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JFA Re-Mastered

Dream Theater – Systematic Chaos

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Album:

Dream Theater - Systematic Chaos

Originally a DR6 heavily clipped album – now “re-mastered” to a DR11-level

Note: Reduce volume on retail by approximately 5.5db during playback for equal loudness comparison

The level & dynamics in the DR11 version are now closer to that of previous albums such as Images & Words – So to enjoy to its fullest, please play on a standalone/dedicated audio system (non-portable – non-builtin) if possible – and turn it up a good bit. The impact, and the resultant attention it draws from the listener as a result of the increased dynamics and seperation of instrumentss should help make the song a lot more memorable & also interesting.

Dynamic Range DR11

Audio Evaluations:

FLAC Format
02-before.png

Retail CD - Before (DR6)

02-after.png

JFA Re-Master - After (DR11)

  • Mike

    Thanks so much. I have been dying to hear what this album would sound like with the dynamics restored.

  • Mike

    Holy Crap! I had to turn down the volume because the kick drum was shaking the room! Nice work!

  • Mike

    If you can do Repentance that would be great. I think that song suffers the most from lack of dynamics. It is a dirge that slowly builds but you can barely hear the volume changes.

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    Links Updated!!

    Enjoy!!

  • Dynamic Range must return

    DUDE YOUR MY HERO!!!!
    It sounds a billion times better!!!
    thank u so much!!!!!!! Petrucci’s guitar has so much more character
    Could u do Slipknot’s Disasterpiece off of Iowa? Andy wallace’s mixes on that album are so brilliant, but the overcompression ruins it. Joey Jordison’s double bass on that song could be so much more menancing with oodles of dynamic range

  • Daniel

    Thank you so much! This is just amazing. What exactly is the process of re-mastering these albums and how easy is it? Well, for you.

  • Jason R Burke

    Will u be doing ‘Train of Thought’ in the future? this album also suffers lack of dynamic range and would sound 1000 times better if this was restored :)

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    I can have a look at that – however the aim is not to go around to every possible album to re-do them but more to give real examples of how a subset of songs or albums would sound with increased dynamics etc – hence the need to limit the number of re-masterings basically :-)

  • Daniel

    I thought Octavarium needs more of a dynamic range treatment. IMO, Train of Thought sounds fine, but Octavarium sounds pretty flat.

  • Jason R Burke

    In the unofficial DR rated list, Train of Thought has a range of 6 verse Octavarium’s 7 – very close but i think Train of Though’ts DN a tad worse (though Octavarium is the better album imo)
    that being said – it would be awesome if they were both mastered by the masterful jNive :P

  • The Mu

    The downloads for #1 and #6 don’t work… can you give me some help here? I really want to hear the full masterpiece that you’ve created (and don’t want to waste a CD-R on an album with gaps in it).

  • http://realurl.org/twitted.php?id=2406889006 Twitted by The_Mu

    [...] This post was Twitted by The_Mu [...]

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    Links updated & corrected

  • darksound

    How are these being remastered? What is the complete process and what is the source? If you are using the original mastered files as they appear on the cd anything you do to them is actually going to make them worse there is no way to “restore” lost audio from a source that has so much clipping. The audio data is clipped off and does not exist and can not be recovered. Are you using some unmastered files here to do this? If not you are simply pulling off some smoke and mirrors and the lowered volume is essentially fooling people into believing it has more audio data than it really does. No matter what you do to the source the missing data is missing because though it is audio it is technically 1s and 0s and once those are cut out there is not getting them back with any hardware or magic plug-in. Please give us some in depth detail on your sources for this otherwise you are probably doing more harm than good by probably deleting even more of the audio data by altering it.

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    As detailed previously and on the forum – these are technical estimate samples of a more dynamic CD mastering than the original. In no way is lost audio data attempting to be ‘restored’ – the aim is to make the existing audio data that is there more balanced & dynamic (the tools for this do not alter the spectral content) – in addition to removing the added harmonics or random noise added on clipped peaks (again not attempting to create false harmonics, just removing the noise-inducing components).

    Overall, as mentioned – these are intended to give an idea only of what the recording might sound like if a more dynamic master was originally used and not clipped either (seperate issue to te over-compression)

  • Dreamrafa

    So, this is just “an idea of what the recording might sound”… And it is not a REAL proper remastering?, you work here looks very interesting tough, hope you could get the original unmastered files to make it sound as it should…

  • http://jrocknyc.blogspot.com go

    made some updated album art with the “JFA wave” and tag. :)

    http://imgur.com/1jZ8d.jpg

    [IMG]http://imgur.com/1jZ8d.jpg[/IMG]

  • Jose Castillo

    great job man! btw you should check in the presence of enemies pt1 at minute 4:49 it seems like a strange noise over there

  • FranticDav

    I’m listening on these Sennheiser HD480 headphones I got recently and it sounds superb!

    But I found something weird in “In The Presence of Enemies – Part I”:

    On 4:54, what is that loud bang?

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    Hmm most likely it is an artifact created during the declipping stage of the song – will need to double check that – it occasionally causes abnormal infinite spikes to occur – usually sounding like either a pop, a loud crack, or worst case, a large bang – I though most they were all taken care of, but one or 2 might have been missed!!

  • SirCanealot

    (I posted this comment on the site where I originally noticed this mix, may as well post it here…)

    I have to say this mix doesn’t sound worse than the original mix, but I’m not sure how much “better” it sounds. It definitely sounds less harsh (which makes it worth replacing on my mp3 player…), but I need to make a comparison with the original CD by making the CD the same volume…

    The 5.1 mix has always had a little less limitting, I need to do/find a good stereo downmix of that sometime… ^^;;

    Thanks for making the attempt though. SC has such a great mix, but the limiting just makes it sound SO harsh and hard to listen to. Any improve is fantastic in my opinion :)

  • angelusredgrove

    i just came across this
    http://www.petrucciforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=47473
    and it gave me the idea that, with Systematic Chaos – which ur probably over remastering by now :P – out of the 6 channels u could seperate them, then possibly individually remaster each channel hich might be ocassionally dominated by a single instrument and allow for more customization to get each instrument closer to how u want it to sound. Now im not sure whether this was originally remastered from the 5.1 mix or not – u havent stated :P
    btw theres still an odd bit in ITPoE pt 2 where it gets louder then back to normal again – i forget where it is, since i leveled the volume myself, this is only for other people’s sake :)

  • biomorfo

    hey the link is broke… pls repost this files!!! THANKS!!!

  • http://usinadopensar.blogspot.com Gabs

    Hey the links are broken, could you please update the files? Thanks

  • nikatapi

    Could you please update the files?
    The links are broken :(

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    links updated in original posting

  • nikatapi

    The first track is not complete…
    Could you reupload?
    Thank you very much!!!

  • Dimitri

    Looks like the links are busted again. Could you reupload? Thanks!

  • JTak

    First two tracks incomplete. Thanks for the remaster!

  • JTak

    Last two didn’t work either – TDEN sounds great!!!

  • GasPanic

    There seems to be a problem with the first two songs. The files are just ~3MB each and end after a few seconds playback.

  • http://tony.com tony

    A couple of the tracks (#1, #2) are only the first minute or so. The rest are fine. Can you post fixed versions of these?

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    sorry about the delay/absence – will be checking the tracks again in the very near future just to make sure. Sometimes it can be a partial download or incompatible FLAC codec version issue

  • Stefan

    Hmm. I A/Bed Constant Motion against my existing FLAC at -6dB, and I literally could not tell the difference. With Dark Clouds, there was always a very noticeable improvement. I understand you have a lot less to work with here, but it was a bit of a disappointment anyways.

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    Systematic Chaos was done from the existing CD Mastering, whereas Black Clouds & Silver Linings was partially re-mixed and much better source material (the deluxe edition audio stems).

    The enhancements done to Systematic Chaos are purely dynamics related with minimal spectral changes (which would be EQ, Reverb etc that was done with BC&SL).

    So indeed, there is only so much you can do working from an existing CD master without ending up with an un-natural sounding piece of work!! This is why we need to push the industry into getting it right from the start and mixing stages and not relying on others fixing or enhancing an already damaged product!!

  • http://none Leonardo Diaz Galindo

    Hello friend.
    I was reviewing your site and download 2 songs, dark eternal night and nightmare to remember and just to remastered sound great your way, I have the original CDs of both albums and I decor is impressive as we are not dedicated to mastering the music as they should so, I would like you to tell me how to do this process from my house with the iZotope advance RX because I have several original CDs and I would like to experience the remasterizaion on my own, to start the album back to start of megadeth and post it on the page just wanted to give me or send a short course on using this program, besides that I wonder if this program can remaster flack not only formats but also in WAV format (linear PCM)? original audio track. Thanks for your atenciomn atte. Leonardo Diaz

  • Leonardo

    Hello friend.

    could you reupload the files?

    the first 2 songs are incomplete and the songs of the ministry of lost souls and in the presesence of enemies are evil part 2 files are corrupted and not complete any player can play.

    Thanks

  • Joe

    Hey, great sound! I noticed that you said you enhanced these from the original systematic chaos cd. Well, I have the systematic chaos DVD that contains a 5.1 surround mix of the entire album, so i ripped the audio from the DVD and noticed that the files had no clipping/compression. if you want them i can give them to you.

  • Christian

    I think that something is wrong with file 2 – Forsaken, because it´s only 3.7mb and other Songs wich the same playtime are 10 times bigger.

    If there is something wrong, please re Upload the file.

    Best Regards, Chris

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    Audio links have been fixed and updated

  • jelbo

    Thanks for this :) Latest track is corrupted though, downloaded twice and foobar2000 says it’s corrupt.

  • Eli

    This is unfortunately true, ITPOE pt.2 is corrupted.

  • http://www.justiceforaudio.org Justice For Audio

    I’ll double check it – might need to re-encode perhaps!!

  • jelbo

    Any news on when the last track will be added?

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