Finally Enough Love: 50 Number Ones Streaming in June!! (Out August 19th!)

[Jackie 3,169]

I’m very rich bitch!

[Roy 4,372]

7 minutes ago, GregVsMatt said:

Those sold prices! 

 

SHET.

With those prices, I can buy a freaking phone. 

[Roy 4,372]

1 minute ago, Jackie said:

I’m very rich bitch!

Gib money. Thank kyewwwww. 

[Roy 4,372]

@Aiwa08 what do you use for the spectogram?

[Aiwa08 10,116]

2 hours ago, Roy said:

@Aiwa08 what do you use for the spectogram?

http://spek.cc

[Aiwa08 10,116]

8 hours ago, GregVsMatt said:

Yeah I would consider it a unreleased remix or a remix that was created as a concept for a live performance

That's exactly what I want in a deluxe box: unreleased remixes, studio versions, instrumentals, songs never released digitally before, and alternate versions. I don't want demos neither unfinished unreleased songs (and many demos only exist in low quality)

For demos, or unfinished unreleased songs, I prefer a new album/compilation with the songs properly finished. For example something like this (but official): https://www.discogs.com/es/release/6933392-Madonna-Animal

[Roy 4,372]

35 minutes ago, Aiwa08 said:

http://spek.cc

It worked! I recreated the video version of Papa Don't Preach using the HDTracks version.

How do you interpret this?

[Aiwa08 10,116]

22 minutes ago, Roy said:

How do you interpret this?

A nice Hi-Res version but with too much blank space. 88200 Hz or 96000 Hz would be enough. Many tracks are at 192000 to represent the analog recording more accurate (but many times you are only recording noise above the 96000 Hz).

[Gutten 102]

Pitchfork review of FEL:  6.5/10

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/madonna-finally-enough-love/

 

The dance-pop icon selects her favorites remixes from a back catalog stuffed with club reworks, but her picks offer a curiously distorted look back at her history on the dancefloor.

 

Few pop superstars have borrowed as much from club music as Madonna. Her decades at the top of the charts have been bolstered by a canny ability to co-opt contemporary dance sounds without scaring off the mainstream. Finally Enough Love is supposed to represent the singer’s own favorites from her extensive remix catalog. It’s an intriguing premise, promising a candid look at what this musical magpie makes of her excursions into club culture. Sadly, the compilation’s selling point also turns out to be its Achilles’ heel, with Madonna making what can only be seen as some pretty weird selections from her remix archive. (This first edition of the album has been whittled down to 16 tracks; a bounteous 50-track companion, Finally Enough Love: 50 Number Ones, titled in reference to the singer’s 50 Billboard chart-toppers, follows in August.)

Toward the start of her career, Madonna worked with a small number of remixers from her inner circle, like John “Jellybean” Benitez, who was the resident DJ at the Fun House club in New York where Madonna used to dance. As demand for remixers grew, she called on an increasing number of producers from further afield, and many of them, frankly, were not particularly worthy of the honor. These lesser names are over-represented on the second half of the album, which trails off dramatically.

It’s heartening, in a way, that Madonna has thrown in a load of her Y2K-era remixes simply because she likes them. But Eddie Amador’s leaden and infuriatingly sexless “Club 5 Edit” of Hard Candy’s “Give It 2 Me” probably isn’t even Eddie Amador’s favorite late-period Madonna remix, while the jubilant and cheeky “Music” deserves so much better than Washington, D.C. duo Deep Dish’s dull-as-Deep-Dishwater “Dot Com Radio Edit.” The fact that workaday Israeli DJ and producer Offer Nissim appears twice across the album’s 16 tracks, while the Pet Shop Boys’ fantastically chiseled take on “Sorry” only turns up on 50 Number Ones, is a cultural facelift akin to Cecilia Gimenez’ scandalous attempts to clear up the Ecce Homo fresco.

At their worst, there is something rote and functional about the mid-to-late-period remixes that dominate the second half of Finally Enough Love, as if Madonna needed something to get played in the fashionable New York clubs from which she emerged, and didn’t care all that much about how she did it. The fact that Madonna ostensibly cherishes these songs enough to pick them out of the business-house bin of history isn’t enough to rescue them from ignominy.

The other baffling call on Finally Enough Love is the decision to include remix edits rather than the full remixes themselves, when often the whole point of the remakes was to create extended jams that would work for dancefloors and DJs alike. The version of “Into the Groove” included on Finally Enough Love, for example, is the “You Can Dance Remix Edit,” a truncated take on the magnificent eight-minute-plus remodel that Benitez and True Blue producer Patrick Leonard created for You Can Dance, Madonna’s 1987 remix album; the decision is akin to buying a dog that loves to swim, then locking it in the laundry room.

The “You Can Dance Remix Edit” of “Into the Groove” (which this compilation makes available digitally for the first time) is glorious even in its truncation, with instrumental effects, stuttering vocals, and occasional rhythmic flourishes offering a sparkling alternative flavor to one of Madonna’s most iconic hits. But it invites damning comparison with Madonna’s previous work. You Can Dance was an essential Madonna release for the way it showed how a huge pop act could live in parallel to the club underground; Finally Enough Love feels more like a collection of footnotes. (In the case of 50 Number Ones, a very long and tangled set of footnotes.)

Questionable curatorial choices aside, there is plenty of incredible music on Finally Enough Love. “Everybody,” “Into the Groove,” “Like a Prayer,” and “Express Yourself” may appear as rather stingy remix edits, but they are still “Everybody,” “Into the Groove,” “Like a Prayer,” and “Express Yourself”—four of the best singles of the 1980s, and near-perfect examples of how club culture can be directed toward the mainstream without sacrificing its sass or vigor. Shep Pettibone’s canny, percussion-heavy remix of “Express Yourself,” meanwhile, goes a long way to explaining why he was the remixer of choice for ’80s pop megastars, capable of teasing out a club groove with a few well-placed tweaks while maintaining the integrity of the original song.

Shuffling forward in time, David Morales’ “David’s Radio Edit” of “Deeper and Deeper” and Junior Vasquez’s “Junior’s Luscious Single Mix” of “Secret” are scintillating examples of the early-1990s New York house sound: all tough, swung beats, perky keyboard lines, and perfectly coiled tension. And Stuart Price’s raucous “SDP Extended Vocal Edit” of “Hung Up” (a song he produced in the first place) is a wonderful example of how 2000s Madonna connected with the European dance underground on her fantastic 2005 album Confessions on a Dance Floor.

Sadly, it’s not quite enough. Finally Enough Love is good when it should be spectacular; frustrating when it could be fantastic, a mixed bag where we deserved solid gold. You could accept the odd strange song selection, maybe, but Finally Enough Love makes the erstwhile Queen of Pop feel inexcusably boring at times—which is the one thing Madonna at her prime would never countenance.

[Roy 4,372]

31 minutes ago, Aiwa08 said:

A nice Hi-Res version but with too much blank space. 88200 Hz or 96000 Hz would be enough. Many tracks are at 192000 to represent the analog recording more accurate (but many times you are only recording noise above the 96000 Hz).

Ooooh... the same goes for the debut album and LAV. So much blank space at the top.

The HDTrack version of the LAV album is really odd though. All tracks capping at a sharp 20kHz, -100dB.

[Aiwa08 10,116]

23 minutes ago, Roy said:

Ooooh... the same goes for the debut album and LAV. So much blank space at the top.

The HDTrack version of the LAV album is really odd though. All tracks capping at a sharp 20kHz, -100dB.

Because "Like A Virgin" is a digital recording at 44100 Hz.

For example "I'll Remember" has a little music information even at 192000 Hz. But this is rare.

Click the picture below to see it larger:

[thegoldencalf 8,965]

9 hours ago, GregVsMatt said:

Yeah I would consider it a unreleased remix or a remix that was created as a concept for a live performance

Yes but my point is that it’s proof they’re willing to scratch beneath the surface and include unreleased material.

Also I assume the material curated for the 2003 scrapped boxset still exists and whatever unique material they meant to include in that will be added to these reissues 

[Roy 4,372]

7 minutes ago, Aiwa08 said:

Because "Like A Virgin" is a digital recording at 44100 Hz.

For example "I'll Remember" has a little music information even at 192000 Hz. But this is rare.

 

 

You're actually right with LAP on FEL being a true lossless source. I wonder what source they use for this one? I think for the rest, it's from CDs.

[Aiwa08 10,116]

10 minutes ago, Roy said:

You're actually right with LAP on FEL being a true lossless source. I wonder what source they use for this one? I think for the rest, it's from CDs.

Like A Prayer and Express Yourself. The source? Obviously master tapes. Sadly,  I think many remixes were created at CD/DVD quality (oh, those days when the vinyl was almost dead)

[Prayer 3,949]

26 minutes ago, thegoldencalf said:

Also I assume the material curated for the 2003 scrapped boxset still exists and whatever unique material they meant to include in that will be added to these reissues 

This will be interesting to see cause legend/some fans theory is Caresse Henry took it all away with her when she left/was fired - she was the one behind that project anyway. So we'll see!

[Roy 4,372]

11 minutes ago, Aiwa08 said:

Like A Prayer and Express Yourself. The source? Obviously master tapes. Sadly,  I think many remixes were created at CD/DVD quality (oh, those days when the vinyl was almost dead)

Yikes. That's the case for the rest of the remixes in the deluxe edition unless we can discover something.

[thegoldencalf 8,965]

9 minutes ago, Aiwa08 said:

Like A Prayer and Express Yourself. The source? Obviously master tapes. Sadly,  I think many remixes were created at CD/DVD quality (oh, those days when the vinyl was almost dead)

It seem like they just weren’t concerned about using HD transfers. You Can Dance single edits, Deeper, Frozen. All these were released on vinyl.

Also I was disappointed because I assumed they used the original multitracks for remastering but it seems like they only polished the already mastered versions. 
Hopefully this is not an indication of how the reissues will be handled 

[thegoldencalf 8,965]

2 minutes ago, Prayer said:

This will be interesting to see cause legend/some fans theory is Caresse Henry took it all away with her when she left/was fired - she was the one behind that project anyway. So we'll see!

That’s just fan folklore. When these things are done they are catalogued and archived and in 2003 labels were archiving stuff digitally. There’s not just one CD that any one person can take and it’s gone forever. Unless the original masters have been taken before transferring.

But from everything we’ve seen through the years Madonnas music has been preserved properly unlike her film/video work.

[Aiwa08 10,116]

9 minutes ago, thegoldencalf said:

It seem like they just weren’t concerned about using HD transfers. You Can Dance single edits, Deeper, Frozen. All these were released on vinyl.

Yes, many of them were released on vinyl, but many master tapes of these remixes could have been created at CD quality (remember the original recording of "Like A Virgin"). Anyway, I'm sure you're right.

[thegoldencalf 8,965]

Just now, Aiwa08 said:

Yes, many of them were released on vinyl, but many master tapes of these remixes could have been created at CD quality (remember the original recording of "Like A Prayer"). Anyway, I'm sure you're right.

See this is something I don’t get. If they’re created at CD quality how come the vinyl rips have information above 44.1kHz?

I have never looked at a graph for the LAV vinyl but I assume it cuts off at 44 and above that it’s just bright blue peaks

[Prayer 3,949]

2 minutes ago, thegoldencalf said:

That’s just fan folklore. When these things are done they are catalogued and archived and in 2003 labels were archiving stuff digitally. There’s not just one CD that any one person can take and it’s gone forever. Unless the original masters have been taken before transferring.

But from everything we’ve seen through the years Madonnas music has been preserved properly unlike her film/video work.

I guess we'll see with the first proper album reissue. If the remaster is done with multitracks or just boosting the original mixes, just like "Finally Enough Love".

Honestly I thought everything was lost until they started uploading the digital singles.  So yes, all must be there.

[Arckangel 128]

41 minutes ago, thegoldencalf said:

Yes but my point is that it’s proof they’re willing to scratch beneath the surface and include unreleased material.

Also I assume the material curated for the 2003 scrapped boxset still exists and whatever unique material they meant to include in that will be added to these reissues 

Veronica Electronica was also scrapped. Does anyone know if remixes actually created for it?

As for the Spek software... Can anyone help? It's not showing me anything past 22 kHz for any song.

@Roy

 

[thegoldencalf 8,965]

2 minutes ago, Prayer said:

I guess we'll see with the first proper album reissue. If the remaster is done with multitracks or just boosting the original mixes, just like "Finally Enough Love".

Honestly I thought everything was lost until they started uploading the digital singles.  So yes, all must be there.

Well a good indication is the fact that we have a ton of multitracks spanning her entire career. Including remixes, tour arrangements and vocal takes. And a lot of unreleased songs dating all the way back to 1983. All in perfect digital quality

[thegoldencalf 8,965]

3 minutes ago, Arckangel said:

Veronica Electronica was also scrapped. Does anyone know if remixes actually created for it?

As for the Spek software... Can anyone help? It's not showing me anything past 22 kHz for any song.

@Roy

 

As far as I’m aware we have no indication that anything was developed for it. If there was it’s most likely it would have surfaced on this compilation or hopefully on the Ray Of Light reissue

[Roy 4,372]

11 minutes ago, Arckangel said:

Veronica Electronica was also scrapped. Does anyone know if remixes actually created for it?

As for the Spek software... Can anyone help? It's not showing me anything past 22 kHz for any song.

@Roy

 

I think it depends on the relevant kHz for the song and also its bitrate and format, I guess. I am still learning the whole thing because it is fascinating. :D