To me, it's very simple. Any artist who is any good should be able to go in the studio, start the tapes rolling, and record the CD in 60 minutes
For folk or jazz, this can *sometimes* be done, but mixing/mastering is still a lengthy and expensive process (unless you're happy with a mediocre sounding recording.) Also, some (valid) styles of modern music rely on more than just a straight recording of a band in a room. I don't think you could (or would want to) make a Radiohead/NIN/Beck album in an hour.
I agree that it would be great if musicians could distribute their own music and make money, but the statement that only "no talent acts" need a lot of studio time is not true. Also, while recording time is expensive, the distibution/marketing/radio airplay advantage held by major label artists seems to be more of an issue.
In the interest of upholding the tradition of pedantic bastardry here on slashdot, the original lyrics are:
Then I was down south and I heard some funk with some main ingredients Like Doobie Brothers, Blue Magic, David Bowie.
It was cool,
But can you imagine Doobiein' your funk? Ho!
16 vs. 24 bits becomes very important when dealing with recordings with a wide dynamic range. CD's 16 bit resolution can become a very audible limitation during quiet passages in (mostly jazz/classical) recordings, even without super-high-end speakers/amps. Turn the stereo up really loud on a very quiet part of a recording some time and check out the grainy/unclear quality. With 24 bits, you can get CD quality using only the bottom 1/256'th of the available dynamic range.
44.1kHz vs. 48/96/192kHz is more questionable. The only real advantage over 44.1 is that cheaper analog to digital converters can be used. It is neccessary to place a filter on audio at 1/2 the sampling frequency before it is converted to digital (to prevent aliasing distortion.)
At 44.1, this filter needs to be very steep (get rid of almost all information above 22.05k, but leave the theoretically audible 20k alone.) Good sounding, very steep "brick wall" filters are not cheap/easily designed. At 96k, the filter can be very smooth (cheaper) and have no trouble getting rid of 48k and up, while leaving 20k completely unblemished.
Slashdot Mirror
In the interest of upholding the tradition of pedantic bastardry here on slashdot, the original lyrics are: Then I was down south and I heard some funk with some main ingredients Like Doobie Brothers, Blue Magic, David Bowie. It was cool, But can you imagine Doobiein' your funk? Ho!
16 vs. 24 bits becomes very important when dealing with recordings with a wide dynamic range. CD's 16 bit resolution can become a very audible limitation during quiet passages in (mostly jazz/classical) recordings, even without super-high-end speakers/amps. Turn the stereo up really loud on a very quiet part of a recording some time and check out the grainy/unclear quality. With 24 bits, you can get CD quality using only the bottom 1/256'th of the available dynamic range.
44.1kHz vs. 48/96/192kHz is more questionable. The only real advantage over 44.1 is that cheaper analog to digital converters can be used. It is neccessary to place a filter on audio at 1/2 the sampling frequency before it is converted to digital (to prevent aliasing distortion.)
At 44.1, this filter needs to be very steep (get rid of almost all information above 22.05k, but leave the theoretically audible 20k alone.) Good sounding, very steep "brick wall" filters are not cheap/easily designed. At 96k, the filter can be very smooth (cheaper) and have no trouble getting rid of 48k and up, while leaving 20k completely unblemished.