Is it ok to apply eq to old master?

Findlay

Member
I'm struggling a bit and would appreciate any advice on this.

I have a 24/96 digital copy of a master tape of an album recorded by my late brother 40 years ago this month. I had the copy made 14 years ago after I had made enquiries at the old (long closed down) recording studio. The original 2 inch 16 track tapes were unfortunately sold in the early 80s. The 1/4 inch 15 ips master had been lost but a 1/4 inch 15 ips copy had been made (Dolby A used throughout) and found in the engineer's loft. It was this 26 year old tape that I had digitised. I had a CD released from this tape as it sounded pretty amazing. But lately, at the 40th anniversary, I got to listening to the CD again critically and think it sounds a bit dull. I recently remastered the tape applying an 8dB boost at 9.6KHz and believe this has improved the sound dramatically - you can hear detail in the cymbals and vocals for example that had been lost. Noise is still virtually nil. In a word it sounds like I remember when I attended the sessions in '79. I wonder if I am just restoring high frequencies that have been lost with age and storage or if I am tampering with a recording which should be left alone. What do you think guys?
 
Sure, you can remaster from the old digital master. But you can't just apply eq and be done with it since it's likely you'll cause the signal to peak over 0dBFS, so you will need to revisit levels and limiting along with eq. This might be a good time to read up on things like intersample peaking and the fact that peaks will rise when a digital file is compressed to a lossy format like mp3.
 
You should also read up on Dolby A to see how it applies to your tape. Do you know if you ran the audio through a decoder before/while recording to digital? You might still have encoded Dolby A audio on the tape. I remember with cassette tapes, if you ran with no Dolby on the playback, it made the audio brighter; meaning the high freqs were not "de-emphasized". But cassette tapes used Dolby B which is different than Dolby A. I wonder if you could find a Dolby A de-emphasizer plug to run the audio through. It would be interesting to hear the difference before making EQ changes.

I don't think aging would cause a loss of higher frequencies. If aging affected the magnetic domains on tape, it wouldn't discriminate to a specific band of frequencies. The heads on the playback deck might be a different thing.

Good on you for keeping your brother's legacy going.
 
I would want to know why such a "singular" frequency boost...?

I can see applying equalization to the track(s)...but I doubt it would be just that....just one frequency point, and a fairly large boost at that for just the one.

Of course, without hearing the before and after, the discussion is kinda meaningless AFA any specific suggestions, but yeah, it's OK to EQ or whatever you need to do to get the sound where it needs to be.
 
Thanks for the comments guys. I've kept levels down but will swot up on intersample peaking etc. The copy was definitely made using a Dolby A decoder - it took a while and cost quite a bit fo the studio to get hold of one! I'm wondering if the playback machine was down in response. Thanks for the heads up about keeping Mick's legacy going Chili! The large boost does worry me a bit Miroslav. I could post the before and after perhaps for you to listen to or send them in a private message? Maybe it is just my ears failing!
 
Thanks again for the comment on this, I've uploaded the before and after files of one of the tracks - "Out and Running". It should be obvious which one has the eq. The original starts off at higher levels - I've kept levels lower on the new version, as advised. Please bear in mind this is a 40 year old tape. I'd very much appreciate any comments. I think maybe I've added too much top!
 

Attachments

  • 01 Out And Running.mp3
    8 MB · Views: 22
  • 01 Out And Running.mp3
    8.1 MB · Views: 9
So....

Why did you lower the levels so much on your redone version...?
If the original tracks were all done to tape, in the analog domain...you do NOT need to lower the levels at all, because they will/should be well within the digital limits, and fall right where they should.

It's hard to make comparisons with such a big difference in levels between the before and after without having to raise/lower one or the other to get a match...but on just a quick computer speaker listen...TBH, I don't hear anything bad with the original that really needs to be corrected...and even though the "after" is so low in level, I can hear that maybe you are going a bit overboard with the EQ boost in the highs.

I would have to listen on my studio monitors to make a better judgment, and again, I will have to adjust the levels between the two to make them match...and that's what you should do, because only then will you hear just how and in what way you are affecting the original by doing all that EQ.
When you lower it so much, it may sound OK...but I would trust the original studio levels more, and if you raise the level of your "after" track to match, I think you will find that the EQ boost in the highs is too much.

I'll try to check these out later in my studio...so I'll post back...and maybe in the mean time, you might post both at matched levels, for a better comparison.
 
I stuck them into Vegas Pro and used nulling to get the levels close. I think the modified one is an improvement though not quite what I would do.
 
You can apply whatever processing you like without destroying the original digital file. I had a quick listen to the original and agree that it could use a bit of a high end boost.
 
Thanks for taking a listen guys. I've posted the tracks again at more matched levels. Part of the problem is that in the original recording the sound level appears to drop after the intro when the vocals kick in - as if the engineer was applying the fader - and it has always seemed to me that some of the impact is lost. In addition to the eq I've also faded the levels up gradually at this point. I had normalised the eq'd version to -1dB originally, whereas the original seems to peak at 0dB. I've posted the original version normalised to -5dB so they start of at about the same volume, if that makes sense. I was hoping that this would lead to more impact in the lead section at about 4 mins in. The original seems to lack the sort of sparkle you'd expect from a 16 track on all my systems - very grateful for comments when listening on different systems! Maybe I should have left well alone.....
 

Attachments

  • Out And Running (eq).mp3
    8.1 MB · Views: 19
  • Out And Running (original).mp3
    7.9 MB · Views: 13
I had normalised the eq'd version to -1dB originally, whereas the original seems to peak at 0dB.

The peak value doesn't tell you a lot about perceived volume. An RMS measurement will tell you more, though the frequency balance can make a big difference that even RMS doesn't account for. A more comprehensive measurement of loudness is the LUFS system.
 
"Is it ok to apply eq to old master?"

Why not major labels do this all the time then sell it to you as the new re-mastered version LOL.

Yes, it's OK, I have revisited many albums I have recorded both fo me and clients over the years, some have been remastered from the only cassette copy still in existence. As software improves your can often improve what was recorded on sometimes less than ideal equipment (due to budget at the time) to sound quite amazing.

For example This was recorded live and live mixed to stereo in my first studio back in 1993. All the masters were lost at some point so we did a cassette transfer and remastered for digital. I still can't believe we got this from a cassette. Vocals SM58 with monitors in the room LOL, I used a Tascam M2524 console and a Casio portable DAT, I owned 2 reverbs and 1 stereo compressor, which was patched across the stereo out to grab peaks.

Alan.
 
Thanks for this Alan. Crikey - I can't believe you got that result from a cassette! Presumably recorded on a top deck with Dolby S?!! I wish you'd remastered my tapes!
 
Thanks for this Alan. Crikey - I can't believe you got that result from a cassette! Presumably recorded on a top deck with Dolby S?!! I wish you'd remastered my tapes!

Standard Crome tape from a copying company that they made from a dat tape, yes the dat tape that went missing lol.

Alan.
 
I've always been amazed at what you can get out of cassettes. I keep plugging away here about what a terrific sound you can get from a Tascam 244 for example. Yours knocked me sideways though.
 
Obviously I'm not intimately familiar with the song, but I did prefer the EQ'd version. To my ears, it's a definite improvement.
On Bal Sagoth's "Starfire Burning" album, the remastered version turned up the high end without apparently listening to the end result, and the entire album is now a scratchy-sounding mess compared to the original release. So there have been some very badly done professional remasters...
 
thanks jp - I'm encouraged that you think the EQ'd version it is an improvement - I think some of the top end must have deteriorated due to the storage in a hot loft for all those years.
 
I think some of the top end must have deteriorated due to the storage in a hot loft for all those years.

Or maybe through the multiple transfers...because you said this was like a copy of a copy...?

I also think that back in '79, they didn't EQ the way they do modern music today, which is very bright/edgy...so if you pull up a lot of commercial music from the '70s, it's going to sound more darker, softer in the lows, drums almost kinda dull...etc...not everything, but there was different mindset back then.

With much (not all) of modern Pop/Rock...it's like every track and every mix element, has to jump out and slap you in the face. There's a heavy competition for getting mixes really forward...and so the high end has gotten brighter/edgier, and the lows harder and deeper...and it makes older music sound that much more duller and certainly much lower in overall volume or the appearance of it, because they didn't push every track in a mix up against the wall as hard.

In the track you posted...you can hear how "dullish" the drums sound (either version)...but that's simply how they use to generally record drums back then.
Anyway...I finally listened to your before/after tracks on my studio system...and you're version is not overdoing the EQ you applied.
Heck, if anything, I would have also bumped up the upper mids a tiny bit, just to add some definition and snap to the mix...somewhere between 600Hz and 2kHz..and just a touch boost to the sub-lows.
Something like this, to give you an idea...(I used your EQ version to tweak). If you don't like it, no problem, just a suggestion. :)

FindlayEQTest.wav
 
Wow, thanks so much Miroslav, that sounds fantastic! - how I always thought it should sound. Is there any chance I send you (maybe by PM?) my eq'd WAV file for you to perhaps have a go at treating like this?
 
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