The Waterfall: Digital Trends / The Audiophile

[CC]

"On their new album The Waterfall, My Morning Jacket experimented with a number of different recording techniques to craft a different vocal treatment for every song, including Jim James' signature "fish tanking" technique."

Read more:
http://www.digitaltrends.com/music/my-morning-jacket-jim-james-on-the-waterfall/

[Jamfish]

Thanks for sharing, good read! 

[buymycar]

Very cool article. One of the things I've noticed in my listens of The Waterfall is Jim's vocals. They sound phenomenal and unlike anything he's ever done before, so it's good to know he's keeping stuff like that in mind while recording. The "fish tanking" process is fascinating.

[CHIMMJFAN]

Great read! Thanks for posting, interesting to hear some of the audio recording details. Maybe one day they will raffle off a Roll Call sit in the studio for a day prize!!!

CHIMMJFAN

[justbcuzido]

Great read! Thanks for posting, interesting to hear some of the audio recording details. Maybe one day they will raffle off a Roll Call sit in the studio for a day prize!!!

CHIMMJFAN

That would be amazing. My favorite thing is reading about how they put their songs together.. Really for any band.

[Santo]

Great article. Like others have mentioned, I find the "behind the curtain" tidbits.

I apologize in advance for the nitpickery, but I'm also fascinated with the high-res music debate. In this article Jim answers this question:

I'm a staunch high-res guy and I'll only listen to 96/24 mixes at this point, if I can help it. Especially with the kind of layered detail on a record like this, you'd do yourself a disservice by listening to it on MP3s. Do you agree with that?

with

"I do! The whole problem is, I wish we could convince the rest of the world of that..."

He is obviously is a Pono supporter, but in a Spin magazine article, he also cautioned "I've already bought Aretha Franklin's 'Respect' a lot of times. Do I have to buy it again?" when discussing Pono.

I'm a fan of physical media and I purchased both the signed CD and the vinyl. As far as I know, neither comes with the High-res download. Including it would solve both issues Jim brought up.

[Mr. White]

Santo, I think what Jim was wondering (out loud) when he asked if he needed/should buy Aretha Franklin's "Respect" again was... is it worth it?, is it necessary?, will it make him appreciate it more? and how many times does he have to purchase one song/album to enjoy it? I get all that. There's plenty of music I already own that I wouldn't spend the money on to get a better version of. On the other end, I am ready to jump on a select few albums in High-Resolution as soon as they become available. I still buy remastered versions of albums I love on CD and rip them to FLAC at 44.1/16 resolution. Reading more of this Digital Trends article leads me to believe Jim is coming to the conclusion now that it is worth it, if you value the particular piece of music more than say some other sort of cool song you liked way back when but don't really think is worth getting an upgraded version for quite a mark-up on some songs/albums. He sees the possible future where memory/storage and playback will become cheaper and more prevalent. When this happens, people will be more able and more willing to go for the High-Resolution files for music listening pleasure at it's utmost. Storage is less of an issue on the Pono Music Player with it's built in 64 GB memory and the micro SD port that will handle 128 GB cards now and larger ones that are coming as we speak. The big problem with the newest, largest micro SD cards is the price, but the smaller ones like 32 and 64 GB cards are going way down. I got two 64 GB SanDisk cards from Best Buy on Cyber Monday for $22 each (killer deal). Jim even mentioned the day coming when phones and other devices will handle this expanded memory. The question is...will it take off and become prevalent in the near future? I hope so, and it sounds like Jim is hopeful. As far as the download codes for The Waterfall not being included with the CD versions and only being in 320 MP3 version for vinyl album download codes, I don't get it either. I'll bet it's the record company's call. Since I ordered the Deluxe Vinyl Edition that is delayed until at least May 12th, I was sent an MP3 download for only the original 10 songs that didn't even include the album artwork (pretty weak in my opinion). I can only assume the Deluxe Edition does not include the 96/24 High-Resolution version either. That's disappointing especially since the Led Zeppelin Deluxe Boxed Sets did. In fact, I think the Zeppelin downloads were 192/24. Anyway, I'm going to include the parts of this Digital Trends interview that are specifically about 96/24 Resolution and Jim's thoughts on listening to High-Res.

Edit: I forgot to say I went ahead and purchased the Deluxe Edition of The Waterfall in 96/24 from the Pono Music Store the day it came out for $17.99. I'll be OK until my Deluxe Box Set (with the puzzle damn it!) makes it to me. High-Resolution will save the day!
https://www.ponomusic.com/ccrz__CCPage?pageKey=product&oId=of%3A1cdccadca57b4a0f8aed340605fcdc2b&type=Album&artistId=of%3Ab16d96be7cf04d6f87c99a95e5d98fe3

"Interviewer: Now I think you're going to have to trademark the phrase, "fish tank mode." Are you into high-resolution audio? Do you record at 96/24?

Jim James: Yeah, we've been doing everything at 96/24 for a while now. I really think 96/24 sounds great. We work on a bunch of different computers, and we're always getting high quality. We're not doing 44.1/16. Computers are starting to get a little bit faster, so you can jump around to anybody's studio and do it high-res at 96/24. But one of the main things with us is space. We end up recording so many different things and have so many different ideas, that if we went higher than 96/24, space would get out of control.

Interviewer: I'm a staunch high-res guy and I'll only listen to 96/24 mixes at this point, if I can help it. Especially with the kind of layered detail on a record like this, you'd do yourself a disservice by listening to it on MP3s. Do you agree with that?

Jim James: I do! The whole problem is, I wish we could convince the rest of the world of that. For the casual music fan who maybe doesn't know — they just want to get "their song," and an MP3 is easiest, especially when you're traveling. I record all of my vinyl onto the computer so I can take it with me on the road. In that sense, having all that space is good, but I much prefer to listen to vinyl and high-resolution stuff. It's the same problem with Pro Tools, and with iTunes wanting to re-sell us everything at 96/24 three years from now, or whatever. I'd like to see it when computers and your phone have enough internal memory where you can keep the same number of MP3's you already have — but now they're all 96/24, and your storage can handle it all.

Interviewer: I'm all for that. Well, the more we have this kind of dialog with artists like you who believe in the merits of high-res audio, the easier it will be to convince people that, hey, they don't have to compromise sound quality when they go portable. We've already got things like the PonoPlayer and some other high-res devices from companies like Astell&Kern and Sony, where you can carry around 96/24 music files with you.

Jim James: Yes, that is very nice! Have you ever heard that "Ghost in the MP3" thing? Oh man, you should Google it. This guy took all of the matter that is extracted from a WAV file that's compressed into an MP3. It sounds so cool, like ambient music. It's an example to show people exactly what's taken out. It's a tangible example of what you're losing.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/music/my-morning-jacket-jim-james-on-the-waterfall/

[buymycar]

That Ghost In The MP3 thing is eerie as hell. If it's legitimate, it really shows that you're missing a lot when you do lossy audio compression. I'll keep on beating this dead horse, but there really is no need for lossy compression anymore. It's a relic of an era of limited storage and bandwidth.

[Woldie]

Anyone download the version of The Waterfall that is offered via the Pono store?

[Mr. White]

Anyone download the version of The Waterfall that is offered via the Pono store?

I downloaded it the day it came out!
This is part of my post (just two posts above yours) "I forgot to say I went ahead and purchased the Deluxe Edition of The Waterfall in 96/24 from the Pono Music Store the day it came out for $17.99. I'll be OK until my Deluxe Box Set (with the puzzle damn it!) makes it to me. High-Resolution will save the day!"
https://www.ponomusic.com/ccrz__CCPage?pageKey=product&oId=of%3A1cdccadca57b4a0f8aed340605fcdc2b&type=Album&artistId=of%3Ab16d96be7cf04d6f87c99a95e5d98fe3

[Woldie]

Anyone download the version of The Waterfall that is offered via the Pono store?

I downloaded it the day it came out!
This is part of my post (just two posts above yours) "I forgot to say I went ahead and purchased the Deluxe Edition of The Waterfall in 96/24 from the Pono Music Store the day it came out for $17.99. I'll be OK until my Deluxe Box Set (with the puzzle damn it!) makes it to me. High-Resolution will save the day!"
https://www.ponomusic.com/ccrz__CCPage?pageKey=product&oId=of%3A1cdccadca57b4a0f8aed340605fcdc2b&type=Album&artistId=of%3Ab16d96be7cf04d6f87c99a95e5d98fe3

Apologies!  I somehow missed that part of your post.  Thoughts on the Pono version?

[buymycar]

Anyone download the version of The Waterfall that is offered via the Pono store?

I downloaded it the day it came out!
This is part of my post (just two posts above yours) "I forgot to say I went ahead and purchased the Deluxe Edition of The Waterfall in 96/24 from the Pono Music Store the day it came out for $17.99. I'll be OK until my Deluxe Box Set (with the puzzle damn it!) makes it to me. High-Resolution will save the day!"
https://www.ponomusic.com/ccrz__CCPage?pageKey=product&oId=of%3A1cdccadca57b4a0f8aed340605fcdc2b&type=Album&artistId=of%3Ab16d96be7cf04d6f87c99a95e5d98fe3

Apologies!  I somehow missed that part of your post.  Thoughts on the Pono version?

I got the HDTracks version, and it sounds great to these ears. However, the dynamic range numbers indicate that there's really not much difference between it and the CD version. The real difference comes from the vinyl vs. digital versions. They are still mastering the vinyl to have a better dynamic range than the digital formats. Which I really do not understand, because the digital formats can certainly handle a better dynamic range.