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Why was some songs on The Triumph album mixed so badly?

Themidwestcowboy

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It dawned upon me while listening to Nick's remix of Walk Right Now that some songs on the Triumph album was very weirdly mixed. I hadn't listened to Triumph for a while so i went back and heard it with fresh new ears. Some of the songs that sticks out are Walk Right Now, Everybody and wondering who. Walk right now really sticks out because the voice feels like it's buried under the track the volume is so low on the lead vocals. I don't know but when I heard the remixes the quality was much, much better and made the songs sound better. It also sounds like the speed for some songs had been increased.

Walk This Way from The Album


Walk This Way Remix by Nick

I would love to hear a remixed and remastered version of Triumph. What do you guys think?
 
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Are these new “expanded” releases remastered?
 
dam2040;4321405 said:
Are these new “expanded” releases remastered?
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That’s a good questions! I have been wondering about that myself. Unfortunately I don’t think the problem was the mastering of the tracks. Even though a new remastered version of the album would make it sound much better, the issue that I have is with how they mixed the album.
 
Themidwestcowboy said:
the voice feels like it's buried under the track the volume is so low on the lead vocals
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Album versions are not all equal. Even without changing the mixes, they depend on the whole mastering process which can emphasize certain frequencies and neglect other frequencies.
What you are describing sounds like most post year 2K remixes with emphasis on drums and instrument at the cost of vocals clarity, and sometimes added overdubs, and most of the time "sound compression", which reduces recording dynamic range in order to make everything go as loud as "possible" (also search on critics about the "loudness war" phenomenon).
This is why I always favor releases from early 90s or earliers if they are available.
Though issues even with those, if you take Off The Wall late from 80s it sound nothing like early 80s CD (if I'm not mistaking, early 80s release used the same mastering as vinyl release, which has more emphasis towards high frequencies... but I could be mistaking).

And I still need to mention that the 2008 remasters of the Jacksons, and Thriller, are among the less "destructive" remasters I heard. On the other hand, Off the Wall 2016 is pure garbage right out of the box. Which is why I'm skeptic about the coming Jacksons re-issues. Nice that they will include so many "rare" tracks ... but at what cost in terms of mastering?



Edit: About this, in a recent conversation, someone reported that MJ himself thought the some releases mastering sounded awful, but was not sure if it was about the 2001 remasters, The Ultimate Collection or Invincible. (I personally don't think it was Invincible.) (
 
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I’d always heard the 2001 editions were the best versions.

I know the 2012 Bad 25 is the worst one I’ve ever heard.
 
You may be right, I don't have Off the Wall and Bad 2001 (though I thinking of buying Bad 2001). As I already mentioned, I think the Thriller remasters are usually OK. Regarding Dangerous it depends on tracks, in example, right now I think that the remaster works well on Jam, not so well on Give In To Me (haven't compared the whole album). So yeah, the 2001 remasters may be better than in my memories. For TUC, it depends on tracks, I was focused on rared tracks and Someone Put Your Hand Out 2004 is awful compared to Someone Put Your Hand Out 1991. Someone In The Dark 2004 also sound very different compared to Someone In The Dark 1982, but not catastrophic.

--> Seems like the MJ's early 2000 remasters don't seem as catastrophic as I remembered, but I was focusing on some specific tracks.
 
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dam2040;4321405 said:
Are these new “expanded” releases remastered?
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Somewhere else on this forum I asked "what's the difference between the deluxe and the regular mix? (can't listen paying attention right now)".
And I got this reply: "On the album (regular mix), they cut the strings in the first part of the intro Including the sound of electric guitars and synths in album version
also Nick* made the Deluxe Mix sound balanced and matched with the original mix."
 
OTW 01 sounds pretty good although it is still too loud. Bad and Dangerous do not sound great at all in my opinion. Also yeah the B25 remaster was even worse lol.
 
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I've never thought about it. I'll have to listen to that album on the way to work tomorrow and judge it, any excuse to listen to that masterpiece of an album

Heads up Themidwestcowboy, was Walk This Way on the same album as Love Waits For No One ?
 
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Maxym said:
Album versions are not all equal. Even without changing the mixes, they depend on the whole mastering process which can emphasize certain frequencies and neglect other frequencies.
What you are describing sounds like most post year 2K remixes with emphasis on drums and instrument at the cost of vocals clarity, and sometimes added overdubs, and most of the time "sound compression", which reduces recording dynamic range in order to make everything go as loud as "possible" (also search on critics about the "loudness war" phenomenon).
This is why I always favor releases from early 90s or earliers if they are available.
Though issues even with those, if you take Off The Wall late from 80s it sound nothing like early 80s CD (if I'm not mistaking, early 80s release used the same mastering as vinyl release, which has more emphasis towards high frequencies... but I could be mistaking).
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I don't think that's the case, because some songs on triumph sounds just perfectly fine and clear with front and center lead vocals but some other songs sounds very muffled and unclear. The dynamics sounds very uneven.

SmoothCriminal1995 said:
I've never thought about it. I'll have to listen to that album on the way to work tomorrow and judge it, any excuse to listen to that masterpiece of an album

Heads up Themidwestcowboy, was Walk This Way on the same album as Love Waits For No One 😁
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mjchris said:
Walk this way? hhh? Its "Walk right now" !
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HAHA! wow. I'm sorry guys. This is the second time I mix up the names of the songs for this album. I'll probably end up calling Everybody "Everyone"
 
This is interesting, I never thought they sounded too bad myself.
 
awaken450;4321431 said:
This is interesting, I never thought they sounded too bad myself.
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Neither did I, but when you hear the new mixes that talented producers/mixers make of this track you’ll clearly notice how the mixing on some songs sounds rather flat and dull. Destiny didn’t have this issue. Neither did any of MJ’s solo albums so I wonder what was going on with Triumph. Also on some songs his voice almost sound pitched up, giving him a bit of a chipmunk-y sound. I really believe that they sped up some songs on triumph.
 
The mixing wasn't done thoroughly enough. For instance, listen to "Your Ways" - at around 03:48, Michaels "okay, ehem" shouldn't be on the final mix but it is.

 
Fuzball said:
The mixing wasn't done thoroughly enough. For instance, listen to "Your Ways" - at around 03:48, Michaels "okay, ehem" shouldn't be on the final mix but it is.

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Wow great ear mate. I've never noticed that before.
If I remember rightly in his book Moonwalk MJ didn't sound too satisfied with certain songs on Triumph. If I can remember off the top of my head, it was something like, it didn't have the richness of Quincy's sound
 
Triumph was definitely sped up. That's one reason why that additional verse from Wondering Who was left out. They could only fit so much onto an album.

There's got to be one or two nearly finished songs in the vault for this album that just didn't fit.

The vocal at 3:48 of Your Ways, I always heard that and thought it was intentional. It always sounded like "Okay, girl" to me.

It was engineer Tom Perry who mixed it. He worked on other albums like The Emotions and EWF. It wasn't like he had no experience. He also worked on some demos for MJ and Janet around this time.

There was no Bruce Swedien to mix this. He was probably working on the Brothers Johnson album and George Benson.
 
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