Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Siti Nurhaliza Unplugged Vinyl Album...

Siti Nurhaliza is an iconic, successful singer in Malaysia and its neighboring countries. The recent unplugged concert at Istana Budaya on 17th April 2015 has made another milestone in her career as this is her first album to be ever released in vinyl. This vinyl album is not the first from local artist since the resurrection of vinyl format.

It is double LP and the artwork is good, very nice in presentation. This album has been remastered for vinyl format at Sterling Sound, New York and pressed in Japan. On paper this is very promising and should sounds as it should be. Highly anticipated album for many  audiophiles in this format. Be it her fans or not, many has grabbed this limited released LP.



My expectation on this album is very high since the mastering and pressing of this album has been properly taken care to ensure its sound quality. 

On the very first track membunuh benci, the simple one voice one piano track is really good. The vocal projection from Siti is great consider it was a live concert recording. The reverberation of concert hall nicely captured in this recording.

When the second track kicks in, my perception on local live recording already sets in. The sound staging is nowhere to make this album a benchmark. When full musical instruments came to play, there is no sense of ample space in between musicians in a large concert hall. It was a great show to many of her fans, great recording is a must and all these should be feel in this recording. It was typical musical show like in tv program but her vocals remain focus and anchored strongly in the whole presentation.


It was like a tv show, yes...and I think it is suited more towards dvd or bluray format. The arrangement of music is nothing unusual for local standard. I was expecting a "pause" on every tracks even though it was a live recording and to cut out too much talking, chatting interactions with fans. In video format it is okay to do this. The medley arrangement also is a bit off for my liking.

As I said my expectation is high and I don't buy reasons like, "it's ok la for local show or artist". It's not...this is 2015. Our live recording still way behind many good production company and I don't know whether if it a recording engineers quality of work or the equipment used.

Let me get this straight, this album is okay. It is very good for local standard and don't get into placebo effect that everything on vinyl will sounds great. Yes, it is better than the cd since the mastering for LP was done separately...I guess.  Perhaps her strong vocal helps so much in this recording and we tend to think the whole presentation is great.

I have a strong feeling that if it is a small unplugged session in a studio, the recording will be much better. Large hall live recording is not easy to capture the sense of being there.

This is just my personal take and view on this album. If many of you satisfied with this album...just enjoy it.


P/s: I might have compared with international artist live recording, i.e. Kenny G live (great dynamic recording, listen to the drums, sense of the hall..very airy..the separations of musical instruments). too much isn't it?...but hey that was 1989 recording and we can't matched that yet?