Deathmetal Hi-Fi Extracting the most from your CDs or Streamers

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MrReaper182

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Glacialpath said:
How's everyone doing, what you been upto/ listening to?

Hi, the last extreme metal album I listened to was the fantastic album The dreadful hours by My Dying Bride. There are lots of slow heavy guitar riffs and prog rock style elements on the album and lead singer Aaron often goes from singing in clean style vocals one minute to signing in extreme metal style vocals the next (he has such a beautiful voice). The song The raven and the rose off of the album is one an all time favourite songs, I love that slow heavy guitar riff. The last song from the album The return to the beautiful is a great remake of the song As the flower withers from their fist album. It is the only song on the album not to be sung using clean style vocals as Aaron uses only extreme metal vocals (most other songs contain both style of vocals) and it is very extreme and heavy. It's not the best record album in the world, the drums sound is a bit of a let down (there is not enough weight to them) but that does not stop it from being one of my all time favourite metal albums.
 

Glacialpath

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MrReaper182 said:
Hi, the last extreme metal album I listened to was the fantastic album The dreadful hours by My Dying Bride. There are lots of slow heavy guitar riffs and prog rock style elements on the album and lead singer Aaron often goes from singing in clean style vocals one minute to signing in extreme metal style vocals the next (he has such a beautiful voice). The song The raven and the rose off of the album is one an all time favourite songs, I love that slow heavy guitar riff. The last song from the album The return to the beautiful is a great remake of the song As the flower withers from their fist album. It is the only song on the album not to be sung using clean style vocals as Aaron uses only extreme metal vocals (most other songs contain both style of vocals) and it is very extreme and heavy. It's not the best record album in the world, the drums sound is a bit of a let down (there is not enough weight to them) but that does not stop it from being one of my all time favourite metal albums.

Hey dude. I haven't listened to MDB for years. The last album I heard was Like Gods Of The Sun. That will put it into some kind of time frame for you.

I'll check out The Dreaful Hours on my HT and see if my Subwoofer adds the weight youo feel they are missing.
 

Big Chris

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Glacialpath said:
Those of you who have Chaosphere by Meshuggah. Have a listen to Sane and tell me how clear the Bass guitar is and how it sounds (clean/distorted) And how often you can hear Thomas hitting the toms and how often he changes the cymbal he's playing and which type too.

The bass guitar is clearer on the slower sections, it's a bit harder to make out in the fast verses. It's overdriven certainly. Not clean, but not fuzzboxed to hell either.

Cymbal changes from a lower/larger crash to a higher/ smaller crash halfway through the verses.

Tom hits is easier. If there's no cymbal/ hi-hat playing, he's hitting the toms. :)
 

Glacialpath

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Hey Big Chris. I thought this thread had been taken by the reaper.

Thanks for taking part in the experiment. Yeah the bass is nicely distorted, I think it helps give that slight industrial sound. Sounds like your set up is pretty sweet. Sounds like you got a good sound stage.

I guess a process of ilimination helped with the toms, if he's not hitting cymbals then I guess he's playing the toms but can you actually hear the pattern he plays on them? You don't have to try and write out what he's playing :grin:

I haven't actually made any notes on paper as such but have done in my head before I asked you guys. I hearing some slightly different things than you, I am a drummer though lol.

I guess not everyone has time to do this so I will make my notes and post then soon.

Thanks again dude for your imput.
 

Glacialpath

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Hey guys any of you still alive?

So I have got to the letter D listening through my CDs again. Today I've had Dark Funeral 1st EP, "Secrets Of The Black Arts" (my fav) "Vobiscum Satanas" and "Diabolis Interium". Dark Throne "Soul Side Journy" (only album I own) "A Moltitued Of Beings" by Deadlystrain and now I'm on Death.

Death's Leprosy album never sounded very good to me before so I didn't like to listen to it. It use to sound metalic and really washy. Now though with the Anthem cable in place most of that metalic sound has gone and it's tigtened up some what. Now I like how it sounds.

Any of you guys got Leprosy and found it sounded strange on CD?

Human just sounds awesome. Scott Burns is my favorite Producer and I think the production on this album sound amazing. Really fat sounding, punchy too.
 

Waxy

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Glacialpath said:
Any of you guys got Leprosy and found it sounded strange on CD?

I've got Leprosy >)

I have it on LP and MP3. The vinyl is original, and a little bit crackly these days. I do believe it sounds better than the digital files though. That's probably just my dodgy ears, and a case of hi-fi vs car stereo!
 

Glacialpath

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Waxy said:
I've got Leprosy >)

I have it on LP and MP3. The vinyl is original, and a little bit crackly these days. I do believe it sounds better than the digital files though. That's probably just my dodgy ears, and a case of hi-fi vs car stereo!

Haha yeah car stereos never really do justice to music especially Metal. I bet the Vinyl sounds closer to how I heard it the other day on my system than how the CD used to sound. I think it sounds better than Spiritual Healing.
 

Big Chris

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Went to the Indigo at the o2 on Monday night for Metal Hammer's Golden Gods. Met a few cool people and tried to get photographed with as many drummers as possible....

10479694_910746772276165_6479012334091390616_n.jpg
Me with Anup Sastry, drummer for Skyharbor, Intervals & Marty Friedman.

10262253_910860858931423_5052117582067961487_n.jpg
Me & Jay Postones, drummer for TesseracT

10418328_910790028938506_9061231928110353442_n.jpg
With Chris Emery, drummer for American Head Charge.

One of the best nights I've had in recent times. Hopefully we'll be going back next year..... :dance:
 

Glacialpath

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That's awesome dude. Are you a drummer too? I'll send you a pic of me if you like then you will have a pic of the drummer from The Air Turned To Acid and Glacialpath too lol.

You didn't happen to see David Croft and Jonny Herbert from Sky F1 did you?
 

Glacialpath

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Waxy said:
Track 5...

Oops again I'm not paying attention. I have only listened to Leprosy 3 times including the other day so I didn't know what you meant lol. I will deffinitely be listening to it more now it sounds good.
 

Big Chris

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Glacialpath said:
Big Chris said:
Glacialpath said:
That's awesome dude. Are you a drummer too?

Yep. Didn't the pic on the left give it away? :)

Are you an a band?

Yep. Here's something I put up a few weeks back.

http://www.whathifi.com/forum/off-topic-and-miscellaneous/a-certain-members-band-has-a-track-on-the-metal-hammer-freebie-cd

:)

And here's a vid of us playing last year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdwGlY8ufwE

As for kit. I've got a Mapex Pro-M in Tobacco Fade. 20" x 18" virgin kick, 8" x 4", 10" x 5", 12" x 5.5", 14" x 7" short stax rack toms and two 18" x 16" floor toms. I also have a Black Panther 14" x 6.5" hammered brass snare - all black, including hardware - and a 14" x 5.5" standard Pro-M Maple snare - in black - as a back-up.

Although in its current configuration, I'm only using the 10", 12" and one 18" toms.

All Sabian cymbals. 20" AAX Stage Ride, 19" AAX Metal crash, 17" AAX Metal crash, 17" AAXtreme China, 12" HH Splash, 10" Max Stax, 10" APX Splash with 14" HH hats.

All hanging off a Pearl Icon rack with Pearl 1000 series boom arms and Pearl 2000 series snare stand and Hi-hat stand.

Pedal is a Pearl Demon Drive double kick, Throne is a Roc'n'Soc, Also use a Nord Drum module with a Roland trigger on my kick and a Roland 8" TD pad for sub bass drops.

Oh yeah..... Pro-Mark Oak 2B Nylon tip sticks.

What kit do you use?
 

Glacialpath

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Big Chris said:
Yep. Here's something I put up a few weeks back.

http://www.whathifi.com/forum/off-topic-and-miscellaneous/a-certain-members-band-has-a-track-on-the-metal-hammer-freebie-cd

:)

And here's a vid of us playing last year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdwGlY8ufwE

As for kit. I've got a Mapex Pro-M in Tobacco Fade. 20" x 18" virgin kick, 8" x 4", 10" x 5", 12" x 5.5", 14" x 7" short stax rack toms and two 18" x 16" floor toms. I also have a Black Panther 14" x 6.5" hammered brass snare - all black, including hardware - and a 14" x 5.5" standard Pro-M Maple snare - in black - as a back-up.

Although in its current configuration, I'm only using the 10", 12" and one 18" toms.

All Sabian cymbals. 20" AAX Stage Ride, 19" AAX Metal crash, 17" AAX Metal crash, 17" AAXtreme China, 12" HH Splash, 10" Max Stax, 10" APX Splash with 14" HH hats.

All hanging off a Pearl Icon rack with Pearl 1000 series boom arms and Pearl 2000 series snare stand and Hi-hat stand.

Pedal is a Pearl Demon Drive double kick, Throne is a Roc'n'Soc, Also use a Nord Drum module with a Roland trigger on my kick and a Roland 8" TD pad for sub bass drops.

Oh yeah..... Pro-Mark Oak 2B Nylon tip sticks.

What kit do you use?

Hey well done on the MH cover mount CD. I must have it somewhere. Have you guys ever made it out to High Wycombe? My mate is a promoter there?

This is from my bands first gig which happened to be pinned on the the end of my Stag do.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rvs3MNW4LFw&feature=youtu.be

That's only my spare kit. The kick is from my main set up so are the cymbals.

My kit is a Mapex Mars Pro. the precurser to the Pro M. I have square sized tom 10"x10", "12x12", 13"x13", 14"x14", and a 16"x14" rack tom My floor toms are 16"x16" which comes from a second shell pack I bought to give me a second bass drum and spare toms and a 18"x16" that came with the original kit.

Nicko McBrain is my idle so you can see why the square sized toms and the amount of drums lol.

Paiste cymbals all round but I want to change to Zildjian though. 2002 22" china, 20" 2002 Power ride, PST3 20" ride that I use as a crash, PST3 18 crash and PST3 hats on an Mapex X-Hat, 2002 18" crash, Alpha 8" & 10" splashes, a 16" sound formula china and last of all 14" signature power hats.

All mounted on a Gibralter rack. Current set up: 10", 12", 13" rack 16" and 18" floors, 2x 22" bass drums and my Black Panther. 3 crashes, 2 splashes, 2 china's and 2 sets of hats

I got a Drum Wright shop exclusive Black Panther, https://www.facebook.com/257515814320813/photos/a.298381930234201.69383.257515814320813/298382223567505/?type=1&theater

14"x6" Mapex brass snare drum, a 14"x3" Mapex brass snare drum a 10"x6" Mapex pichalo snare drum. I also have a pre 1967 Premiare 4 piece kit. I used the snare drum to record a death metal song when I was at Drumtech back in 1999, nice drum

https://www.facebook.com/257515814320813/photos/a.298381930234201.69383.257515814320813/298382113567516/?type=1&theater
 

Fleabyte

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Hi, new member here. I just got my first proper system, a Marantz CD/PM6005 and DAli Zensor 1 speakers. I enjoy a huge variety of music but roots and heart are with metal. I listen to a lot of stuff like converge, DIllinger escape plan, sikth etc. I,m already familiar with half decent audio kit as I gave some decent headphones, Sr80i, Etymotic ER4s etc and to me metal is the ultimate test of a system as the mix is almost always dense and complex requiring musical presentation with good separation and pace.

Before I got the Marantz kit I had a Denon dm39 and quickly returned it for proper separates, glad I did, the difference (same speakers and positioning) in the bass is astounding, much tighter and punchier. Anyway, death cult Armageddon is one of my favourite albums but I'm not sure my lowly system is up to recreating it that well, I have noticed that album to be a bit muddy before. Still, Is will give it a listen ( bear in mind I have only 5 hours on the CDP/amp and 10 hours on the speakers burn-in and I am using the stock rca cable between the CDP/amp)
smiley-surprised.gif


I am looking forward to upgrading stuff in the future, maybe you have some suggestions for small tweaks, Glacial... I have the speakers on Atacama Nexus stands, perhaps they need filling....what about a subwoofer?

Cheers and keep rockin!
 

Glacialpath

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Fleabyte said:
Hi, new member here. I just got my first proper system, a Marantz CD/PM6005 and DAli Zensor 1 speakers. I enjoy a huge variety of music but roots and heart are with metal. I listen to a lot of stuff like converge, DIllinger escape plan, sikth etc. I,m already familiar with half decent audio kit as I gave some decent headphones, Sr80i, Etymotic ER4s etc and to me metal is the ultimate test of a system as the mix is almost always dense and complex requiring musical presentation with good separation and pace.

Before I got the Marantz kit I had a Denon dm39 and quickly returned it for proper separates, glad I did, the difference (same speakers and positioning) in the bass is astounding, much tighter and punchier. Anyway, death cult Armageddon is one of my favourite albums but I'm not sure my lowly system is up to recreating it that well, I have noticed that album to be a bit muddy before. Still, Is will give it a listen ( bear in mind I have only 5 hours on the CDP/amp and 10 hours on the speakers burn-in and I am using the stock rca cable between the CDP/amp)
smiley-surprised.gif


I am looking forward to upgrading stuff in the future, maybe you have some suggestions for small tweaks, Glacial... I have the speakers on Atacama Nexus stands, perhaps they need filling....what about a subwoofer?

Cheers and keep rockin!

Hi there welcome to the Metal or mental section of WhatHiFI lol.

Nice looking system you have there.

I would say you amp is just about powerful enough. The fact you speakers are Ok with 6ohms means you get the 60Ws from your amp but I guess that's why you got them.

Because the amp has digital input connections I wuld try using the analogue outs and the digital outs from the CD player and see which connection gives you the best result. Personally I would look into a DAC in the future too. Glad you are already getting nice tight bass from the system. One thing I do when burning in a new piece of kit of cable is to leave a long CD on repeat all when I go out anywhere. Like if you go to work and if it won't be bothering anyone, put it on in the morning and let it play to itself while you are out.

These tips might sound obviouse but they have helped me.

Make ssure the system is 100% flat, use a spirit level. Also make sure there is plenty of ventilation around the kit. Your speakers are rear ported so don't have them away from the wall. First play around with how far away from the wall lets them sing at their best, then play with toe in. How much they face in towards your listening position. If you can fill the stand then do so. The more you can dampen what the speakers sit on, the less amount of vibrations will be added to the sound coming out of the speakers. This is the same for what you Hi-Fi is sat on. You don't want anything near it that could vibrate.

So maybe in the future and nice wooden Hi-Fi stand could be an upgrade. One made of bamboo would be best IMO but they are very expensive.

Once you are happy with the burn in period where hopefully you will put on a CD that was listened to while it was fresh and it should sound better.

Many people on hear don't believe in cables making a difference or even burn in. I do that's for sure though most of my kit is second hand.

With regards to interconnects I can only recommend Chord Company because I haven't heard any other major brands. I've heard many interconnects but none have come close to Chord Co.

If you stick with the analogue connection and depending on your budget I would try a Chord Company Crimson, Cobra or Chamelion all with VEE 3 connectors on the ends. The cheapest being Crimson but it will make a difference. The difference will be bigger the more you spend.

Despite having a DAC on my system and fairly chunky speaker cable I didn't really start to hear how good Death Cult Armageddon actually sounds till I got 2 lots of Chord Chameleons on my Hi-Fi. Before so it was hard to destinguish what cymbals Nick Barker was playing at any one time. Also I could hardly hear the 40 piece Orchestra, the guitars sounded a big mess and I couldn't really hear the bass.

Now I'm fortunate enough to have 1 Chord Anthem Reference interconnect going from my DAC to my control amp and a Chameleon from the control amp to my power amp. Even before the Anthem with the 2 Chameleons I could easily tell what cymbals are being hit, What the riffs of the guitars are much easier. I can now hear the bass clearly and now know the Orchestra is play for 90% of the album and not the 10% I originally thought.

I can turn my Hi-Fi up louder without it hurting my ears and a lot of that muddyness has gone.

If you go with the digital connection try a Chord Company Prodac cable with VEE 3 connectors. It was the first cable in my set up that gave me that WOW I can hear a lot more from the CDs.

Sorry it's a long reply mate. If I could just pop round and help you make adjustments I would. It would be a lot quicker and I'd be able to compare what I hear on your system to what I can hear on mine.

Since the Anthem cable was put on my system I have had all the Converge albums on and they have some of the best Metal Mixes I have ever heard. Very clean and like you are in the room with them. Just awesome.

Let me know how you get on. :rockout:
 

Fleabyte

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p>I've been experimenting the last couple of days, listening to death cult Armageddon and other things. It seems in the dali speakers are the weak point in the set up in terms of bass, the treble detail and mids are pretty good but separation struggles on that album. A bit miffed, I then checked out some other albums, converge/mastodon's blood mountain/kill switch engage all sounded great, so it is definitely down to production sometimes.</p><p>I, personally do believe in the small changes in a hi fi set up making a difference...cables, burn in, speaker positions and toe in etc. many things make up a whole and some things I have seen evidence of, others I have yet to try so...</p><p>I own a pair of sennheiser momentum cans, they come with 2 different cables - one with a I device remote in line and one straight cable. There is a clear difference to me in that the straight cable sounds best. Also I have been experimenting with the stands and positioning, finding the optimum distance from the read wall and toe in but, most interestingly, the Atacama isolation pads that came with the stands give a much punchier bass than the dali isolation pads that came with the speakers...interesting.</p><p>anyhow, an upgrade to the stock rca cable that came with the cd6005 is a certain thing I am going to buy first, I reckon I will go for the chord cobra which should improve what I have.</p><p> </p><p>Cheers , Aaron</p><p> </p><p> </p>
 

audylubis

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I'm using Marantz CD6005 too. When I changed the stock power cord with Acoustic Zen El Nino (bought used, think mine is the older version), I notice improvement in depth and bass. With stock power cord cd6005 sounds rather light. I mostly listen to punk rock stuff though (fugazi, black flag, etc).
 

Glacialpath

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Fleabyte said:
p>I've been experimenting the last couple of days, listening to death cult Armageddon and other things. It seems in the dali speakers are the weak point in the set up in terms of bass, the treble detail and mids are pretty good but separation struggles on that album. A bit miffed, I then checked out some other albums, converge/mastodon's blood mountain/kill switch engage all sounded great, so it is definitely down to production sometimes.</p><p>I, personally do believe in the small changes in a hi fi set up making a difference...cables, burn in, speaker positions and toe in etc. many things make up a whole and some things I have seen evidence of, others I have yet to try so...</p><p>I own a pair of sennheiser momentum cans, they come with 2 different cables - one with a I device remote in line and one straight cable. There is a clear difference to me in that the straight cable sounds best. Also I have been experimenting with the stands and positioning, finding the optimum distance from the read wall and toe in but, most interestingly, the Atacama isolation pads that came with the stands give a much punchier bass than the dali isolation pads that came with the speakers...interesting.</p><p>anyhow, an upgrade to the stock rca cable that came with the cd6005 is a certain thing I am going to buy first, I reckon I will go for the chord cobra which should improve what I have.</p><p> </p><p>Cheers , Aaron</p><p> </p><p> </p>

Hey that's great to here Fleabyte. I hope you had fun playing around with your system too. Glad to see you are going to try the Chord Cobra. Even though the Chrimson will make a difference the Cobra should make a bigger difference. Make sure you get it with VEE 3 plugs instead of VEE plugs but if you get it diret from Chord Company you will get the VEE 3. They affer a full money back guarantee if you don't hear any difference. I'm confident you will and I think you will start to hear more seperation from Death Cult Armageddon. The Converge albums will sound even better. I warn you though the converge guitar sound has less distortion then you think but they will still sound brutal. You should also be able to turn your system up louder without the ear fatigue (or less anyway) You may even find you want to swap the Cobra for a Chameleon VEE 3 if you hear a big enough difference and can spare the money and your system will sing at you like you didn't know it could.

Let me know how you get on. I found the converge and Mastodon albums sounded awesome without the cable upgrade. With the cable upgrad though they just sound sublimely awesome. I think...no I know you will be very supprised how good a lot of the albums that you think aren't mixed very well will actually sound.
 

Glacialpath

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audylubis said:
I'm using Marantz CD6005 too. When I changed the stock power cord with Acoustic Zen El Nino (bought used, think mine is the older version), I notice improvement in depth and bass. With stock power cord cd6005 sounds rather light. I mostly listen to punk rock stuff though (fugazi, black flag, etc).

That's really cool audylubis. Glad you are now getting more punch from your punk. Welcome to the thread.
 

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