Premier Rock Forum

I just got Michael Jackson's Thriller as a Double LP on vinyl. It is the 25th Anniversary Edition which has recently been released. At first when I heard this album is being released on vinyl again, this time as a Double LP, I was hoping it would be cut at 45 rpm and spread across two LPs. No such luck. Disc 1 contains the original album and Disc 2 contains remixed versions of some the album tracks.

I have not listened to it yet, but in the lead-out it says "RJ Sterling". I looked at Sterling Sound's website and there is no mastering engineer there with the initials "RJ". Also, in the production credits of this new release it only mentions that the album was originally mastered by Bernie Grundman at Bernie Grundman Mastering. It does not say who cut this new release.

That the album was cut at Sterling Sound is a surprise, because I thought they got rid of their cutting lathes several years ago and on their website there is no longer any mention of vinyl mastering services.

My question is: this being a big label remastering job, is it safe to assume that they used a digital transfer of the original master tapes to cut Disc 1 containing the original album? They nearly always do this. Since this new release was also mastered for CD, I bet they just used the new digital CD master to cut the lacquers for the vinyl edition. At least with some remasters they write "Mastered from the Original Master Tapes". No such thing here. I highly doubt Disc 1 is a true analog cut from the original masters. If it turns out it is, I will eat my record player.

Anyone else purchased this new re-issue? Any opinions on the sound quality?

They could be from a digital source. The last slew of Beatle reissue lps were digital masters. Stupid.

The new Steely Dan reissue is from the master tape. All you EA Aja fans line up now!

Redline wrote:They could be from a digital source.

No doubt about it. It is a shame that big label remastering jobs are always ruined like this. Either they always get loudness-maximized, hyper-compressed and no-noised to hell and back, or they are cut from a second-generation dub tape or a digital transfer of the analog master. They are never ever done the right way. Re-issues like these are not meant to satisfy audiophiles who were waiting for a vinyl edition of this album with higher fidelity. Re-issues like these are meant to satisfy the average Joe who never got a chance to own this on vinyl. Pathetic.

By the way: I found out who "RJ" is (it says "RJ Sterling" in the lead-out of the LPs). RJ is apparently Ray Jamos - the new kid on the block. They should have let Bernie Grundman do the mastering. At least he would have had the decency to do a an all-analog cut from the original analog masters.