Prometheus Announces Conan The Barbarian Complete Score.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

He is Conan, Cimmerian, he won't cry, so I cry for him.

This sums up the score to Conan The Barbarian.

All the passion and emotion that Conan must conceal because of his discipline of steel is expressed in the beautiful music by Poledouris.

And now it's resented in a stunning recording by The City Of Praque.

As with any re-recording, especially if you know every beat of the OST so very well, it can be strange hearing the same music...different.

That's why I decided not to post my opinion after the first listen and live with this new recording a while before posting about it.

After a while you start to get used to the differences and concentrate on the actual music.

This is a fantastic album, the City Of Prague is no longer a second rate compilation-CD-machine, but a full blodded orchestra with a fantastic string section, good, agressive yet precise brass and savage percussion.

There's a lot of passion and soul and effort gone into both the production and the performance of the music. Most of the time the tempo is spot on, and the orchestra and choir get to the essence of what the music is about. There is no were on the CD that I think they screwed up. (though obviously, there are differences)

This recording was long awaited because the mastertapes are presumed lost.

If they are ever found and released, this recording will still be a force to be reckoned with, and like the Gerhardt recordings of Star Wars, it will not be forgotten.

What is best in life?

[publicist 4,643]

What's next? People complaining that music sounds thin on their iPhone with the 14,99$ headphones?

[Marian Schedenig 8,212]

I've waited until after a couple of listens before posting my thoughts. This is a pretty fantastic album. I'm generally all for so-called "re-recordings", although I usually don't really like the term. As long as music can be performed live, I like to have different performances and interpretation, so since there already is an "original" recording, I don't see it as the major aim of a new recording to duplicate the original one.

In this case, that was very clearly the primary goal, and since what is available of the original recording is incomplete, and Poledouris himself was never fully happy with either the performance nor the recording (and, as I didn't know before reading the booklet, also had to make several orchestrational concessions when not all the called for instruments were available), I'm fine with that.

And in that light, this recording is mindblowing. Because very much most of the time, the tempo and phrasing is so spot-on compared to the original, it feels like you're actually listening to the original recording - only with not just remastered sound, but with remastered players, too. There are a few instances where chords sound "wrong", not as in "that's not what it sounds like on the OST!" but musically wrong, but I think that's just the balance of the mix being a bit "off", dropping the main notes or over-emphasising harmonies. And it only happens a couple of times. And that's pretty much the only fault I can find with this album.

There's some neat stuff in the previously unreleased material, but for me, the biggest joy when listening to this is having a great recording of a great performance of this music.

I now want a new recording of Goldsmith's Lionheart by these forces, with the synth horns replaced by real ones.

[Luke Skywalker 1,796]

The only fault of this release if that Poledouris could not be the one who re-recorded his work as he initially intened....

But then it would not be the precious hommage it is

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

The only fault of this release if that Poledouris could not be the one who re-recorded his work as he initially intened....

Since he passe away a few years ago, this CANNOT be a fault!

Geez Luke!

There's some neat stuff in the previously unreleased material, but for me, the biggest joy when listening to this is having a great recording of a great performance of this music.

Well I always believed that the Varese CD had the best material. Nevertheless, some of the new cues are outstanding. Particulary Pit Fight and The Tower Of Seth/Snake Attack.

[Luke Skywalker 1,796]

The only fault of this release if that Poledouris could not be the one who re-recorded his work as he initially intened....

Since he passe away a few years ago, this CANNOT be a fault!

Geez Luke!

OF F*****g course i know.

I meant that it would have been perfect if they could have been done this when Basil was alive, so he could fullfill his original vision with this score.

just that.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

I meant that it would have been perfect if they could have been done this when Basil was alive, so he could fullfill his original vision with this score.

just that.

Well as even Basil no longer had the Latin text and did not know were he had gotten them from...

[Luke Skywalker 1,796]

james fitzpatrick would still had been involved

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Yes but James cannot guarantee complete accuracy when it comes to the lyrics, since some had to be deducted from listening to the OST of film.

[Luke Skywalker 1,796]

Oh i gotcha you now, you say this cannot and couldnt be 100% basil original vision due to having to guess the lyrics

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Since some portion of the music has become lost, and had to be reconstructed.

But I'm not that bothered about it. Everything sounds like it's supposed to sound.

[Marian Schedenig 8,212]

Well I always believed that the Varese CD had the best material.

Except for one missing cue present on the Varese, I even felt the Milan provided the better listening experience.

Nevertheless, some of the new cues are outstanding. Particulary Pit Fight and The Tower Of Seth/Snake Attack.

Oh yes. When seeing that the liner notes talked about Poledouris giving a nod to many composers, including Rozsa, in the score, I wondered what they were talking about. But Pit Fight really does sound a lot like Rozsa.

[Joe Brausam 215]

Well I always believed that the Varese CD had the best material.

Except for one missing cue present on the Varese, I even felt the Milan provided the better listening experience.

Nevertheless, some of the new cues are outstanding. Particulary Pit Fight and The Tower Of Seth/Snake Attack.

Oh yes. When seeing that the liner notes talked about Poledouris giving a nod to many composers, including Rozsa, in the score, I wondered what they were talking about. But Pit Fight really does sound a lot like Rozsa.

And "Atlantean Sword" is basically Quo Vadis Redux. I find it very interesting though, the whole score is very much a Rozsa score in spirit and tone, I like it.

[Henry B 50]

Well, Rosza is said to be Poledouris' main inspiration for composing film scores.

[Maglorfin 196]

This is a fantastic album, the City Of Prague is no longer a second rate compilation-CD-machine, but a full blodded orchestra with a fantastic string section, good, agressive yet precise brass and savage percussion.

Great, sounds very promising! I can't wait to hear the lamentation of my speakers!

[BLUMENKOHL 1,068]

I haven't read the thread yet, album came in yesterday and decided to chime in real quick how disappointed I was.

They seriously f*cked up the mixing on this album. There's a lot of peak distortion all around...I have to resort to listening on crappy headphones that go down an order of magnitude in clarity just so I'm not irritated by it.

At first I thought it was my amp, then I tried different equipment combos, different sources. Any equipment that's remotely high resolution is going to give you hell with this CD.

Great performance. Shame about the mixing. It's what you get when you have low-paid Czechs sitting around in the mixing booth.

[edit]

OK good it's not just me. I thought maybe my head was giving off huge amounts ESD or something.

This is ridiculous.

[Wojo 2,453]

I love the fact that my ears are terrible, which permits me to not care how bad this sounds to other people. Maybe I enjoy it even more that people can hear problems with it.

[BLUMENKOHL 1,068]

OK, this is going to sound weird. It was weird to me when someone recommended it to me. Like one of those "Who the hell thinks of that?" but get your ears professionally cleaned!

Any GP can do it for you, but I'd go to an ENT (because I'm a wuss when it comes to letting just anybody go about fiddling around with my only 5 senses), with insurance the co-pay was like $30.

You will come out of it 1)disgusted at the massive rock of wax that has been growing inside your brain since birth, 2) be able to hear details in the world, in music you never imagined.

I was flabbergasted. Definitely recommend it. It's uncomfortable for a few seconds, but totally worth it! It feels like you've taken off ear muffs.

Anyways, for those being assholes to the people that are claiming there is a serious defect with the mix of these (what the hell? I'm sticking up for the anal kids at FSM? End of the world) here's the waveform for Anvil of Crom.

A well mixed album's waveform would not cut off with rock solid plateaus.

[Wojo 2,453]

I make a habit of not going to the doctor.

[Charlie Brigden 7]

You should email that JamesFitz guy, I hear he had something to do with it and may be able to help.

[Datameister 2,044]

Ew.

[Trent B 337]

That does look pretty bad...

[BLUMENKOHL 1,068]

Yeah, and normalizing it or decreasing amplitude isn't going to help, because where it clips off the data simply doesn't exist.

You know, I love this, I love that they go back and do this, and I encourage them to continue. But seriously, a little attention to the elementary details?

This is like building a WONDERFUL car, flawless in almost every way, advertised as "fuel efficent as its original designer always wanted" and then forgetting to put a fuel cap on it.

[Trent B 337]

Ya. I noticed that the other labels IE: La-La Land and even Intrada tend to take great pride and preserving the data like that in the cues.

[BLUMENKOHL 1,068]

And you know what, I don't even demand of them to give me a "free replacement."

Just give an apology, say you'll correct it, I'll gladly play twice for a fixed version. I ultimately support what they're doing here, and I think this is easily worth paying twice for, if they just correct this glaring issue.

Re: "Explanation" Mark Olivarez linked:

Here you go:

http://img577.imageshack.us/img577/1337/76683763.png

And this picture proves there is no clipping nor compression.

Just as I suspected.

Therefore, the "distortion" that Sirusjr apparently hears is not in the recording or in the disc, but logically somewhere further down in the CD player-->amplifier-->speaker-->room-->ear chain.

First off, the dumbass that made that post doesn't understand what clipping is, or what a waveform is. Of course if you zoom in on a waveform to that level it'll look like it's dipping and peaking evenly. THAT'S WHAT A WAVE DOES!

Clipping is what happens when the wave PEAKS and gets cut off due to lost bits. Even if you zoom in you can see all the peaks cut off exactly the same point.

as for Fitz' engineer's crappy explanation:

"The score is full of elements that can be mistaken for digital clipping but are probably natural acoustic artefacts or at worst some small amount of analogue overload at the microphone. Loud/raspy bass trombone notes are a classic example of this. In track one particularly, the combination of all the metallic percussion can sound distorted in places, but when two sets of timps, two or three bass drums, tam tams, chains, anvils, sheets of metal, vibes hit with metal beaters, and even the Hungarian Cimbalom... are being hit/scraped that loudly, the instruments themselves can rattle and resonate, and they do! This is all part of the effect. With regard to waveforms, any use of limiting will cause the peaks to look clipped. I remember there were a couple of moments where the horns or tam tam mics where slightly overloaded, but this was 1 channel within a 100 track plus multi-track mix - surely this shouldn't spoil anyones enjoyment of the overall effect...We record/mix and master using our ears and our musical instincts, not digital meters and waveform analysis! "

Again, losing digital bits of data is completely different from natural distortion. What we see on this CD is lost bits of data. Natural distortion looks natural. Digital distortion looks like digital distortion.

The album is provided to us in 16-bits that's a capacity of 2^16 values at any moment, going from -32767 to +32767.

The file is consistently going beyond that range.

[Joe Brausam 215]

You should email that JamesFitz guy, I hear he had something to do with it and may be able to help.

...had something to do with it? He's the producer!! Oy

[Ollie 1,059]

Well post all the images you want, I do not hear anything on my system. It sounds crisp and clear and it also does to a majority of people.

[Marian Schedenig 8,212]

They seriously f*cked up the mixing on this album. There's a lot of peak distortion all around...I have to resort to listening on crappy headphones that go down an order of magnitude in clarity just so I'm not irritated by it.

I'm seriously beginning to wonder if there's a misproduced batch in this release, because I haven't noticed any problems. I have a good system, I have my share of recordings which really annoy me sonically, but while the new Conan does sound like every instrument group was mixed at the loudest level possible (which is certainly confusing at first, but is a large part of what makes this recording feel like the OST), I never noticed any clipping or distortions.

[Charlie Brigden 7]

They seriously f*cked up the mixing on this album. There's a lot of peak distortion all around...I have to resort to listening on crappy headphones that go down an order of magnitude in clarity just so I'm not irritated by it.

I'm seriously beginning to wonder if there's a misproduced batch in this release, because I haven't noticed any problems. I have a good system, I have my share of recordings which really annoy me sonically, but while the new Conan does sound like every instrument group was mixed at the loudest level possible (which is certainly confusing at first, but is a large part of what makes this recording feel like the OST), I never noticed any clipping or distortions.

That was my thought as well. I mean, I don't have a £3K system but I have a decent etup (as well as the usual computer speakers and good headphones) and it sounds great through all three.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

It is clear to me that Cauliflower is just that....

[Trent B 337]

I'm seriously beginning to wonder if there's a misproduced batch in this release.

That's a good possibility now that you mention that. Space Camp had mastering error to it, as well as some of the discs for the Ron Jones Star Trek TNG set. All of which both labels were able to repress for people at their own expense since the pressing plant screwed up.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Maybe it's the film mix, but watching the film today it struck me that the film recordings of tracks Pit-fight and Head Chop were not nearly as good as what was recorded in Prague.

[Luke Skywalker 1,796]

because the prague recording is played 'as it was meant to be'

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Is that sarcasm? Always hard to hear because of your thick accent? :cool:

[Luke Skywalker 1,796]

uh, no sarcasm there.

And i dont have a think accent!...when talking in spanish...

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

?Que? :cool:

The brass does seems to bo toned down or missing from Head-chop.

[BLUMENKOHL 1,068]

¿Que?

[Ollie 1,059]

Que Sera, sera...

[Koray Savas 2,251]

Tengo un puerco en mi naris.

[Wojo 2,453]

El médico lo verá ahora.

[paleo 63]

I haven't read the thread yet, album came in yesterday and decided to chime in real quick how disappointed I was.

They seriously f*cked up the mixing on this album. There's a lot of peak distortion all around...I have to resort to listening on crappy headphones that go down an order of magnitude in clarity just so I'm not irritated by it.

At first I thought it was my amp, then I tried different equipment combos, different sources. Any equipment that's remotely high resolution is going to give you hell with this CD.

Great performance. Shame about the mixing. It's what you get when you have low-paid Czechs sitting around in the mixing booth.

[edit]

OK good it's not just me. I thought maybe my head was giving off huge amounts ESD or something.

This is ridiculous.

I'm so glad that I am not the only one here having this experience. I thought I had improved the clipping effect using a program recommended to me, but I listened to it again today on very low volume, and it still just crackles horribly in many places, no matter what. I can always and easily hear it, and I still think today's technology should be capable to produce a CD that's enjoyable even on a low end system. And congrats for not being massacred here even though you mentioned your disappointment ;-). Are you going to do something about it (writing to Prometheus etc.)?

[Henry B 50]

Yeah... there is clipping for sure. I don't see how it could have been done intentionally, or how the recording engineer's explanation makes sense. That said, it's still an amazing recording that is very enjoyable even with audio problems. I can't believe how close it sounds in places to the original! The things that are different - i.e. supposedly truer to Poledouris' intentions - sound very natural, so certainly nothing was lost by straying from the film recordings.

Love both versions of "Theology / Civilization"!

[Maglorfin 196]

I have finally received this CD and it sounds (and looks) fantastic. I think everybody involved really did a great job and that we should be happy and grateful that we now finally have this music much closer to composer's intentions than what is represented on the original album. Solely listening to Anvil of Crom made my hair stand on end. <_< I haven't yet listened to it in detail and on my trusty AKGs but from what I've heard it really seems like a great job by everybody involved, so kudos to the orchestra, chorus, conductor, producer and to Prometheus. I also like the booklet, liner notes and the lovely introduction - tribute by Alexis Poledouris.