What's the best EARTH, WIND AND FIRE on SACD? GRATITUDE or ALIVE IN 75? (1 Viewer)

[Rich Malloy]

I haven't been living under a rock and I've been collecting SACDs since last Fall... so why in the world had I no idea that there was not one, but two EW&F releases on SACD???

Anyway, I stumbled upon this little fact today, and realized that there's practically zip about these releases anywhere on the web. No reviews, no comparisons, not much discussion at all. Sad.

So, of course, I'm familiar with "GRATITUDE", and that's likely as good a place to start as any... so long as the SACD is a quality presentation, of course! And I'm completely unfamiliar with "ALIVE IN 75", but I believe it's from the same tour as "GRATITUDE", so it must be good, right?

Anyway, I'll probably get them both, but I've way overshot my SACD budget already for this week (this month!) and so I'd like to start with one... any suggestions?

 

[Paul.S]

Rich:

Although not a very hard-hitting review, here's a link to some comments on the That's the Way Of the World: Alive In '75 SACD at AudioRevolution.com.

I was disappointed that the amazing original recording engineer on Gratitude, George Massenburg, did not do the multichannel remix for the SACD. I'm pretty sure Massenburg also engineered Alive In '75, but don't know if he was involved in the re-mix for SACD. His stuff is always outstanding. (Yes, both of these live releases feature material from the same historic 1975 EW&F tour.)

Cheers,
Paul