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Tom Petty - Wildflowers & all the rest

W

Woodface

pfm Member
I bought this on CD earlier in the week, not a massive Petty fan but like the albums of his I own.

Anyway, SQ is excellent but material not quite up to his best.

There are a number of options re this release, a fair few on the Hoffman forum have gone nuts for it.
 
Woodface said:
I bought this on CD earlier in the week, not a massive Petty fan but like the albums of his I own.

Anyway, SQ is excellent but material not quite up to his best.

There are a number of options re this release, a fair few on the Hoffman forum have gone nuts for it.
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Yeah I have it too, but it's still not my favourite material by Petty. The SQ is very good though as you say.
 
Wildflowers is arguably Petty's best record for music and sound, the sonics are outstanding. it was recorded at Sound City in Van Nuys Calif. The same studio that gave us Fleetwood Mac's Rumors and Nirvana's Nevermind among many other greats. The Rupert Neve console from SC now resides in Dave Grohl's studio 606 across town, I believe one of only 4 in the world in this configuration. Wildflowers was produced by Rick Rubin and the production values are stripped down and 'live in studio' in quality. Until recently the orig 1st press was trading in the US for >400 USD and it was mastered from a digital file (yuck). The vinyl release is from the analog masters and cut by Chris Bellman. Its a must have for Petty fans and a great place to start if you want to dip your toe into his catalog of recordings.
 
puroagave said:
Wildflowers is arguably Petty's best record for music and sound, the sonics are outstanding. it was recorded at Sound City in Van Nuys Calif. The same studio that gave us Fleetwood Mac's Rumors and Nirvana's Nevermind among many other greats. The Rupert Neve console from SC now resides in Dave Grohl's studio 606 across town, I believe one of only 4 in the world in this configuration. Wildflowers was produced by Rick Rubin and the production values are stripped down and 'live in studio' in quality. Until recently the orig 1st press was trading in the US for >400 USD and it was mastered from a digital file (yuck). The vinyl release is from the analog masters and cut by Chris Bellman. Its a must have for Petty fans and a great place to start if you want to dip your toe into his catalog of recordings.
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There's nice piece by Fremer on the recent release

https://www.analogplanet.com/conten...x-set-cut-½”-master-tapes-coming-october-16th
 
Just ordered the 7LP set. Found and 'As new' copy from Amazon warehouse at £125. Hopefully their description is an accurate one :rolleyes:
 
puroagave said:
Wildflowers is arguably Petty's best record for music and sound, the sonics are outstanding. it was recorded at Sound City in Van Nuys Calif. The same studio that gave us Fleetwood Mac's Rumors and Nirvana's Nevermind among many other greats. The Rupert Neve console from SC now resides in Dave Grohl's studio 606 across town, I believe one of only 4 in the world in this configuration. Wildflowers was produced by Rick Rubin and the production values are stripped down and 'live in studio' in quality. Until recently the orig 1st press was trading in the US for >400 USD and it was mastered from a digital file (yuck). The vinyl release is from the analog masters and cut by Chris Bellman. Its a must have for Petty fans and a great place to start if you want to dip your toe into his catalog of recordings.
Click to expand...

Agreed on all counts. I had never owned this title in any format, though I was obviously familiar with some of the tunes having seen TP live a few times over the years. This 3-LP set has instantly become my favorite TP record, surpassing even the early material. This LP is a must-own for any music lover and the sonics are of audiophile demonstration caliber. The packaging and pressing is absolutely perfect.
 
The original CD release sounds horrible IMO, the brickwalled compression makes an already forward-sounding mix very fatiguing to listen to. The 24/96 reissue from a few years ago sounds much better and doesn't have any post-production dynamic compression added. However, I'm not sure I'd classify it as 'audiophile demonstration' calibre. It's still quite a forward-sounding mix to my ears.

EDIT - According to dr-loudness database the 24/96 versions have the least amount of dynamic compression of all the digital releases of this album.
 
It seems that it has been remastered a few times since the original release as mentioned here (around 3:40 mins in)

 
It’s not as good as ‘damn the torpedoes’, I find the drumming on it very pedestrian. SQ on the re-release is very good & the extra tracks on my two CD set are excellent.

Let’s not get carried away;)
 
Just received my vinyl 3LP version today.
Yes, it’s excellent, easily justifying the hype. I much prefer it to the streaming versions I’ve heard.
 
I'm a big Tom Petty fan. Big regret is I never saw him perform live. Full Moon Fever is a high point for me. Runnin' Down a Dream, from that album, a particular favourite, too.
 
I first got the 7 LP vinyl version and then found a 9 LP version sound quality is some of the best i have heard
 
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