Sean Magee 2015 remasters - buying help

[starscreamsrevenge]

Hi everyone,

 

I LOVE the 40th anniversary CD sets by Sean Magee, I think they have as much depth as the original vinyls. This is great as it means I don't have to worry about overplay ha ha!! 

 

I think while the Grace Under Pressure 40th set is up in the air, I might try and buy a few of the later albums digitally to save waiting until 2028 or later for those albums to be released as 40th CD sets. 

 

I've got a few questions which I hope someone can answer: 

 

1 - Is Sean Magee the only engineer involved in the 2015 remasters? So if a sales listing has someone else mentioned as mastering the album, that won't be a 2015 remaster, is that correct? Is it a good rule of thumb to say that if a listing has a release date or a copyright date of 2015, it will be by Sean Magee?

 

2 - Can someone tell me if these sales listings are Sean's remasters or not please?:

 

https://www.highresaudio.com/en/album/view/9n57tm/rush-power-windows-40th-anniversary-remaster-2015

 

https://www.highresaudio.com/en/album/view/22tvyg/rush-hold-your-fire-40th-anniversary-remaster-2015

 

https://www.hdtracks.com/#/album/5df32fde9c9028d5e6b9745e

 

On the Power Windows link it mentions Bob Ludwig as mastering it, but I thought he only did the 1997 CD remasters?

 

3 - Has Sean remastered everything in the Discography out of interest? I've seen he's remastered up until Test For Echo, but I'm not sure about the last 3 albums?

 

Thanks for any help anyone can provide :)

 

 

[BanterFromTheCosmos]

1 - AFAIK, yes, Sean's the only engineer involved. Anything with a 2015 date should be good to go. If another person is credited, it might just be a holdover from the original liner notes. To segue into your second question, the downloads in those links are all Magee's remasters.

 

3 - He remastered everything with the exception of Vapor Trails, Clockwork Angels, and the post-1989 live albums. Some sites still have a remaster of the original mix of VT done by Andy VanDette (same guy behind the Sectors and Studio Albums sets). It still suffers from lots of compression, but it's definitely an improvement over the nasty sounding CD. I actually enjoy this one more than the remix tbh!
https://us.7digital.com/artist/rush/release/vapor-trails-4046482

 

Now the unfortunate thing is that there's currently no legal way to buy the 2015 Atlantic-era remasters digitally; the hi-res versions were only included with the vinyl reissues via download codes. The versions available right now are Andy VanDette's remasters from the Studio Albums box. 

 

Three 40th anniversary editions are advertised as having the 2015 remasters on the CDs, but are actually compressed variations of them; 2112, MP, and Signals. Signals was somehow mastered at the wrong speed and is higher pitched than all other versions! How'd such an obvious and significant error slip by QA unnoticed?! There's no way to tell if Sean had any involvement with the CDs, so it's possible someone else needlessly messed with his work. I'm worried that they'll do it yet again once we get to Grace Under Pressure 40. Hopefully it's released on CD unchanged, though I'm not holding my breath.

[starscreamsrevenge]

Hi,

 

Thanks for the reply, I was waiting to see if anyone else chimed in with any responses (2 sources are better than 1 etc! :)) I'll respond below your answers:

 

1 - AFAIK, yes, Sean's the only engineer involved. Anything with a 2015 date should be good to go. If another person is credited, it might just be a holdover from the original liner notes. To segue into your second question, the downloads in those links are all Magee's remasters.

 

Hopefully the 40th CDs are going to be an ongoing project, but if "Grace" doesn't get announced by June, I think I know what I'll be buying after these! :) 

 

I emailed that High Res Audio company to see if they had a definitive credit for the mastering, and they just said what is listed is the info that the record company gives them. Being as their sales listings say "40th 2015 Remaster", I think that's as close as we're going to get confirmation wise unfortunately :(

 

I think I'll buy "Power Windows" as a test to see how it sounds. I've ripped the 40th CDs to my Eversolo streamer, so hopefully if it has a similar sort of depth to those, that's good enough for me (until 2026 for the CD hopefully! :))

 

 

3 - He remastered everything with the exception of Vapor Trails, Clockwork Angels, and the post-1989 live albums. Some sites still have a remaster of the original mix of VT done by Andy VanDette (same guy behind the Sectors and Studio Albums sets). It still suffers from lots of compression, but it's definitely an improvement over the nasty sounding CD. I actually enjoy this one more than the remix tbh!

https://us.7digital.com/artist/rush/release/vapor-trails-4046482

 

I wonder why they got Sean to remaster "Snakes & Arrows" but left off "Vapor Trails" and "Clockwork Angels" from the reunion era? 

 

Now the unfortunate thing is that there's currently no legal way to buy the 2015 Atlantic-era remasters digitally; the hi-res versions were only included with the vinyl reissues via download codes. The versions available right now are Andy VanDette's remasters from the Studio Albums box. 

 

That is unfortunate, as I was hoping to listen to Sean's "Presto" and "Roll The Bones" before 2030 and 2032 if the current release pattern keeps up! :) It's a bit pointless buying the vinyls just for some download codes IMO. 

 

If anyone knows how to digitally buy the 2015 versions of "Presto" through to "Test For Echo", do chime in :)

Having to wait until 2037 for a CD seems a little ridiculous!!! :) :)

At that rate, they'll need remastering again!!

 

 

Three 40th anniversary editions are advertised as having the 2015 remasters on the CDs, but are actually compressed variations of them; 2112, MP, and Signals. Signals was somehow mastered at the wrong speed and is higher pitched than all other versions! How'd such an obvious and significant error slip by QA unnoticed?! There's no way to tell if Sean had any involvement with the CDs, so it's possible someone else needlessly messed with his work. I'm worried that they'll do it yet again once we get to Grace Under Pressure 40. Hopefully it's released on CD unchanged, though I'm not holding my breath.

 

If there is compression on 2112, MP and Signals, it is an EXTREMELY low amount. Everything I've ripped on my Eversolo sounds remarkably consistent sound-wise between the 6 albums. 

 

I wish they'd either release these 2015 Remasters on CD all in one go so we could buy them when we want instead of the 40/41st anniversary of said album, or better still, let us know they are in fact continuing with Grace, and will do until the series is complete. 

 

I'm waiting until June latest for the Grace 40 CD announcement personally. If that is skipped, I guess the series will be finished, as why would they re-start it with Power Windows? It is a shame if it is, but at least they are available digitally up until "Hold Your Fire", so that is something I suppose :)

 

 

Edited January 7, 2025 by starscreamsrevenge

[BanterFromTheCosmos]

3 hours ago, starscreamsrevenge said:

Now the unfortunate thing is that there's currently no legal way to buy the 2015 Atlantic-era remasters digitally; the hi-res versions were only included with the vinyl reissues via download codes. The versions available right now are Andy VanDette's remasters from the Studio Albums box. 

 

That is unfortunate, as I was hoping to listen to Sean's "Presto" and "Roll The Bones" before 2030 and 2032 if the current release pattern keeps up! :) It's a bit pointless buying the vinyls just for some download codes IMO. 

 

If anyone knows how to digitally buy the 2015 versions of "Presto" through to "Test For Echo", do chime in :)

Having to wait until 2037 for a CD seems a little ridiculous!!! :) :)

Presto thru TFE LPs are getting reissued at the end of this month. They'd have to be the Magee versions since that's what the recent Atlantic vinyl box set used. Hopefully they include the download cards this time; the box didn't.

[starscreamsrevenge]

3 hours ago, BanterFromTheCosmos said:

Presto thru TFE LPs are getting reissued at the end of this month. They'd have to be the Magee versions since that's what the recent Atlantic vinyl box set used. Hopefully they include the download cards this time; the box didn't.

That's useful information, thanks for that :)

 

I didn't take much interest in the recent Atlantic vinyl boxset, as I thought you'd be able to buy Magee's 2015 masters digitally like the Mercury albums. Oh well these things are done to test us aren't they?!!! :)

 

 

[Missing1202]

I maybe wrong but i was pretty sure that these were available as HD downloads on that site in 2015.. I have to check but I have them all. I believe the whole catalog is available that way. I use my pc as a media server and the play the flac files. You can see if they are compressed by their size. Plus, most of the bigger albums had a blue ray relase where there is uncompressed, high sample rate audio available. I have Hemispheres, AFTK, 2112, Siganls, and Moving Pictures in blu ray. All of them have at least 24/96 on them. Multichannel is the way to go and the Steven Wilson mix of AFTK is the best Rush album I ever heard.

Rush sold thier thier music to a company and I do not knkw the details of it. I have beem unimpressed by them. To mamy mony grabs. Terry Browns mixes have been the happy spot. 

They need to change their strategy becaise the core buying audience for Rush is saturated.

HD tracks has all the high res versions. 

Edited February 25 by Missing1202