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A wrong time running?!

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andrew fischer

A wrong time running?!

Post by andrew fischer »

Hello everybody!
Lately I’ve found that on the first six Cd’s of ‘Blue guitars’ the running time of the songs put in the tracklist is exactly correct, but on the cd’s from 7 to 11 all the tracks indeed last less longer than it is written in the album! So that, some songs seem to be shortened or reduced, other ones seem to me running a bit faster than they probably should.
For example, the running time for ‘Lampiou’ , mentioned in the book, is 5.46, the real time running is 5.40, and Chris’s brilliant final solo feels like being unreasonably reduced, the ending accords are too quiet, unhearable! I really miss them! The same it seems when listening to ‘Till the Morning Sun Shines on My Love and Me’ (5.30 instead of 5.39), ‘Bajan Blue’ (4.30/4.57!!!), ‘Come Change My World’ (4.02/4.15), ‘Clarkson Blues’ (4.56/5.09) and so on. The ending of this songs is unexpectingly fast and strange in my opinion.
The mistaking in time is different for each and every of the songs, not systematical.. Sometimes the time written is right (‘Too Far from Home’, 7.28).
I can’t guess why it is so. Maybe, the sound producers (I don’t think it was Chris himself) made some compositions shorter or faster than in original versions because it seemed to be better (I do suppose it isn’t!), but why they did it only on the last five albums?!!

Did anybody catch the same? Give your versions please!

Best regards,
&ru.
Chris
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Re: A wrong time running?!

Post by Chris »

andrew fischer wrote:Hello everybody!
Lately I’ve found that on the first six Cd’s of ‘Blue guitars’ the running time of the songs put in the tracklist is exactly correct, but on the cd’s from 7 to 11 all the tracks indeed last less longer than it is written in the album! So that, some songs seem to be shortened or reduced, other ones seem to me running a bit faster than they probably should.
For example, the running time for ‘Lampiou’ , mentioned in the book, is 5.46, the real time running is 5.40, and Chris’s brilliant final solo feels like being unreasonably reduced, the ending accords are too quiet, unhearable! I really miss them! The same it seems when listening to ‘Till the Morning Sun Shines on My Love and Me’ (5.30 instead of 5.39), ‘Bajan Blue’ (4.30/4.57!!!), ‘Come Change My World’ (4.02/4.15), ‘Clarkson Blues’ (4.56/5.09) and so on. The ending of this songs is unexpectingly fast and strange in my opinion.
The mistaking in time is different for each and every of the songs, not systematical.. Sometimes the time written is right (‘Too Far from Home’, 7.28).
I can’t guess why it is so. Maybe, the sound producers (I don’t think it was Chris himself) made some compositions shorter or faster than in original versions because it seemed to be better (I do suppose it isn’t!), but why they did it only on the last five albums?!!

Did anybody catch the same? Give your versions please!

Best regards,
&ru.


--------------

real time and indicated time...

Hi Andrew,

You're absolutely right, the songs on the "Blue Guitars" album, starting with CD#7, are getting shorter and shorter. First, the difference (between the real time and the indicated one in the book) is a few seconds and then 15, or even 20 seconds!
I mean, I assume the songs were all recorded perfectly good (with Chris himself in charge, in his own studio!) but latter on someone handled them in a very sloppy manner or, perhaps, they were shortened, for instance, while being mastered.
Apparently, the technician who did the job was in the hurry to go home, or was late for a party? Only guessing, you know.
And furthermore, It's quite annoying to many of us at, because we are missing some sound. Once you've pointed out the problem in your post, I went back to the album and have listened very carefully to several CDs.
Many beautiful songs should have been allowed to play on and on (and faded away....), but instead they were cut short, like with a razor or a knife, without any reason (or logic) at all. After all, there is plenty of space left on each and every disk! It's a shame and definitely the fault of the technical employees, because Chris Rea (we know it from media reporting) is a perfectionist. Chris couldn't be everywhere in the process of creating the album, therefore he relied upon others....
He could have controlled the process on a few disks, but not on every single one and not in every detail.
Perhaps, had he overseen the production of a single recording, but not 130 songs on 11 CDs!
But what are we supposed to do now? I don't think anyone will replace the existing CDs with some brand new?
So we have to live with it.

FYI, I bought my "Blue Guitars" album at "Saturn" (a multimedia store), in Warsaw, manufactured by "optimal media production" in Germany.

Take care,
Chris
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