Flawed, but a necessary purchase for Düülheads
S. Mcausland | Lake Worth, FL USA | 03/10/2006
(3 out of 5 stars)
"The good news: Crisp, clear sound brings out the subtler nuances of this album, making it more fresh and alive than the slightly dull and murky sounding original LP from 1978. The keyboards and guitars sparkle brighter than I ever heard before, and the band sounds "more alive" than when compared to the vinyl LP. The gatefold with booklet digipack is excellent, with plenty of additional photos of the band from the 1978 era. Also includes three tracks of psychedelic hard-rock jams with prominent Lothar Meid bass heaviness. OK, now for the not so good news. Sigh. 1. There is a low grade snap-crackle-pop most noticable during quieter parts throughout the CD (but not the bonus tracks) that sounds like this CD was either mastered directly from an old LP or that there was some serious digital errors occuring throughout during the mastering process. It is not audible during the louder parts, but when things quiet down (or listening on headphones) it can be very distracting. Ach! 2. There is a prominence of analog tape hiss that was not eliminated. Either that, or, if this was mastered from an old LP, the deficiencies of this kind of archival transfer result in a generational loss of fidelity resulting in more hisssssss. 3. The end of 'Jericho' does an abrupt "tape-stop" end during the solo synthesizer "airplane" swoop which occurs just 1 minute before the true end of the song on the LP. The whole last minute of the song is missing! Also, the double end-stop of 'One Blue Morning' is missing. There is just the single last abrupt chordal chop (on the LP there are two). 3. Admittedly a minor quibble, but the three bonus tracks are not from the same era as the band that recorded 'Almost Alive' and don't have as much relevance to the album as other material (if it survived) from the 'Almost Alive' sessions. ...But to end on an upbeat note... I still think the cover art is the best of any D??l album (or any other Krautrock, for that matter) and is graphically beautiful (despite the smaller media size)."
Track Listings (9) - Disc #1