Tomas Chlebek The fans of the British group Coldplay were treated to a new, seventh studio album with the title A Head Full of Dreams. Although received by critics with little excitement, given that previous Coldplay albums dominated the sales charts in dozens of countries, similar success can be expected now.
A Head Full of Dreams it is also available for listening on streaming services including Apple Music, but it has consistently avoided those that offer a free account with ads, i.e. especially the popular Spotify. Now we can really start talking about the problems that free streaming services will face in the near future (if not now). The reason for the absence of Coldplay news on Spotify is precisely the possibility of free subscription.
It is therefore a similar case to Tayor Swift, who at the end of last year downloaded all her music from Spotify and did not even make her latest album, entitled 1989. Both artists also said they would make their music available on Spotify if only paying users could play it.
Still current album case 25 by Adele is a bit different, as it is not yet available on any streaming service. Even if it appears on them, it will probably ignore the free ones as well. Adele's manager said in November of last year that he only approves paid music streaming.
Coldplay's previous album, Ghost Stories, was not released on all streaming services until four months after its release. Given the rhetoric used source Music Business Worldwide it can be assumed that A Head Full of Dreams will eventually appear on Spotify as well. But it will be again in some time. Currently, its users can listen to at least two singles, "Everglow" and "Adventure of a Lifetime".
I have a question - I would like to know the quality of the music I download to my iPhone via Wi-Fi during the 3-month free period from Apple Music - is it the same as when I buy music from iTunes or do I get better quality recordings there? I decide whether to pay a membership or buy albums, and I want the best possible quality. So far, it seems ok from Apple Music in combination with iPhone 6s plus and Sennheiser CX1.0, but I can't compare it with music from iTunes and after all, cheap plugs... solid for the price though. I'm still choosing big headphones around 5000.
Thanks.
Buy one song and you have a comparison for the price of about €1.
And will the 30-second samples be of a lower quality? I do not think.
Um, it seems the same to me - U2 With or Without You - I've listened to that.
If I were a nitwit, it's pointless to have headphones for 3 or more for these purposes. If someone is an audiophile and buys proper hearing aids, they also have to feed them with something. If from a proper hifi tower, or from a better PC sound system via FLAC, etc. Otherwise, these are nuances and it is unnecessary to deal with them. Few people recognize it
Well, but I don't take it with me on trips, do I :) If I were a nitwit, the tower and the PC are out - ONLY VINYL - I have a gramec, but I mainly need to solve the trips. And the iPhone has a fairly ok output. What I found out is that the music is in AAC - can it be downloaded somewhere in Apple Lossless?
The vinyl isn't that good, I don't know why people suddenly thought of it. Then, of course, there are the players for audiophiles on the go :). Otherwise, I don't know how to download it from Apple
Proper music is only through equipment that is of adequate quality. Some MP3s and similar tracks are for teenagers.
Yes I agree. Unfortunately, today's geeks have probably never listened to anything else, so they don't even have a comparison. Already in Svazarm, in the HiFi club Ve Smečký, there was a sign in the late 70s: "The quality of the acoustic chain is determined by the worst in the line". And I mean, nothing has changed over the decades.
Mr. Sladek, it's such a time that everyone wants to have everything on their mobile phone, and preferably for free, or we won't change that. But I have already experienced a situation when a friend of my son listened to some music at my place and recognized that it played much better than MP3.
Yes, the youth have their ears dulled by the sound of crappy computer game soundtracks on their dad's PC, and since they've never heard real music, they take it as the standard. It also has the knowledge that "download for free" has been hardened by school education. Free ain't even a chicken..., stealing destroys music, that's why we got to the quality of Loudness War and garage publishers today. Above you write about Adele 25. I'm not surprised they don't want to stream it anywhere. My son got that record. I tried to let it go – verdict : majesty du ven …. It has DR 5, blurred bass and treble at 10Khz in 45dB drop. I don't understand how such rubbish can be sold. Well, read the web reactions, it's full of praise for the MP3 128 tangled buns - yikes.
Unfortunately, the "Pack" time is over and I miss it too, but fortunately we have vinyl left (I never got rid of it), which I distribute and if I intend to play digital audio, then only SACD (preferably Japanese ones), or Holt CDs, but strictly those released in the years 1982 - 1995. Later it's a loud Loudness War. As my colleague Sládek writes, and I add that a high-quality acoustic chain cannot be spoiled right from the start with a very low-quality recording. At the moment, only classics, some rock stuff (who is able to take care of it and not allow their work to be disrespected) are released in good quality in digital audio, but generally the quality is unter hund. So common sense and happy choosing.
Nicely written and I wholeheartedly agree with you. With my equipment, I have yet to experience the disappointment that something would play better in the digital era. MP3 I'll laugh at that. I have some music on my iPhone headphones and I also play it in the car, but I also have a high-quality amplifier and speakers in the car. I wish you happy holidays and lots of joy from music and health. :-)
And where do you put it when you want music in the car, on a walk, on the way to somewhere, from somewhere, at work, etc.? If the MP3 is good and the album can handle it, why not. If it's a more demanding album, then flac. Sure, it's different, like the hardware, but I think it serves the purpose and it's not bad at all. And I'm not a teen.
I also have music on CD in the car and I already have some on my iPhone. I agree that I don't care about quality in the car. I have everything on CD at home
I rather meant the apparatus as a whole, not just the data source. Not to mention that today even CDs are designed to be cheap to produce, sometimes they don't last long and not making a backup is a real gamble. And that backup needs to be used for something. I think flac, or "apple flac" is fine. As I read some tests and reviews, some "also audiophiles" did not even distinguish CD from MP3 320 CBR. I, if it weren't for a couple of albums, or maybe compositions, I would never have dealt with it that way. Of course, if someone has 128k MP3s, or worse, that's something else, but I think the 320CBR is fine for the average mortal.
I have a lot of friends who have returned to vinyl, and vinyl in general is experiencing an unusual boom. It's because people are returning to quality. I mean audiophiles. All compressions are simply a compromise and it doesn't matter what it's called. I know that they have NASs and they have music streamed there in better quality than CDs. For me, compression is always a compromise. I have a €30000 camera at home and I'm going to play some compressed formats on it???? It's nooo……
The question is not whether to play compressed format on expensive equipment (and as I wrote, I also have something in flac – uncompressed format), but whether it can be recognized. And according to the discussions on the net, sometimes you can't tell. Of course, it is often a question of the specific composition, of course also of how, with what and into what it is compressed, but sometimes it is simply imperceptible even by measurement. And CD vs flac is probably not necessary to solve, so it is impossible to know, and if so, the error is not in the "format", but somewhere along the way.
I'll put it this way. When I buy a CD, I don't care if it's recognizable compared to Flac. When you have Flac, always check whether it is of the same quality as a CD. I will tell you that CDs from Chesky Records or Widham Hill are definitely audibly better quality than any flac. We are not talking about classic studio recordings such as Columbia, Geffen, Universal. These are studios where there are gunners behind the mixers, who simply mix the recording on some Yamahas or general-purpose machines and that's it....
If I have flac, it's more about where from. If I make it myself, I know it's like a CD. In the same way, I already wrote that often the CD is already in progress and nothing can be extracted from it. I have nothing against hifi players, but they should also take into account the fact that not everyone can appreciate it and often neither do they, and just for the feeling that I won't play flac on expensive equipment, because flac seems strange to me. Let everyone listen to what they want and where they want :-)
I agree with you, just to create a quality Flac you need many times the CD, otherwise why not buy it right away?:-)
That's a different matter :-) But I've always been at the level of technical quality and I didn't solve the economic or moral question :-) If someone lends me a CD and I rip it, he'll either make a flac for me directly, or I'll buy it directly ( there are also such eShops), so I will assume that I have the most that can be had in terms of the technical level under the given circumstances. And then there is the question of what to do next. For example, I need mp3 in the car because flac cannot handle it. I can't put that many albums on the iPhone either (I have a few dozen albums in flac and it's 60GB) and I probably wouldn't even recognize it there, I only have RHA T20 headphones and they also have limits.
Yes, I agree. Flac is a lossless format that, in my opinion, is indistinguishable from a CD. I confess that I still burn CDs. :-)
If the free version of Spotify is enough (and I'm one of those people), they won't buy a CD or anything else. Music doesn't bother me. I don't even listen to it in the car. Not at home anymore. There, I sometimes play YouTube on the TV. Sometimes I play something at the gym. Just as a backdrop or for motivation. So for me, I don't care if I'll Cold play in Spotify or not. So does Taylor Swift or Adele. It's their choice. Most of the time, commercially successful performers who get their money in other ways boycott streaming. For others, streaming is the only way to reach people.