The Dylan SACD remasters.(Reissue Roundup)

Like the main character in James Joyce's story, "Araby," whose "eyes burned with anguish and anger" upon coming to grips with his own disillusionment, this writer has begun to realize that the music industry still doesn't care enough to capitalize on a new audio format by offering superior products. It would be foolish of me to think that this hasn't always been the case. Back when stereo was introduced the industry set about to offer us electronically re-channeled monaural recordings so that we could hear spatially different sounds on our new rigs; never mind that they usually sounded worse than the originals. Then, in the early eighties with the advent of the CD, they foisted heaps of poorly engineered LP-to-CD transfers on us, rarely pausing to assess what they were putting out (and capitalizing on their gaffs a decade later with many a poorly executed so-called high-definition remaster). Why would I think that things would be any different today as the legions of record companies launch their conversions to DSD/SACD? One would think that Sony, co-creator of the new format and owners of the Dylan tapes, would most avidly pursue the quality of software that would demonstrate how much better SACD could sound, but the five Dylan reissues I have sampled from the fifteen disks that were released recently indicate that, perhaps it too is simply milking a cash cow.

Factually, it is Steve Berkowitz who oversees this Dylan reissue project with the same level of zeal and exactitude that so impressed me in ABKCO's 2002 Rolling Stones program. And like the Stones" SACD reissues, prospective buyers can distinguish the new hybrid SACD/CD releases by their cardboard, album-like cases. Unlike the Stones reissues, though, some, of these new Dylan albums provide a chance to hear the music in surround sound. You can read an interview online in which Berkowitz discusses this project in depth (contact me if you are interested in seeing this).

Since beauty is in the eye of the beholder, I'll concede that there are many audiophiles who regard these 15 Dylan reissues as the cat's pajamas. Most of them, though, are too young to have heard an original issue LP pressing, and are basing their reactions to them by comparisons to those eighties CDs or to the several audiophile vinyl reissues. I'll also concede that during several of the comparisons I made, I found differences among all three and sometimes four samples, but few of these would I construe as improvements worthy of upgrading to the new releases, especially if you're happy with what you have. While I would be the last T$S contributor to say that taking scientific measurements is tantamount to proving a point about the sound of audio, I did run some computer-based tests using a program called CD Spin Doctor to observe and compare the graphics represented by the audio output of about ten random samples--maybe two per disk. Often these graphics showed that the major differences were in the amount of gain present, with the original CDs showing slightly better dynamic range in most cases. This was as expected. It is common knowledge that today's recordings show much greater compression and higher volume levels.

I based my opinions and findings on comparisons of these five titles: Another Side of Bob Dylan (Sony CH 90327, stereo/multi-channel), Bringing It All Back Home (Sony CH 90326, stereo/multi-channel), The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (Sony CH 90321, stereo only), Highway 61 Revisited (Sony CH 90324, stereo only) and Love And Theft (Sony CH 90340, stereo/multi-channel). I chose not to buy a copy of the newly remastered Blonde On Blonde, as I had already bought fire earlier SACD release. Love And Theft is the only modern recording; the others represent my personal favorites of Dylan's many excellent records from the sixties. I have early "Columbia 360 Sound" LP pressings of three of these that I ...