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The Music
Billy Joel is certainly no stranger to those of us who
grew up with his incredibly popular songs. His wonderful music have
spanned many decades and have reached many fans. Clearly, his album
"The Stranger" is no stranger to the top ten charts of its
day. And it's not by accident that my personal favorites are "Movin'
Out (Anthony's Song)", "Just the Way You Are", "Only the
Good Die Young", "She's Always a Woman", and "Everybody
Has a Dream".
This SACD contains dedicated multi-channel and stereo
recordings for the original tracks released in the 1977 album. (See the track
listing in the left column.) If you're a fan of Billy Joel's
music, this SACD is worth adding to your collection. Whether you're
into the multi-channel re-mix or just care about the high-resolution stereo
recording, the SACD renders every nuance of Billy Joel's original
performance, like you've never heard it before. It's so true to the
original analog studio master that the historical artifact of tape noise is
even apparent during quiet passages when played back in a high resolution
audio system.
The Recording
In the multi-channel DSD
(Direct
Stream Digital) recording, Billy Joel's vocals are firmly anchored in
the center channel. Most of the music comes from the front left and
right channels, with surround channels frequently adding various
instrumental accompaniments and acoustic reverberation effects. The
multi-channel mix is involving. You can't help but be absorbed into
the music. It's not a recording that you can multitask by pressing
"play" and going off to another room to do your thing. The
high-resolution and multi-channel recording begs you to sit in the sweet
spot of your multi-channel audio system and just enjoy the experience.
The immersive multi-channel mix is mesmerizing. For
example, the motorcycle sound in "Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)" is
almost holographic as its engine fires up from the center channel, revs up,
and drives off into the distance. In "Scenes from an Italian
Restaurant", the strumming of the acoustic guitar can be heard in the
right surround channel . This is echoed again and even more
prominently in "She's Always a Woman", when the acoustic guitar is
reproduced principally in the right surround channel, and to a lesser extent
the left surround channel.
For those who enjoy and appreciate the original 2-channel
stereo experience, the dedicated 2-channel DSD recording in this SACD offers
an unprecedented level of realism that approaches the original analog studio
master. And as I noted above, both the multi-channel and stereo DSD
recordings contain a low level of analog tape hiss, which should be expected
for a recording that dates back to 1977.
I've heard these Billy Joel favorites many, many times on
various media: CD, LP, 45's, but I've never heard them this good.
Every nuance of the performance is rendered clearly, particularly in the
multi-channel version thanks to the spatial cues of the aggressive
re-mix. This makes me realize of how much there is to hear in these
old favorites. Phil Ramone, Ted Jensen, and Sony Music did a great job
from bringing this all-time favorite album back to life in high-resolution
stereo and multi-channel SACD splendor. I think their rather
aggressive approach for the multi-channel mix works well for this
material. And I recommend this SACD without hesitation.
Disc Compatibility Notice
This multi-channel Super
Audio CD (SACD) can only be played back
on an SACD player or a DVD player that supports SACD playback (look for the
SACD logo). To
hear the high-resolution stereo DSD recording, a stereo or multi-channel
SACD player is required with stereo analog output to a quality 2-channel
audio system. To hear the high-resolution multi-channel DSD recording,
a multi-channel capable SACD player is required with 5.1-channel (6-channel)
analog output to a multi-channel home theater audio/video receiver. The
high-resolution stereo or multi-channel DSD recording layer on this disc will not play in
an audio CD player, DVD-Video player, DVD-Audio player, or DVD-ROM drive.
Buy this SACD title from:
> Amazon.com
for $19.99
Support this site: buy through our links.
For additional information: visit the Billy
Joel web site and the Sony
Music web
site.
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Associated equipment used in evaluation: Sony ES
SCD-C555ES Super Audio CD 5-disc
player, Sony
DVP-S7700 reference DVD player, Sony
KP-61V45 61" rear projection TV (4:3 screen aspect ratio), Sony ES STR-V444ES A/V receiver, four
B&W CDM 9NTs as left/right main speakers
and left/right surrounds, B&W CDM CNT center channel speaker, Monster Cable M-series S-Video cable MSV-500, Monster
Cable Interlink LightSpeed 100 (Toslink) optical cable, Monster Cable
Interlink 400 MKII interconnects, Monster Cable
Original speaker cables in bi-wire configuration with Monster Cable twist-on gold-plated banana plug
connectors, Lovan Sovereign T HiFi audio
rack, and Sony MDR-V600 studio monitor headphones. Our home theater equipment was calibrated
with the Video
Essentials DVD.
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