New Wave Outpost Forum

RevUp64 wrote:Preorder links for the new West View comp, both vinyl and digital, are up:

https://mw-viciouspink.bandcamp.com/album/west-view

Nice! The Minimal Wave Bandcamp store assures me an uncompressed DL if I buy the 2xLP. And the US shipping on the LP is only $8.00. Two thumbs up!

The digital release is available now from Bandcamp.

https://mw-viciouspink.bandcamp.com/album/west-view

$20 for a download? **** off!

I got the CD quality files last night, but haven't listened to them yet. Hopefully they are not brick walled, but they could be. If that's the case, I can digitize the LP tracks as a backup when it gets here. Hopefully it's not a GZ pressing! Buying physical music now is such a crapshoot!

Sadly, as I feared, the CD quality files were brickwalled to within an inch of their lives.

Minimal Wave, Anna Logue, Genetic Music and some other reissue labels are notorious for brickwalling. Vinyl-on-Demand is also pretty careless with sound. For all this talk of loudness wars there's very little labels seem to have learned

Passing_Stranger wrote:Minimal Wave, Anna Logue, Genetic Music and some other reissue labels are notorious for brickwalling. Vinyl-on-Demand is also pretty careless with sound. For all this talk of loudness wars there's very little labels seem to have learned :(

Well, Cherry Pop's 2009 "Vicious Pink" CD was brick walled as well. A bit inconsistently, as some tracks are not quite as bad as others. But overall, not inspiring. Maybe Brian Moss is deaf now, if he approved the masters? This weekend I have started the task of digitizing my VPN LP/12" collection to make my own CDs and the vinyl rips will be more pleasing to listen to even as they were from records. Hopefully once the vinyl ships for "West View" I can digitize that and make my own BSOG [boxed set of god] of everything.

postpunkmonk wrote: Maybe Brian Moss is deaf now, if he approved the masters?

I remember Andy O from Blue Zoo posting here about the reissue of their album "2x2" and stating he is quite satisfied with the sound - while all other users complained about it being brickwalled. The performers themselves are most likely either careless about such things or simply don't hear them for one reason or other, unfortunately.

I got the shipping notification from Minimal Wave. Am hoping I can digitize the LPs effectively and make a DIY CD-R. If they are GZ pressings a M record could end up sounding VG. [crosses fingers] I went with black vinyl so as not to take any chances on fidelity, though every Vicious Pink record should have been on pink vinyl.

Well, the LP arrived yesterday. Impressed with the detail that Minimal Wave put into the shipping and packaging. LPs were in top quality anti-static inner sleeves, shipped outside of the outer sleeve to prevent seam splitting. No shrink wrap was used, and the whole package was inside a heavy PVC outer sleeve. But the pressing itself was CZ. I've yet to spin it and hear what it sounds like, but the other CZ pressings I have were M records that sounded VG at best with a ton of clicks and pops. I hedged my bets and got black vinyl. Will report back with my findings later.

It's two weeks later. Still no time to spin the wax. It's a big reason why I hate records. It takes so much time to clean/digitize them. Beyond distortions and vinyl flaws!