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Neil Young slams Apple, iTunes

updated 11:50 am EDT, Thu July 24, 2008

Neil Young on iPods

Folk and rock star Neil Young has issued sharp criticism of Apple and the iPod, Fortune reports. Speaking at a conference hosted by the magazine, Young said that the sound quality of recordings has been reduced to "Fisher-Price toy" levels in recent years, and companies ike Apple are to blame. "Apple has taken a detour down the convenience highway," says Young. "Quality has taken a complete backseat -- if it even gets in the car at all."

Although providing faster downloads and more space on music players, Young believes that the prevalence of the MP3 format -- spurred in part by the iPod -- has resulted in a general lowering of sound standards. Music has become more "like wallpaper" as a result, he claims. "We have beautiful computers now but high-resolution music is one of the missing elements," he adds. "The ears are the windows to the soul."

by MacNN Staff

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iPod, industry, music, MP3, audio, Neil Young, Apple

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unity@mac.com
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+21

07/24, 12:02pm | report spam | close Reply |
MP3

The MP3 format was VERY popular long before the iPhone. In fact I though Apple went with AAC to increase the quality as much as possible, even working on Apple Lossless format. On the flip-side, I thought the labels were the ones dictating the end user quality.

fritzair
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Joined: Oct 2000

+5

07/24, 12:05pm | report spam | close Reply |
Music quality

I have to agree with Mr. Young kind of.
Does the younger generation know that there is an option to mp3?
We have been downloading songs from each for over 10 years.
Children may have never listened to an album on a quality stereo. When they do they morph it into 5.1 sound with a mix to the center channel.
Rap artificially boosts the bass so much. Could any instrument produce that sound?

Grrr
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07/24, 12:05pm | report spam | (1 reply) close Reply |
•

The old hippy managed to miss his own point somewhat. The quality is as good as what you put on it. Sure if folks download any old MP3 from Limewire etc it probably was not ripped very well, and will likely sound c***.
Rip at good quality (Or better yet, lossless) and play on good headphones or via a decent hifi and it will sound as good as a good CD player does.

You can't blame Apple for the way people choose to import their music. In fact on the scale of things, Apple is better quality than your average bargain basement MP3 player.

Neil Young made a good album or two, but that doesn't make him right in this case.

Comment buried. Show

briandunning
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07/24, 12:07pm | report spam | close Reply |
How surprising

Smoke another fat one, Neil

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bobolicious
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Monstermind
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07/24, 12:10pm | report spam | close Reply |
A Cry For Attention

Whether it's against Apple, Bush or concert sponsorship, the easiest way for hippie dinosaurs like "Young" to get press is to b****, since musical tastes have, for good or bad, long passed him by.

Remember, Neil: you can't be 20 on Sugar Mountain. So what the fudge are you still doing there? Get off the stage!

moo083
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07/24, 12:10pm | report spam | (1 reply) close Reply |
sure....

As much as I respect Neil Young, and as true as his statement is in some ways, he doesn't really have a grounding in technology. Yes, many people use c*** formats, but 256 kbps AAC (the non-drm itunes format) is not a c*** format. And even 128 kbps aac isn't c*** either. Not amazing, but pretty good.

Comment buried. Show

manleycreative
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07/24, 12:12pm | report spam | close Reply |
Pot and Kettle

Oh man, Neil doesn't like it! Time to throw the baby out with the bath water again.

Talk about lack of sound quality. That would be Neil Young's entire music career.

"Ancient whores with secret vices. Lucky's got the cheapest prices"

Durandalus
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07/24, 12:13pm | report spam | close Reply |
Apple uses AAC ;-)

Don't blame the iPod, blame the fact that nobody connects it to a proper stereo …

TiDual
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07/24, 12:15pm | report spam | close Reply |
CD Quality

I think there is a valid point being made here, and it deserves some media attention. Two comments:

(1) If people are only getting their music via down loads, then sure, there's a quality loss (and it's easy to hear). The solution should be: buy the CD and rip at better quality, but ...

(2) There is actually pressure within the industry to reduce the dynamic range even of CDs so that the songs don't sound different from what people here on the radio (and possibly on bad mp3). That is, we truly are dumbing down the quality of our audio (though I suspect this doesn't apply to all genres).

So the next time you read "CD quality" ... think "Oh dear".

TiDual
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+2

07/24, 12:18pm | report spam | close Reply |
CD Quality

I think there is a valid point being made here, and it deserves some media attention. Two comments:

(1) If people are only getting their music via down loads, then sure, there's a quality loss (and it's easy to hear). The solution should be: buy the CD and rip at better quality, but ...

(2) There is actually pressure within the industry to reduce the dynamic range even of CDs so that the songs don't sound different from what people here on the radio (and possibly on bad mp3). That is, we truly are dumbing down the quality of our audio (though I suspect this doesn't apply to all genres).

So the next time you read "CD quality" ... think "Oh dear".

bobolicious
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07/24, 12:20pm | report spam | close Reply |
Lossless works...

...better

bobolicious
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climacs
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07/24, 12:25pm | report spam | close Reply |
"get off my lawn"

Neil Young would be better off harshing on people who use crappy earbuds (like the ones that ship with every iPod).

He reminds me of a friend of mine who is both an engineer and a photographer (advanced amateur). Until recently he's been very harsh on digital cameras because he owns a medium-format camera and therefore any camera which cannot match that quality is s*** and therefore not worth using. Well, you know what, a medium-format camera is overkill for vacation photos, just like uncompressed audio files and studio-quality headphones are overkill for Miley Cyrus.

Likewise, these days a lot of people watch TV over satellite. It's a sometimes horribly compressed MPEG-2 signal. Should they just not bother to watch TV at all unless it's an uncompressed 1080i HD signal?

What would Young prefer - that people either only listen to music uncompressed with top-quality earbuds/headphones or not listen to music at all?

The answer is not to grouse about the iPod, but to educate music fans to become audiophiles.

that one guy
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07/24, 12:26pm | report spam | close Reply |
Well.

To be sure the 128kb AAC does suffer from too much compression, but 256kb and above is hard to discern from the original CD. Its ironic that Neil Young, who is known for going for a really raw sound in the studio is complaining about sound quality.

Longwalker
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07/24, 12:27pm | report spam | close Reply |
Apple IS partly to blame

Several of the previous comments are blaming the users for ripping in c*** formats. But no one has mentioned that Apple standardized its iTunes store on 128kbps AAC format and only recently offered a 256kbps option for SOME songs. This is NOT the users' fault. This is Apple deciding the format of our purchased music libraries. And since iTunes is now the largest music retailer, that means A LOT of our music is far less than CD-quality.

dliup
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07/24, 12:31pm | report spam | close Reply |
who is to blame?

Unfortunately it's the music industry that is to blame.

Apple provides movie trailers for free (some hundreds of megs for 1080 HD trailer). Apple has bandwidth to distribute loseless music, but it's the power hungry, low IQ music industry execs that are to blame for the low bit rate files. However, keep in mind that the AAC (mp4) is better quality than mp3, with AAC retaining more details overall, including low and high end than mp3s.

Remember that Apple actually get people to pay for digital music when everybody was downloading digital copies of music for free. By the way, for quality conscious, anyone can buy CDs and put it on their computer as loseless. Been doing that for years.

rspress
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07/24, 12:32pm | report spam | close Reply |
Oh Neil!

While I like Neil Young he really should stick to making music. If Neil was really worried about perfection he would learn to sing and play guitar correctly. Apple has increased the bit-rate of a lot of their music with itunes plus and home users can choose to encode at any bit-rate they want or even not to encode at all. The device is not the problem. Having heard many encoding schemes I wonder why Neil does not rag on Microsoft's WMA(Worst Music Always) format which, bit for bit is much worse than AAC.

I am glad Neil is worried about sound quality, not all of his album measured up to his own standards.

dmsimmer
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07/24, 12:35pm | report spam | (1 reply) close Reply |
Download CD quality

Neil Young is spot on with this. Why the attack on the messenger? iTunes is poor, poor quality. I use the Store, but if it's something I really want, I'll buy the CD.

Guest
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07/24, 12:41pm | report spam | close Reply |
Hearing loss?

Good old Neil. He certainly was great in his heyday. But when was the last time this aging 62-year-old, has-been musician had his ears checked?

sdfalk
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07/24, 12:42pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re:A Cry For Attention

I certainly don't agree with everything anyone says.
However The cry for attention comment was just short of
mildly retarded.
Youngs written some great stuff over the years..and still does.
I completly disagree with his comments, but Young as a
musician has nothing to do with this.

Guest
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07/24, 12:43pm | report spam | (1 reply) close Reply |
Quality has improved

Even mp3's provide much higher quality than the cassettes, 8-tracks, and vinyl records on which we originally played Neil's music.

miyazakifan
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07/24, 12:47pm | report spam | (1 reply) close Reply |
He's mostly right

I am an ardent long-time Apple fan and supporter, but Mr. Young has a very good point.

While it isn't entirely Apple's fault (Apple did not invent the MP3, after all), they haven't helped by continuously flogging low-quality downloads on iTunes (only recently did they finally add a 256k AAC "high quality" format).

Real musicians and people in the music industry (of which I am one) know that even CD quality (16-bit, 44 KHz) is not great. Most studios use a minimum of 48 KHz for recording, and LPs and original masters have a much greater sonic range than CDs.

The MP3 is an abomination to a true music listener. Because it's compressed, there are always frequencies missing from the stereo spectrum, resulting in a "squished" or incomplete sound. It was originally developed because back in the days of dialup, no one wanted to spend a day downloading a full WAV or AIFF file (uncompressed audio files).

But in this day and age, with HD televisions and Blu-ray, there is absolutely no need for substandard music formats. Apple should offer "lossless" (CD quality) audio files for download for all of its music, as should all of the online music stores.

The reason they haven't can be traced directly back to the RIAA (or CRIA here in Canada). If people can download the complete, high-quality product, they wouldn't buy the CDs anymore (not that they are anyway!). Given that the record companies balked at removing DRM for years, I don't think they are likely to cave in to this one anytime soon either.

So perhaps Mr. Young should direct his ire at the recording industry, maybe not just at Apple. And he is right. Downloaded music these days mostly sounds like c***.

mullum
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07/24, 12:49pm | report spam | close Reply |
Agreed

I agree that producers and musicians alike should be pushing the boundaries in terms of recording quality (resolution).
Bring on higher sample rates, bitrates and multi channel music ! A bluray dvd, with high resolution audio and perhaps "extras" like music videos/live etc on there COULD reignite the physical media side of the music industry.
The choice would be :
download mp3's (or whatever compressed format) - or,
buy a high resolution audio disc (too big to download)

Guest
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07/24, 12:49pm | report spam | close Reply |
On Neil...

how about some pressure to his record company to support iTunes Plus?
If he can then hear a difference to his published CD he can complain. It's not Apple's fault that Music Industry does not like publishing in higher quality.

JohnFromBeyond
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07/24, 12:57pm | report spam | close Reply |
ears aren't windows!

Everyone knows the ears aren't the windows to the soul, the EYES are! How can an ear be a window? A ventilation duct, maybe...

Seriously though, most consumers (like me) don't need better than 128kbps and I don't want to cut the storage capacity of my music player in half (or worse, in terms of number of songs).

I'm to blame. Blame me!

UberFu
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07/24, 12:59pm | report spam | close Reply |
...

Yep. The labels were dictating the quality standards. And yes Apple is using AAC which is much higher quality and a more modern codec than MP3. However Apple is not using the lossless version of their AAC codec in the iTMS. They are using a lossy compression.

Aside from that - Neil Young likes to complain about everything anyway. Also for arguements sake he's an expert music listener. Unlike the general public that couldn't tell the difference between the sound on Vinyl and the sound on a CD. Which brings up another issue - Vinyl was never an ideal format either. It may be uncompressed - but it was physically flawed out the a**. 'Pits' and 'scratches' and 'nicks' all over lead to crappy recordings that were mass produced. Cassette Tapes and 8-tracks included.

Either:

Neil Young needs to rework his arguement to blame Apple for using Lossy AAC music codecs

or b**** at the Music Industry [which includes himself] for promoting MP3s and other less favorable music formats to begin with.

lkrupp
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07/24, 01:01pm | report spam | close Reply |
What is needed...

If the entire music industry would just switch to Ogg Vorbis encoding this whole problem would be moot. And if we would all just start using Amiga computers the whole world would be better. And if we...

JackWebb
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07/24, 01:17pm | report spam | close Reply |
Only blame listeners

Excellent quality has been economical and widely available ever since CDs and CD players became affordable about 1990. Compressed formats allow any quality you want and most digital stores are doing at least 192 VBR MP3 which is indistinguishable from CD for most music and listener's ears. It's a whole lot better than the clicks and rumble of records and the low-fidelity cassettes destroyed by more plays and sunlight etc. Headphones and speakers in excellent quality for the price are widely available. The mp3 players themselves, at least those I've heard, have been great. So the only way audio quality is being made worse is by the choices of listeners. The listeners are the only ones you can blame.

Now as for musical quality, I've heard of Neil Young but never put the name together the music with the name. Now that I'm listening to it from a list of most popular (Old Man, Heart of Gold, Cinnamon Girl) I now realize this music made my childhood more depressing by having to hear it on the radio. I have to draw the same conclusion: The listeners are the only ones you can blame

Elektrix
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07/24, 01:25pm | report spam | close Reply |
Apple's not to blame,I am

I'm one of those consumers for whom 128kbps or 256kbps AAC's are "good enough", and I have to admit I have a hard time distinguishing between it and a CD. I don't use lossless because it would dramatically increase the storage requirements of my music library, and it would also mean only being able to carry a fraction of my music at once as I do now on my iPod or iPhone. So I'm to blame; I don't see the point of blaming Apple, as I still did this before I got an iPod, and I'd do it if I had something else too. I understand the appeal of lossless, but I also don't really want a single CD that takes up 700 megs of space.

Eventually, when 20 terabyte drives are standard, and I can get a 1 terabyte iPod, I'll be more than happy to consider using lossless formats. But for now, they don't really suit my own needs.

desarc
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07/24, 01:28pm | report spam | close Reply |
bahh

Just for that Neil, Cinnamon Girl is my new ringtone. i hope you're walking by when someone calls me.

elroth
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07/24, 01:32pm | report spam | close Reply |
go neil

Neil is totally right about the crappy sound of downloads from iTunes, where the large majority are still 128 kbps. It's not mostly Apple's fault, though - I'm sure they'd like to sell lossless music, but probably never will be able to. It's unfortunate it developed that way. That said, Apple has some hand in this - touting the "quality" of its earbuds, for example.

The industry is totally about commodities now, and doesn't care at all about sound quality. To the industry, the consumer is the enemy. It just amazes me how the record companies can hate their customers as much as they do. They spend 90% of their time and money trying to restrict and annoy their own customers.

As far as killing the messenger, if you don't like Young's music, that's fine. But don't embarass yourself by saying he's worthless and has no talent. He's been such an influence on so many musicians - and they openly acknowledge it.

RiquiScott
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07/24, 01:35pm | report spam | (1 reply) close Reply |
Perhaps in the future...

I'd like to see the iTunes store eventually move toward the setup that allofmp3 had when it was around - the server stored a full-resolution copy, and you chose what bitrate you wanted to download, up to and including full-resolution. Pricing was on a per-megabyte scale, so you could choose how much fidelity you wanted to pay for.

Right now, I'm encoding all of my purchased CDs into Apple Lossless format for storage on my computer, and if I start to run out of space on my individual portable devices, I can make lower-bitrate versions "on-the-fly" for my iPhone/iPods. Since the files are lossless to begin with, I don't get any extra artifacts from the down-conversion the way I would if I initially ripped the CDs at 320 kbps or 256 kbps and later down-converted them to 128 kbps for my portable devices.

ccrider
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07/24, 01:41pm | report spam | close Reply |
uhh

Neil has been a proponent for advanced sound quality for years. For those who don't know, he embraces new technologies and was one of the first (and only sadly) ones to move his catalog to DVD-Audio, and now he recently announced moving his entire catalog to Blu-ray.

He is simply pointing out that people are missing out some some great sound (anyone heard Beck's "Sea Change" on SACD?, or Dark Side of the Moon?).

Maybe apple will eventually embrace some new HD standards and all our ears will be the better for it...

Oh and NO, neil is no dinosaur - he's still out there producing great music. And I buy 1000's of songs a year from the most modern indie labels to old school rockers, like Young. In fact I own 3 of his albums on DVD Audio.

lurkerdude
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07/24, 01:45pm | report spam | close Reply |
good for him

I'm not enough of an audiophile to care about the difference between 128 and cd quality, I can rarely tell the difference. So in that respect, he's not speaking for me.

But really, how can anyone bash a guy who is pushing for more quality?

MacnnChester
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07/24, 01:53pm | report spam | close Reply |
Quality vs. Convenience

The balance and competition between quality and convenience is at the heart of most tech mediated entertainment and art forms. Do you want 10 awesome songs or 1,000 okay songs? Do you want a great 5.1 stereo system or something that fits in your pocket?

Neil may be arguing, but he isn't whining, he is just bringing up a valid point that is debated here often enough times.

Apple has made its rep on quality and Jobs has decided that quantity is less important to him, so no clones and 5% market share was okay. Now Apple is dominating music and trying to take a big chunk of telephony and the Mac is approaching 10% market in the US. As we've seen with MobileMe and iPhone 3G launches, quality vs. quantity still requires compromise.

Neil is just lamenting the compromise that inevitably happens. To many who don't see the compromise or don't appreciate it, don't see his point and have use ad hominem attacks. Grow up. Leave the self-righteous "hippie" comments to Rush Limbaugh and admit that in the quality to convenience debate you have made your choice and Neil has made his.

I for one have a few CD's in lossless, many in AAC, but most in mp3. I have chosen to carry everything in a 80gig iPod and do not have an iPhone. At somepoint I would love to have everything lossless on a harddrive at home and just have a mythical 50 gig iPhone for favorites and podcasts and the rest to hold work files, but until then I've chosen convenience over quality. I guess I just don't feel the need to vilify someone with more experience in music than I, like some of you.

JohnFromBeyond
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07/24, 02:00pm | report spam | close Reply |
ears aren't windows!

Everyone knows the ears aren't the windows to the soul, the EYES are! How can an ear be a window? A ventilation duct, maybe...

Seriously though, most consumers (like me) don't need better than 128kbps and I don't want to cut the storage capacity of my music player in half (or worse, in terms of number of songs).

I'm to blame. Blame me!

macadore
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07/24, 02:20pm | report spam | close Reply |
GREAT TOPIC AND COMMENTS!

It was SAD though to see people attack Neil Young for the fact that he is 62? The AGISM is like punching below the belt! A dirty victory like that is not a victory to me!

It's nice to see that topic come up! All Comments for this article make valid points.

The more world talks about Apple the better for all of us! Enough with Spreadsheets, let's spread music!

NOISE CANCELLING, IN EAR BLUETOOTH EARPHONES! TERRABITE iPhone 10G, WITH VIDEO!

As to MUSIC!!! -- 128K or 196 Bit -- 2 Mega Pixels or 200 Pixels, if it's s*** -- I don't Hi Res to tell me that it's s***!

And if it's BEAUTY, I'll still be able to tell at 128K too, and much easier than on a S***** cassette, playing in between keys, in the car, that is not very sound proof, EVEN if it just came out of a showroom!

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bobolicious
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07/24, 02:23pm | report spam | close Reply |
Lossless works...

...better & one can buy CDs & rip them - no DRM to worry about - one can thank Apple for offering lossless - bandwidth may still be the biggest limitation in popularizing e-hifi...

Equalization seems the nemesis of audio quality - the cassette industry biased & equalized desks for their most expensive tapes to upsell everyone while the early decks could be user customized - Cr tapes could fool pundits once a deck was set up - blame the suits - offering better EQ options (custom) for iPod headphones may be the single greatest improvement I could think of - and the use bayonet style silicone earplugs ($12 Sure) for a proper acoustical seal...

Resonance of ear canals (and wax) also varies dramatically between users so if we want to get really picky...!

bearcat2000
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07/24, 02:26pm | report spam | close Reply |
Oh Neil...

I think you just need to adjust those hearing aids a little, they're buzzing when you use the earbuds. :)

godrifle
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07/24, 02:26pm | report spam | close Reply |
Blame Apple?

The reason Apple doesn't offer high quality AAC? Record labels.

Young ought to focus his bitching on the S***** quality of CDs. Funny how we're using a technology of the 80s as the benchmark for high quality sound.

Give me SACD, with its 64x better sampling rate. Oh wait, labels aren't supporting that either.

Better yet, give me uncompressed digital files. Like that'll happen.

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Monde
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07/24, 02:36pm | report spam | close Reply |
Who?

Who is Neil Young? Never heard of him.

sdfalk
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07/24, 02:44pm | report spam | close Reply |
Re: who is Neil Young

hahahahahahahahah

leamanc
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07/24, 02:51pm | report spam | close Reply |
He's got a point, but...

...placing blame specifically on Apple is a little misguided. I guess they're an easy target since they have the most popular MP3 player on the market.

But, I do know what he's talking about. Kids today will grow up not knowing the joy of waiting for a new LP or CD to come out, enjoying the artwork along with the music and enjoying full fidelity music.

Now, the plan is to grab the low-quality MP3 leak as soon as it hits the torrent sites.

Jadey4
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07/24, 03:10pm | report spam | close Reply |
AM Radio

I first heard Neil on AM radio, I believe. Actually a cheap hand held imported radio with an antenna to a local low power station.

I liked the music and later bought an album or two.

So what's his problem now if someone starts with and MP3? He didn't seem to complain back then.

scotte75ky
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07/24, 03:14pm | report spam | close Reply |
Neil is clueless

We were ripping high quality mp3's in the mid to early 90's. I guess old Neil just didn't know what a computer was back then.

resuna
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07/24, 03:21pm | report spam | close Reply |
MP3 on iTunes?

Where can you download MP3 from iTunes?

Zkatz007
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07/24, 03:22pm | report spam | close Reply |
What about cassettes?

Cassette tapes were AWFUL quality. Really bad. At least 128 AAC beats that!

cgkaide
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07/24, 03:48pm | report spam | close Reply |
Another "celeb" opinion

OOH...Another opinion from a "celeb" (at least maybe at one time). They are usually well-known for such impressive knowledge and insightful commentary. When people steal his music in a badly ripped format...their loss. AAC is great, not perfect, but there is always lossless...
Now tell us about Scientology...or global warming...or nuclear power...

Guest
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07/24, 03:51pm | report spam | close Reply |
Hm....

I hope Neil Young will remember; Southern Man don't need him around anyhow.

That said, while Hippy Young has moved his catalog between formats, he's rarely gotten them cleaned up and remastered, IIRC. Some of those old master recordings are getting pretty bad now...

Pot. Kettle. Black.

Herod
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07/24, 03:58pm | report spam | close Reply |
i wish

i could salvage those CSNandY 8 track tapes my parents had and pop them into an 8 channel hifi, zone out with incense burning in the background.....

cblackmo
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Joined: Nov 2006

+3

07/24, 04:41pm | report spam | close Reply |
sound is relative

1) The music quality on a computer for most people has more to do with speakers and headphones than the digital format.

2) As much as I respect and admire Young's music, someone with the vocal quality of a quivering bird should be the last one complaining about the quality of digital formats.

ptklenk
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07/24, 04:46pm | report spam | close Reply |
What's his expertise?

Quite frankly, Young's comments lack any substantial weight. He is a musician, perhaps. However, does he have a degree in a physics degree or an academic concentration in sound? I doubt it. Thus, quality issues should be left to those who are schooled and have experience in the field. Therefore, Mr. Young's comments are nothing more than ideal rantings. Too bad, I like some of his music, but his thought process is faulty!

ptklenk
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Joined: Jul 2006

-1

07/24, 04:46pm | report spam | (1 reply) close Reply |
What's his expertise?

Quite frankly, Young's comments lack any substantial weight. He is a musician, perhaps. However, does he have a degree in a physics degree or an academic concentration in sound? I doubt it. Thus, quality issues should be left to those who are schooled and have experience in the field. Therefore, Mr. Young's comments are nothing more than ideal rantings. Too bad, I like some of his music, but his thought process is faulty!

Mojo
Mac Enthusiast

Joined: Apr 2000

+5

07/24, 04:49pm | report spam | close Reply |
Neil Should Talk!

I became a Neil Young fan Way Back in '69 and I have most of his albums and CDs. I guess you can say that he was my Main Man during the 70s...

A few years ago my wife and I attended a CSNY concert in Portland, Oregon. It was the first time that I had the opportunity to see the four musicians play together and my wife had never heard any of them live. Should I mention that we had reasonably good seats after paying $115 per ticket? (They were on the side of the venue within 75 feet of the stage, well-away from the PA system.)

When a stage-hand plugged-in Neil's famous black Gibson it sounded like a jet getting ready to take off... Little did I know!

Imagine our disappointment when the sound level was turned up so loud that we could not possibly enjoy the music. Even the acoustic set was over-amped. I have been to my share of rock concerts over the years and that CSNY concert was the loudest by far, even louder than Emerson, Lake and Palmer in SF circa 1970.

The music was so loud that even ear-plugs didn't help; it actually became an (unpleasant) physical sensation. If we hadn't paid so much we would have walked out after the second song... (As it was we wasted over $400 on a weekend in Portland to attend the worst concert of my life.)

Our ears hurt for over a week; we felt like we had been beaten-up. I think that I may have suffered permanent hearing damage after a lifetime of taking good care of my hearing so I could enjoy music until the day I croak.

I suspect that Neil and Company are as deaf as posts... so how can he possibly hear the difference between an MP3 and an LP?

elroth
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Joined: Jul 2006

0

07/24, 04:53pm | report spam | close Reply |
think a little

It's funny that so many people should attack Neil - either because he's famous (a celebrity), or old (a hippie), or whatever. Especially because he's on the side of the consumer. He always has been. He's not some pompous egotistical rock group. He's been fighting the record companies over sound quality for a long time. He wants people to have better music sound quality. So flame him.

If you like lossy 128 kbps music, you can always have it. It takes up much less space, you can have that as much as you want. But what's wrong with giving the rest of us a choice to hear the music losslessly, in the best sound we can get? I won't explain why better sound quality is important to me - just accept that some people care.

As far as Neil's own older CDs, Warner Brothers owns them, and has idiotically decided not to remaster them. (Neil's newer CDs are fine quality). Warner Japan has remastered some of the older ones, but I haven't heard them yet). You can bet that Neil has asked Warner Brothers to remaster them, and Warners won't. The same way Warners won't sell even 256 kbps quality on iTunes - they just don't care about the quality they put out. They hate the consumer, and as long as most people go along with it, they'll continue to treat us as scum.

KaiserX
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Joined: Sep 2007

-4

07/24, 05:15pm | report spam | close Reply |
Neil Young?

Who the heck is Neil Young?

Unless he's banging Britney Spears; what influence he's got in the music world is...nada.

Shut yer trap old man.

bradpdx
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Joined: Sep 2007

+4

07/24, 05:15pm | report spam | close Reply |
Old formats sucked, too

I love and respect Neil Young, but I think he is way off base on this. He has been saying this, by the way, for several years.

At 50 years old, I have owned tons of music in all the formats of my lifetime - vinyl, cassettes, reel-to-reel, 8-track, CDs and now various compressed digital formats (AAC and MP3). The old formats were NOT better, not in real life. They were generally a chore to work with and yielded uneven results at best.

Most LPs are damaged within 2 plays, and listening was done with crappy turntables with cheap cartridges played through muddy sounding speakers. Most cassettes were heard in horrible car stereos over a mountain of road noise. So listening to an AAC file on an iPod is worse??? How?

We suffered with hissy cassette copies of scratched LPs, and yet we complain about 128kbps AAC? Tell me how the AACs are worse, I want to know!

I heard most of the great music of the 1960s over the AM radio in my Mom's car. That was better than reasonably ripped MP3s? Really?

Whatever the deficiencies of the standard iTunes format (128kbps AAC) I can guarantee you that I ENJOY music in that format far more that those of the past - it sounds much clearer, fuller and detailed and does so consistently.

Just as the old formats were based upon convenient technology (as opposed to "best") so are the newer compressed formats. 128kbps AAC makes sense when you assume that customers value small files sizes for speed and storage. When that equation no longer holds, you change it.

benj
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Joined: Mar 1999

+2

07/24, 05:44pm | report spam | close Reply |
Every Time

Someone complains about MP3 quality and DRM they blame apple but you know it's NOT apple at all. None of the RIAA distribution folks would deal with Apple unless they talked DRM. Then Universal has the gall to complain about DRM.
The Audio quality preferences are driven by the audience NOT by audiophiles so if the quality sucks and we don't complain we only have ourselves to blame. Personally, I encode at higher bit rates from CD's I buy unless it's something that I don't care about that much.
Conversely, lots of "remastered" stuff sounds like s*** -
and some artists (zappa and steely dan, for instance) have multiple remastered versions of their great vinyl stuff that sounds odd when listened to on cd. Indeed, where are the new Beatles remastered albums (as if i want buy all those albums again).

tonewheel
Mac Enthusiast

Joined: May 1999

-2

07/24, 05:59pm | report spam | close Reply |
NEIL....

Well I hope Neil Young will remember; Apple fans don't need him around, anyhow.

bsnoel
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Joined: Feb 2006

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07/24, 06:19pm | report spam | close Reply |
I agree

I have an iPhone and have had some 6 iPods. I love my iPods, and there is a lot of good that can be said about the iPod. For example, I can now have my entire music collection in my pocket and carry it with me just about anywhere. However, I agree, the general premise that the MP3 / iPod / etc have in many cases lowered the bar on audio quality. As good as my iPod is with a lossless audio file and premium headphones, its still not as good as my Rotel CD player, driven by my Ray Samuels Audio
Emmeline XP-7 Headphone Amp. On the flip side, I would not want to drag my home rig with me everywhere I go.

Neil Young is not the first recording engineer to point out that quality has been heading in the wrong direction lately. If your an audiophile that may ring true, but the flip side is that most people are still perfectly happy with the quality of sound from itunes on and iPod.

Guest
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Joined: Nov 1999

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07/24, 06:53pm | report spam | close Reply |
Neil is Right

I think the iPod is great for casual listening and for use in the car, but for serious listening, compressed audio is really not good. In fact, CD quality is not great either. The LP still sounds better, if you have a good pressing, and a good turntable/cartridge. However, putting together a good system is work, and usually costly as well, and most people now are interested in convenience more than quality, so the iPods will still rule the roost. Shucks, I have two of them, as well as an iPhone, so I am not against technology, but I also still have a high quality analog system at home. And I am older than Neil.

Johnny Niles
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07/24, 07:36pm | report spam | (1 reply) close Reply |
Is Neil right?

You and Neil both seemed to have missed something. While compressed audio is not really good, who's forcing you to use it? iTunes and the iPod both support lossless audio. Rip your CDs using lossless and put THAT on your iPod.

128k MP3 files are the standard on iTunes for the sake of convenience, nothing else. If you care more about quality than convenience, then BUY the CD, rip it to lossless. If you don't like CDs, then output your turntable to your Mac and record that, then export it to iTunes, the iPod will play that too.

tmedia1
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07/24, 08:25pm | report spam | close Reply |
Perspective

Now Mr. Young, lets have some perspective. When you were truely popular 60's-70's. Many people listened to your music on cassettes with no high frequency, 8 tracks that had so much wow and flutter that it sounded like you were under water and vinyl records that popped and clicked with every spec of dust. I'll take high bit rate mp3's ANY day over that junk!

Karango
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Joined: Apr 2008

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07/24, 08:40pm | report spam | close Reply |
what?

I'm not sure why Neil Young is being flamed for sticking up for the consumer.

For those who are hating on Neil... keep your eye on the ball.

Remember, if Apple were to offer ALL the music they currently offer in lossless format, they would require 10 times the server capacity and 10 times the bandwidth they currently use to deliver the same aggregate number of songs.

It's about a whole lot more than just 'convenience.'

Guest
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07/24, 08:50pm | report spam | close Reply |
anti digital audio

I don't think even lossless digital audio is good enough for Neil. He's a heavy proponent of analog recordings, preferring vinyl over CD.
I agree vinyl sounds different, but it isn't more accurate or have even close to the dynamic range of CDs. Don't forget vinyl needs to be equalized to get acceptable frequency response and the quality of audio on vinyl can vary from the innermost groove to the outermost groove. Vinyl is far from perfect! - but it is a unique sound.
You're best bet is hearing a concert live, though concert halls have acoustic problems too.

desarc
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07/24, 09:54pm | report spam | close Reply |
ok ok

i have a 15 year old pioneer component system with some very nice legacy convergence speakers that i'm sure are suffering speaker rot by now. i can tell the difference between 128 kbps mp3's and CD's with very little problem. 192 aac... not so much. 320 kbps and i can't tell the difference, BUT, transferring your music to SACD or Blu-Ray? for what - a super high bitrate? how's that going to help a 40 year-old magnetic tape sound better?

adept1
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07/25, 01:05am | report spam | close Reply |
MP3s not all equal

The iTunes encoder for MP3's is not great. People in the know use something else (usually the LAME encoder). A lot of people will also assert that LAME encoded MP3's sound better than iTunes AAC files. I have not heard one, so I can't say.

Roehlstation
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07/25, 08:31am | report spam | close Reply |
Purpose

Neil is right in that the sound quality is not as good, many of you are taking to heart that he's blaming the iPod for this, and he's not. The title of the article suggests it, but he's blaming the music format and inherantly Apple and the iPod will recieve some of the blame because of the popularity.

But Neil also needs to realize that the iPod's purpose is to allow you to carry your music collection around so it is accessible, sometimes you just want to hear a song, and when you are sitting on a noisy subway you really aren't going to be able to determine what the sound quality is like anyway. For me to carry all my music around with me on the format that Neil thinks I should, not only do I have to lug around a big piece of equipment, but I also have to drag behind me a Radio Flyer stacked to the hilt with my CDs/DVDs/Blu-Ray disks (whatever format Neil feels is best) and to hear the one song I'm looking for would take hours.

And seriously, you cannot tell me that a Cassette Walkman sounds better than my iPod, Did Neil also complain about the sound quality of tapes 20 years ago? The format and the equipment is designed for portability, and the sound quality it completely fine for what it is designed for. Audiophiles will use the apporpriate equipment, I know a few and still make fun of them for spending all their money on equipment that is sitting in a room that isn't accousitcally correct anyway. After all it isn't just about the equipment it is about the location as well. For everything to sound best you have to select the perfect euipment for the perfect accoustics, and after you've done that, you cannot change anything about the room or equipment, that doesn't make music all that enjoyable to me...

snapjack
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07/25, 10:00am | report spam | close Reply |
A Cry for Attention

People who are saying Neil is done get over it or some such stupid nonsense, where is your contribution to society? The man is still producing and you're sitting here blasting him because he said something about Apple. Wow you people are morons.

MeandmyMac
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Joined: Feb 2008

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07/25, 10:02am | report spam | close Reply |
Better sounding music...

I've heard Mr. Young's music and for my tastes, I don't think that's possible. It's bad enough to hear noise. The last thing I would want to hear is 'crisper' sounding noise! I'd say the quality of music being produced today is what falls under the "Fisher-Price toy" levels in recent years. Musicians have taken a detour down the convenience highway and quality has taken a complete back seat to originality and any artistic musical value. "The ears are the windows to the soul." he says. Wrong body part ignoramus,,, it's 'eyes'! That said, iPod/iTunes recordings sound quality great - no. Good enough for the purpose at hand - absolutely!

driven
Addicted to MacNN

Joined: May 2001

+1

07/25, 11:35am | report spam | close Reply |
Still complaining ...

Still complaining after all these years.

Southern man don't need him around anyhow.

driven
Addicted to MacNN

Joined: May 2001

0

07/25, 11:37am | report spam | close Reply |
Still complaining ...

Still complaining after all these years.

Southern man don't need him around anyhow.

Terrin
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Joined: Jan 2006

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07/25, 11:24pm | report spam | close Reply |
Well said

I tend to agree with Neil. The MP3 format was developed to solve the problem of how to store a large amount of information on a small amount of space. For that convenience, sound quality was sacrificed for convenience. Now that hard drive spaces have gotten bigger, the balance towards quality music should be going the other way. Yet, the quality hasn't gotten much better.

With that said, I don't necessarily see that Apple is the cause of the problem. Apple allows you to rip Lossless music to your iPod or iPhone. Sure it doesn't sell it on iTunes, but Apple has struck a balance between cost and quality. The more data that gets downloaded, the more Apple pays. Moreover, Napster showed that people are willing to give up quality for free/and or cheap music.

chadpengar
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Joined: Oct 2001

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07/26, 12:48am | report spam | close Reply |
Oh Alabama

A certain Lynyrd Skynyrd song comes to mind...

vri2i
Forum Regular

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0

07/28, 02:03am | report spam | close Reply |
Lynyrd Skynyrd Said It Be

I hope Neil Young will remember-An Apple fan don't need him around anyhow

Guest
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Joined: Nov 1999

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09/02, 03:41am | report spam | close Reply |
He's right

The problem isn't just MP3s, it's the devices they are played on. Even ALAC does not compare to a CD when played on an iPOD. The digital to analog converters in iPods are junk. If you can't hear the difference when doing a comparison between an iPOD (even when using uncompressed AIFF or WAV) and a 10 year old CD player, you are deaf and should just give up on music all together. Then again, iPods are like discmans, and no one in their right mind would have used a discman as a main player in a hifi setup.

macwoof
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01/04, 11:30am | report spam | close Reply |
neil, who?

First, let's remove the great moral conscience from iTunes (since it's so beneath him). Secondly, I personally love the quality, convenience and variety Apple gives me. Third, Neil doesn't speak for me, my family or friends. Everyone have a terrific new year!

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Neil Young slams Apple, iTunes

updated 11:50 am EDT, Thu July 24, 2008

Neil Young on iPods

Related Articles

Recent Articles

MP3

Music quality

•

How surprising

deleted

A Cry For Attention

sure....

Pot and Kettle

Apple uses AAC ;-)

CD Quality

CD Quality

Lossless works...

deleted

"get off my lawn"

Well.

Apple IS partly to blame

who is to blame?

Oh Neil!

Download CD quality

Hearing loss?

Re:A Cry For Attention

Quality has improved

He's mostly right

Agreed

On Neil...

ears aren't windows!

...

What is needed...

Only blame listeners

Apple's not to blame,I am

bahh

go neil

Perhaps in the future...

uhh

good for him

Quality vs. Convenience

ears aren't windows!

GREAT TOPIC AND COMMENTS!

deleted

deleted

deleted

deleted

deleted

deleted

deleted

Lossless works...

Oh Neil...

Blame Apple?

deleted

deleted

Who?

Re: who is Neil Young

He's got a point, but...

AM Radio

Neil is clueless

MP3 on iTunes?

What about cassettes?

Another "celeb" opinion

Hm....

i wish

sound is relative

What's his expertise?

What's his expertise?

Neil Should Talk!

think a little

Neil Young?

Old formats sucked, too

Every Time

NEIL....

I agree

Neil is Right

Is Neil right?

Perspective

what?

anti digital audio