GiGinJapan Artwork of Japanese CDs (mostly) Rush / St. Louis 1980 Pre-fm / 1CD+1Bonus DVDR / Cygnus
Kiel Auditorium, St. Louis, MO, USA 11th-13th February 1980 plus Bonus CDR “PERMANENT WAVES: MOBILE FIDELITY CD”
Play sample :
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RUSH in 1980 opened a new horizon by sending the ambitious work “PERMANENT WAVES” to 4th place in the US. A soundboard album that will pour the live performance into your brain is now available.
“February 1980 St. Louis performance” is engraved on this work. It is the stereo sound board recording. Speaking of “PERMANENT WAVES Tour”, part of it was adopted in the traditional edition “EXIT… STAGE LEFT”, and now the official live album is attached to the deluxe edition of “PERMANENT WAVES”. In order to organize the situation around that, let’s first take a bird’s eye view from the activity summary at that time.
● 1979
“HEMISPHERES Tour”
・ January 11-April 15: North America # 1 (60 performances)
・ April 23-June 4: Europe (27 performances)
“PERMANENT WAVES Warm Up Tour”
・ August 17-September 22: North America # 2 (20 performances)
《Production of “PERMANENT WAVES” from September to October》
● 1980
“PERMANENT WAVES Tour”
・January 17-May 23: North America #3 (79 performances) ← Coco
・ June 1-22: UK (19 performances) ← * Official 2 types
“PERMANENT WAVES Warm Up Tour”
・ September 11th-October 1st: North America # 4 (16 performances)
《Production of “MOVING PICTURES” from September to October》
This is the 1979-1980 RUSH. At that time, they were also known for their unique activity style, and it was a rotation of “warm-up tour → album production → main tour → warm-up …”. Even on this tour, “EXIT … STAGE LEFT” and official Dela Eddy were produced from the “UK” tour, but the St. Louis performance of this work was the beginning of “North America # 3” before that. However, the date has not been confirmed. The St. Louis performance is also famous for being broadcast on the radio, but the live itself was three consecutive nights on “February 11th, 12th and 13th”. I don’t know which of these shows, or if it’s a synthetic edit.
In any case, the FM soundboard broadcast of the St. Louis performance has reigned as a major staple of the “PERMANENT WAVES Tour”, but this work is the highest peak. It is one of the products digitized from the pre-FM reel before broadcasting. In fact, the sound is completely official grade. The effect processing that emphasizes the feeling of echo like “EXIT … STAGE LEFT” is less, but it is a super-superior product that does not compromise on the mix and the sound quality itself.
The live performance of the “PERMANENT WAVES Tour”, which has entered a new era, is depicted with such transcendent quality. It’s not a full show because it’s edited according to the broadcast frame, but the recording time of about 76 minutes is almost the same scale as “EXIT … STAGE LEFT”. Let’s put things in order here.
・Night Flight: Beneath, Between And Behind／By-Tor And The Snow Dog
・Permanent Waves: The Spirit Of Radio/Natural Science
・Other: 2112 (★)/Xanadu/La Villa Strangiato (★)/Medley (Working Man/Anthem/Bastille Day/In The Mood: ★)
* Note: “★” marks are songs that cannot be heard even in the official Dela Eddy “PERMANENT WAVES WORLD TOUR 1980”.
… and it looks like this. As mentioned above, the most famous symbol of the current “PERMANENT WAVES Tour” is the official live album “PERMANENT WAVES WORLD TOUR 1980” recorded in “PERMANENT WAVES” Dela Eddie. In this work, you can enjoy the large songs “2112”, “La Villa Strangiato” and the initial medley that you can not listen to there. In particular, the medley, which concentrates the famous songs up to “CARESS OF STEEL” in about 10 minutes, is a delicious suite as it was not even in “EXIT…STAGE LEFT”. Also, for those who have not experienced “PERMANENT WAVES” Dela Eddie, the large song “Natural Science” that flows out with a completely official-class sound may be fresh.
A great classic that has been loved by fans for many years is the Shin Ketteiban that has undergone the ultimate evolution by pre-FM masters. RUSH decided to postpone the live album plan and produce “MOVING PICTURES” due to the favorable reception of “PERMANENT WAVES”. If the live album was made as originally planned, what kind of work would it have become? Please fully enjoy the press CD that leaves its brilliance forever.
★ Stereo sound board recording of “February 1980 St. Louis performance”. It is a pre-FM master that updates the highest peak of standard sound sources, and its sound is completely official. The effect processing that emphasizes the echo feeling like “EXIT … STAGE LEFT” is less, but neither the mix nor the sound quality itself is compromised. “By-Tor And The Snow Dog”, “Natural Science”, “2112”, and the early medley, the repertoire that cannot be heard in “EXIT… STAGE LEFT” is also a delicious decision board.
The main press CD is a completely official quality sound board album that represents the “PERMANENT WAVES Tour”. As a bonus to celebrate the birth of a new live album, we have prepared the ultimate version of the studio work. This work is a 24K gold CD “UDCD 772” released in 2007 from “Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab (MFSL)”, a manufacturer specializing in analog masters. Yes, it is the masterpiece “PERMANENT WAVES” that opened up a new era for RUSH.
[Mobile fidelity with the greatest emphasis on master tape sound] In the 1990s, when the production of analog works on CD reached its peak, many high-quality CDs appeared, but MFSL was exceptional among them. Other high-quality sound CDs are based on the concept of “suppressing digital deterioration,” such as using new technology to reduce the discomfort of compression and reducing reading errors with materials. On the other hand, MFSL’s policy is to “faithfully reproduce the sound engraved on the master tape and not add anything extra”. We have developed our own “half-speed mastering” technology that also focuses on the stage of extracting sound from magnetic tape, and we place the utmost importance on “the analog recorded sound itself”.Since 1987, MFSL has borrowed original master tapes from record companies and has meticulously digitized numerous masterpieces one by one. We released the “Ultradisc” series, in which the sound of the master tapes was transferred to CDs. Currently, it is also expanding into the SACD and LP fields, but the point is that this work was made into a CD in the first half of the 90’s. Magnetic tape masters are vulnerable to deterioration over time, and the more time passes, the more the sound at the time of recording is lost. There are cases where the tape is distorted or sticks, but even if it is stored precisely, the loss of magnetism cannot be prevented. Currently, there are situations where the sound of LPs recorded with physical grooves was better than the master tape itself. In that respect as well, the “Ultradisc” series was a feat. It started in the 1980s when CDs were popular, and digitally recorded the sound of master tapes before the advent of new technology CDs that claimed high sound quality.
MF sealed the extracted master sound in a 24-karat gold CD. A gold-plated coating with a purity of 99% or higher is typically more reflective than the thin metal film of a CD, reducing errors. The aim was important, but what is now considered even more important is preservability. Polycarbonate of CD is water-retentive and corrodes (that is, rusts) the metal thin film (aluminum) inside. If you hold an old CD up to a light, you may see small dots, which are corroded holes that are said to be one of the causes of read errors. Gold, on the other hand, is the most stable metal and does not rust in nature. Of course, since it’s just a coating, there are limits, but it’s preserving power is incomparable to that of a normal CD. [“PERMANENT WAVES” with a surprising freshness that overwhelms both remastered and analog] “PERMANENT WAVES” revived by such MFSL is this work. We have already introduced MFSL versions of “MOVING PICTURES” and “SIGNALS”, but they were released in the 90’s. On the other hand, “PERMANENT WAVES” was released in 2007, a long time after the MFSL conversion was delayed for some reason. I thought that the master freshness could not be expected just because that much time had passed, but I was surprised because it was not the case. In fact, compared to the 40th anniversary remaster, this work sounds much better. The 40th anniversary edition also had an analog-like natural sound, but the sound was cloudy, probably because the master had deteriorated over time, and the three-dimensional effect and dynamism were spoiled. On the other hand, in this work, each note stands out clearly, and the contemporary ensemble rises like a structure. Of course, there is no meaning in the three-dimensional effect produced by equalizing, but there is no need to worry about that because it is MFSL. While it is natural to the fine details of the sound, it draws out a vividness that far exceeds the modern remastered board.
What’s even more surprising is that the freshness is good even when compared to the analog board of the time. Magnetically recorded master tapes lose information over time, but analog records engraved with physical grooves are resistant to aging. If it is not played back and the storage conditions are good, the original sound will be retained semi-permanently. This time, we used the first UK edition and the Japanese edition at that time, which are special even for such analog. Still, this work is more fresh. This impact is more than when “MOVING PICTURES” and “SIGNALS”. From here it is only a complete imagination, but although the MFSL board “PERMANENT WAVES” was released in 2007, the digitization work itself may have been done much earlier. If you do not think so, you will not be satisfied with the beauty of this sound.
The master sound of a daimyo record that has been preserved to the present day precisely because it is a gold CD by “Mobile Fidelity”. This work is a piece that precisely reproduces the beautiful sound. Along with the main press CD, which is the new masterpiece of the live album, please enjoy “RUSH in 1980” standing on a new stage with the highest quality.
