Audio Fidelity has announced two new upcoming SACD titles. Both should be excellent acquisitions.
On February 17, AF will reissue the 1973 ‘best of’ collection, The Best Of Bread. Bread, led by songwriter, David Gates, held a number of Top 20 spots for the singles they released from 1970 until the time this album was released just a few years later. This SACD issue will feature a 4-channel Quad mix of the album, as well as a Stereo DSD mix. This SACD will not contain “The Guitar Man” but will adhere to the original’s release track-list, which did not contain it.
On March 10, Audio Fidelity will follow with a 5.1 multi-channel reissue of Winelight by Grover Washington, Jr. Winelight, released in 1980, is a great Jazz effort that netted Grover Washington, Jr a Grammy for Best Jazz Fusion Performance, and one for a single from the set, “Just The Two Of Us”. It has that sultry late ’70s, early ’80s smooth jazz sound.
Winelight will also contain a new DSD Stereo remix.
The Bread SACD is a definite purchase for me. Too bad about “The Guitar Man” though…it’s probably my favorite track by them and would have sounded superb in some form of surround sound.
Still, plenty of other great songs on this one!
So far, this is shaping up to be a fun year for us surround fans…this one plus the upcoming Blood, Sweat, amp; Tears and Guess Who releases.
BTW, BSamp;T’s “Child is Father to the Man” 5.1 SACD release from late last year is nothing short of terrific! And this coming from someone who somehow missed hearing this album throughout all of its existence…
Keep ’em coming…still longing for the day that the rumored-to-have-been-completed-but-never-released Fleetwood Mac surround mixes for their self-titled and “Tusk” albums get released…
Jon
I have ordered the two other AF 4.0 pending releases (The Guess Who Greatest Hits and Blood Sweat And Tears S/T) and I am kind of curious how my receiver will handle 4.0 vs 5.1 with respect to the sub-woofer. I am assuming that since I have all 5 speakers running through the sub-woofer and am allowing the s-w to separate the bass portion that I shouldn’t have any issues. But I am wondering how a 4.0 vs a 4.1 release would handle the bass if the receiver was doing the separation.
I am kind of on the fence with this Bread release. I will have to sample the songs to see how many of them I remember from my youth in the 70’s.
And yes Jon, the AF “Child Is The Father To Man” 5.1 mix is excellent.
As for non-AF releases, I don’t think there has been a bigger surprise 5.1 mix than the Pink Floyd “Division Bell” release. I’ve always liked that album but never thought of it as highly as the “Meddle” to “The Wall” era albums. After hearing it in 5.1 I now crave listening to that album more than any other (maybe because it’s one of the newer ones or maybe because the 5.1 mix is spectacular).
I saw the “Bread” announcement a couple of days ago and thought “this just might be catching on.” But the re-release of the Grover Washington is also very welcome!
BIG Thumbs-Up to the guys over at AF for getting this material out there again!!! Keep them coming guys!
Actually, Best of Bread Vol. 2 was released as a quad as well. Maybe if sales are good one the first one they’ll consider reissuing vol. 2 as well. I wonder why they’re not claiming these are from the original master tapes?
The DSD stereo layer is NO remix, but a remaster!