re:(RAM: Paul McCartney) - phase corrected version-NEW UPLOAD 29-5-22 remix

[D-listener]

I had finally spent time with your remix. It is just excellent and I heard great things long hidden. This is definitely THE version. Would love to hear what you can do with Johns albums. Thank you!

[Tex]

So the left and right channel are out of sync slightly AND they are inverted from each other? Is one channel 180 degrees inverted? Also can one channel be LESS or MORE than 180 degrees inverted?

I think some new people conflate the two problems so let's just clarify that "Ram" apparently has TWO issues not just one. You can have the left channel and right channels inverted but still be in "sync" and/or you can have both channels in the same correct phase but out of sync time wise.

[Hozman]

I listened to this last night and the clarity of the sound picture was "ear opening"! Thanks for this mix. This will be my go to version.

[ianbuckers]

So the left and right channel are out of sync slightly AND they are inverted from each other? Is one channel 180 degrees inverted? Also can one channel be LESS or MORE than 180 degrees inverted?

I think some new people conflate the two problems so let's just clarify that "Ram" apparently has TWO issues not just one. You can have the left channel and right channels inverted but still be in "sync" and/or you can have both channels in the same correct phase but out of sync time wise.

Perhaps mojofilter will comment if he reads this thread. As he has put out two phase corrected versions of this on RMW he should be able to clarify what needed to be done...?

[diddlebunk]

Holy cow — I never had any idea of the phase issue on the stereo mix of Ram. I've always preferred the mono mix since its reissue on vinyl in 2012, so this is a big "back to stereo" moment for me.

Very excited to listen, and appreciative of your efforts on the project. Cheers and thanks...

[steve1950]

could someone share RMW 756 RAM?

[mojofilter]

A tape recording being out of phase results when it is played back on a machine where the playback head is not aligned precisely in the middle of the magnetic stripe on the tape. This is an azimuth misalignment issue. Tape heads can be adjusted in a small arc, up or down. Somewhere in there is the "sweet spot" where the signal on the tape is dead centered with the alignment of the head that recorded it. This is why virtually all tape dubs from one machine to another sound worse - it's not just that there's an extra generation of tape hiss, but the heads of the two decks are pretty much guaranteed to be aligned just slightly different from one another. The dub will be out of phase. One channel will sound brighter, the other duller.

One channel being inverted refers not to phase, but polarity. Picture the waveform of a snare drum like Ringo's, being miked from the top and bottom. When he hits the snare, both peaks should go up at the same time. If one goes down while the other is going up, this is a polarity problem in the mic cable or somewhere in the signal chain. If the whole mix is like that, it messes with the stereo image. Invert one channel, and it sounds normal again.

In the case of RAM, Paul recorded the bed tracks at one studio in NYC. Then he took the tapes to LA for overdubs and mixing. This is where the problem comes from: the record and/or playback heads of the machine in NYC was/were aligned differently from the head of the machine in LA. If you were to play the completed tape back on the NYC machine, the overdubs would be out of phase; if you played it in LA, the basic tracks would be out of phase. When you mix down that multitrack to stereo, it's going to have a smeared stereo image. If you sum the channels to mono, they will go dull and swishy from phase cancellations.

Adobe Audition 3.0 has an Automatic Phase Correction function. The first time I saw and heard this work, the program paid for itself. It has the ability, through some ingenious programming, to correct for misaligned azimuth. What it did for RAM was breathtaking! I didn't do anything beyond discover that setting and let it do its thing with Steve Hoffman's RAM CD, which seems to have had the reputation for being the best mastering of the album. Collectors began to hear this, and were full of effusive praise for the "new" sound of the album. I never got to see this discussion, but it was brought up on the SHF, with everyone saying how great it sounded. Steve Hisown Self deigned to join the thread to say that that tape had always been out of phase and there was nothing that could be done about it. Anyone who thought it could be "fixed" (like me) was uninformed and trying to pull a fast one. Then he deleted all the posts in that thread and shut down the discussion.

Well, Steve, a team at Adobe built software that can fix that problem and it did, regardless of how it hurts your ego to learn that there are people who know more about some stuff than you do. I get the impression that he must think that $300 software is a kiddie toy. But somebody knew that it could be done, and they designed the program that would do it, and put it there for anyone to discover. It's not mentioned in the Help files, nor explained. But it's there, and I'm assuming everyone in this thread has heard the result. I take no credit for anything beyond having discovered that it was possible. The real stars here are the people who wrote the code that made it work.

I use Phase Correction all the time now. On everything. I look at every piece of audio I open in Spectral Phase View. I highlight a short section, hit the Go button, and if the image changes, I undo the test and apply correction to the whole thing. You would be appalled at just how many recordings out there need this procedure done to them, and how much better they could sound. I'm not aware of APC being offered in any of the expensive DAW programs. Channel polarity, yes, but not phase correction.

[alphabeatles]

APC seems to still be available in Audition 2022 (v3 is from 2013 so it may be difficult to acquire and launch today, depending on OS):

From hxxps://helpx.adobe.com/audition/using/noise-reduction-restoration-effects.html#automatic_phase_correction_effect

Automatic Phase Correction effect

The Noise Reduction/Restoration > Automatic Phase Correction effect addresses azimuth errors from misaligned tape heads, stereo smearing from incorrect microphone placement, and many other phase-related problems.

Global Time Shift
Activates the Left and Right Channel Shift sliders, which let you apply a uniform phase shift to all selected audio.

Auto Align Channels and Auto Center Panning
Align phase and panning for a series of discrete time intervals, which you specify using the following options:

Time Resolution
Specifies the number of milliseconds in each processed interval. Smaller values increase accuracy; larger ones increase performance.

Responsiveness
Determines overall processing speed. Slow settings increase accuracy; fast settings increase performance.

Channel
Specifies the channels phase correction will be applied to.

Analysis Size
Specifies the number of samples in each analyzed unit of audio.

Note:
For the most precise, effective phase correction, use the Auto Align Channels option. Enable the Global Time Shift sliders only if you are confident that a uniform adjustment is necessary, or if you want to manually animate phase correction in the Multitrack Editor.

[ianbuckers]

could someone share RMW 756 RAM?

Mr. P did share it a few days ago on the '207 Beatles RMW albums in one folder' thread but the link is already dead. Maybe ask him to repost?

[steve1950]

I will Thanks