that I can make out, simple blue triangle under the Harvest label, SHVL804. I’m guessing this is a letter re-issue?

 

[Tony L]

Not wishing to be argumentative, but I thought the general consensus was that the red book layer of the CD was dreadful, conspiracy theorists suggesting a deliberate ploy to make the SACD layer sound (even) better.

I’m in the ‘dreadful’ camp on that one. It is very obviously compressed and if you look at it it in Audacity it actually clips quite badly in several places. The SACD layer is very decent indeed. I’d take the first Japanese pre-emphasis master over it for sure, but it is the next best I’ve heard. I’d definitely not buy the SACD unless you can play the SACD layer.

 

[Seeker_UK]

Oh well, I better get the wallet out then.

 

[antinchip]

1989 Harvest Reissue LP (A11/B11)
30th Anniversary SACD

Both sound very good to me but the former is the one that gets played - much easier to just put an LP on rather than the SACD faff. Didn't stop me getting the WYWH Analogue Productions SACD mind!

 

[paulfromcamden]

Not a fan of DSOTM at all but very much enjoying the impressive level of nerdery on this thread!

 

[Tumeni Notes]

PS Does anyone know the Wembley 74 gig?

It was broadcast by the BBC on Alan Freeman's Saturday show, as I recall, re-broadcast on Tommy Vance's Friday Rock Show, and previously issued on the Immersion (?) box set.

There's bootlegs and downloads galore to be found, including some with the encore (Echoes) included, which was left out of the broadcast.

Unless they played more than one night, and they've unearthed tapes of another .....

 

[gavreid]

The 2016 Bernie Grundman vinyl is supposed to be good. I bought the 2016 CD (Guthrie master) just because I'd never heard the album and thought that I probably should see what all the fuss was about.

 

[Theo]

I've just checked and I'm embarrassed by how many copies of this album I have. My earliest copy was bought by me in 74-ish (A5/B5). There's a Quad copy that gets played a bit because it's a noticeably different mix. There's the MFSL which rarely gets played (got sucked into the hype in the early 80s). Then we have a myriad of CD versions. Go-to is the SACD, then the 70s A5/B5.

I'm certainly not buying another copy, 50th Anniversary or not.

 

[Seeker_UK]

It was broadcast by the BBC on Alan Freeman's Saturday show, as I recall, re-broadcast on Tommy Vance's Friday Rock Show, and previously issued on the Immersion (?) box set.

There's bootlegs and downloads galore to be found, including some with the encore (Echoes) included, which was left out of the broadcast.

Unless they played more than one night, and they've unearthed tapes of another .....

AIUI, it's the BBC recording from the 16th November.

For the complete concert, you also need the "Immersion" box or "Experience" 2xCD version of WYWH: "Shine On Pts 1-6", "Raving and Drooling" ("Sheep") and "You've Got to Be Crazy" (Dogs)

Sadly, you need the "Early Years" box to get "Echoes", the encore. The CD set it's part of ("Continu/ation") is the only one that never had a standalone release. I don't like it as it has too much Dick Parry and features the backing singers. It's waaaay too 'Vegas residency' for my liking.

[edit]

Other PF live recordings, including DSOTM from other nights at Wembley are available as they now fall outside of 50 year copyright laws.

 

[Woodface]

Wish you were here is my favourite.

 

[Tony L]

Other PF live recordings, including DSOTM from other nights at Wembley are available as they now fall outside of 50 year copyright laws.

I don’t have a streaming service, but I get the impression Floyd themselves have dumped a lot of live content up to such services e.g. all the live content from the big boxes etc, maybe more. This will effectively reset the copyright date. I’m sure this is why a lot of these huge box sets exist in the first place. They can effectively stick a (c) 2023 date on DSOTM and start the clock again. The Beatles have been doing it for years.

 

[droodzilla]

No great interest in this reissue but I'm dismayed to see Pink Floyd have gone "woke":

When will this madness end?!

 

[ToTo Man]

The biggest clue is no barcode and (unless it has been changed-out) a smooth-sided case. That tells it apart from the UK silver-face which is very similar otherwise.

It gets even more bonkers complicated/geeky in that within the subset of Japan for UK ‘black face’ DSOTM you can apparently have both ‘non-TO’ and ‘TO’ matrixes, and get this, they are both the same (Sony) mastering, i.e. both the same as the first crazy valuable Japanese ‘black triangle’ ‘non-TO’. Details here on Pink Floyd Archives. My copy is the first ‘non-TO’ issue.

You need to be wary of other nationalities too, e.g. I’m pretty sure the West German ‘black face’ is the same as the ‘TO’ ‘black triangle’ and ‘silver-face’ UK, i.e. not the quiet pre-emphasis ‘non-TO’ mastering.

PS For clarity: subjectively there is absolutely no way in hell anyone could confuse the ‘black triangle’ ‘non-TO’ with the ‘TO’ (same as UK silver-face). The latter is about 5x louder and way brighter, i.e. if you swapped between them without adjusting the volume you’d be buying new speakers and likely ears!

PPS My ‘black triangle’ is this one (PFA). This site is very good as it gives levels, so you can see it appears to be the same as the UK silver face (it is) and also the German black-face.

My CDs are all boxed away and not easily accessible but I checked the peak values of my AIFF rips of DSOTM and one of them matches the values of the first title in your first PFA link above, so I think it's pretty safe to assume it's the same mastering. This is with pre-emphasis still present, the peak levels of my "de-emphasised" AIFF files are lower.

Pre-emphasis is a pain-in-the-arse because the final result varies depending on what software you use to de-emphasise the files. No two de-emphasis filters are exactly the same so you can end up with a file that's either slightly brighter or duller than what was originally envisaged without knowing it, not to mention the potential for SQ degradation when the levels are changed on 16-bit audio (I assume the same applies to the de-emphasis filters built-into CD players?).

 

[Tony L]

My CDs are all boxed away and not easily accessible but I checked the peak values of my AIFF rips of DSOTM and one of them matches the values of the first title in your first PFA link above, so I think it's pretty safe to assume it's the same mastering. This is with pre-emphasis still present, the peak levels of my "de-emphasised" AIFF files are lower.

To my knowledge there is only one mastering with pre-emphasis, the one that originated with the earliest Japanese ‘black triangle’ and ended up on the earliest Japan for UK ‘black face’.

The other early masterings I am personally aware of are the very widely distributed UK EMI as used on the UK ‘silver-face’. Next was the 20th anniversary box, and after that were into what I’d view as the modern age from the mid-90s onwards. As such really only three masterings I’d describe as ‘early’ to be found on UK CDs, and I’d be reluctant to describe the ‘92 20th Anniversary box as ‘early’. It’s early enough not to have an IFPI code!

What you say about pre-emphasis is interesting, I didn’t realise it was a variable more than some players/decoders being able to do it, and some not. The two players I have tried my disc on (Marantz SA8005 and Rega Apollo-R/DPA PDM3 transport/DAC) both seem to cope with it fine. It sounds tonally spot on to me, as stated virtually indistinguishable from ‘70s UK vinyl. I think some of my Japanese Steely Dan CDs might be pre-emphasis too, probably a few other early discs too. I have one of those 5xCD ‘Original Album Series’ boxes, I think the Curtis Mayfield one, where I have a feeling at least one album is is pre-emphasis but lacks the flag as it sounds very odd tonally (really bright).