The Plague of Modern Remasters

Okay. I finally picked up a used copy of Theatre Of Pain, original Elektra US Pressing. For half a year now, I've been an avid reader of Steve Hoffman forums. I don't consider myself an audiophile, for obvious financial reasons. However, I am able to spot a lossy compressed file from a lossless one, or spot differences in terms of mastering. Being only 20, most of my CD collection is made of modern versions of albums, which means ones that have been applied a modern remastering. I'm not against this process, sometimes it's effective (I think about Queen and Queen II here, for example). But in some cases, the sound of the album is absolutely butchered.

Most people already know about the question of loudness war, so I'm not gonna repeat something well documented. What you need to know is that some record companies consider the question of re-edition of their catalogue as a quick cash grab, and not an audio-preservation project. To accomodate with the developpement of portable music playback devices, so-called ingeneers have started to raise the volume level of albums, to make them sound "louder, fuller". But multiple remasterings, i.e. volume elevations result in what audiophiles call a "brickwalled sound", which means an album with no sonic dynamics. To be simple, quiet moments are as "loud" as dynamic ones : the listening of the album becomes a very tiring experience, cause the listener as the sound, cannot breathe.

There has been the infamous Death Magnetic-gate, with the latest Metallica studio-effort being awfully brickwalled, and impossible to listen to from start to finish.

Now I understand how much this plague can damage even an album that you love. I love Mötley's Thatre Of Pain. Both the songs and the absolutely awesome cover. But I only have the remastered edition, with bonus tracks part of the "Crücial Crüe" re-editions. I hope Sixx & co don't think this is a good way to remember their music because :

1- Therer are some sonor glitches on the songs, mostly noticeable on "City Boy Blues" and "Home Sweet Home", with a few milliseconds of mmusic that are simply skipped.

2- The sound is brickwalled as hell.

I can't see myself listening to the remaster now that I've got an original version. There has to be a new remastering. Seriously, it's awful, just look...

I loaded WAV-files of "Smokin' in the boys room" in audacity. Here are the waveforms, on top, the original release, on bottom, the remaster.

No dynamics, only noise.