# Dutton Vocalion SACDs



## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

I just wanted to note the problems I've had with every single SACD I've gotten from Dutton / Vocalion... Mancini, Floyd Cramer, Stokowski, Hugo Montenegro... I think this label is mastering their multichannel music improperly.

I just got the Stokowski Bach Transcriptions / Wagner Brunnhilde's Immolation. It's derived from a quad master, but when I play it the light for 5.1 lights up. The response is very band limited. There is almost nothing below 80Hz. I had bass management turned on and I tried boosting the level of my sub to +16dB. With any other music, that would make the bass explode rattling the walls, but I could barely hear any difference with this SACD. The kettle drums were all top end rattle, no sub bass and the same was true of the string basses. At the end when the Rhine overflows its banks there is an extended triangle trill. It sounded like a bell, not a triangle- as if there was nothing above about 10 or 12kHz. The violins were mushy and lacked definition too. Normally, I would blame it on the recording, but I have the Decca Stokowski CD box set and on there the bass is full and the treble is crisp.

There also seems to be some rechannelling going on. Even though this is a quad recording, there's sound coming out of the center channel, and sometimes there are odd balances where something that should be front left or front right gets smeared to the rear channel along the side wall. Very unnatural sounding when it's strings in the Stokowski or piano in the Mancini. When this happens there is a weird phasey distortion that sounds like one of those fake stereo boxes from the 70s. I've never heard the quad versions of these albums, so I don't know how the parts are laid out in the four channels, but I have the stereo CDs of the Stokowski and Mancini albums and the CDs sound a LOT better than the SACDs.

I encountered these same exact same problems on every other Dutton Vocalion disk I've gotten. It sounds nice and clean in the middle frequencies, but there are steep rolloffs on the top and bottom, as if I was playing them on bookshelf speakers, not full range speakers with a subwoofer. I thought it might be just the Mancini and Cramer albums since they were among the first SACDs Dutton Vocalion produced, but now more than a year later, I just got two new releases and they have the same problems. Perhaps they might sound OK on headphones or on little bookshelf speakers, but on a good system it sounds really bad.

Just letting everyone know. if you see stuff you like on the Dutton label, try one and see what you think before you go ordering a bunch from England. Caveat emptor.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

I've been pleased with the Dutton discs I have acquired; they were all newly recorded - Taneyev and a group of British composers from the early 20th century.


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

Maybe it's just the reissues that have the problem. Do you have a subwoofer? If so could you do me a favor and boost the level of the sub up and see if the bass changes? With all of my SACDs, there's no sub bass at all. Everything is chopped off below 80Hz

I probably wouldn't notice this if I didn't have full range speakers, but what's the point of putting something on an SACD and then not even having a response that covers the range of human hearing?


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

I've got speakers that sound good to me; that's about it.


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

I'm trying to determine if there is an LFE channel on the disc. There is one on all of my discs, but it's empty and the mains are rolled off at 80Hz, presumably because they intended to include an LFE channel.


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

I went back and thoroughly checked the Stokowski Bach Transcriptions. It's four channel quad with no LFE track. There is very little there below 80Hz. It messes up the transcription of the organ pedals. I also noted that little fills have been added to the rear channels as overdubs. There is a flute solo in Komm Susser Tod that isn't on the CD release. I guess they punched in and spiced up the stuff for surround. It definitely doesn't sound as good as the CD though.

I did find one Dutton SACD in the batch I bought that has first class sound and a great quad mix. But it's TV show theme songs from the 70s by Ray Davies, it isn't classical. I'm going to be very cautious if I buy from Dutton in the future. Five duds and one good one isn't very good odds.


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