iTunes sounds different than a CD?

[Fearless Leader]

I recently bought a couple weezer albums on iTunes to replace the old mp3 rips from my cousin. Well on a lot of songs, it sounded different. Not just because it was clearer but just different. Certain guitar chord progressions changed, and the vocals changed. (not the words but the pitch)

Is this due to the mp3 apposed to aac? or the fact that apple gets the actual songs differently as in not on a CD?
Has anyone else notice anything similar?

BTW how does apple get the music for the iTunes store?

[chrisdazzo]

I think Apple rips CDs, though songs are two seconds longer. Also, they are going to sound different because many albums on there are ripped at 128kb/s, which is the LOWEST bitrate known to man aside from audiobooks.

The songs are going to sound different because many frequencies are left out once ripped at 128kb/s.

[Blue Velvet]

Apple doesn't rip CDs... labels have tools provided by Apple for batching that process and those files are supplied to Apple.

[Gallick]

What songs changed, and how exactly, if you don't mind my asking?

I'm just curious, as I'm a huge Weezer fan, so I can probably identify any differences in the tracks themselves. :p

[CanadaRAM]

Umm... no. It is impossible for the encoding of a piece of music to change the chord progression or the melody. Think about it a moment.

What you are hearing is a different mix of the song -- the CD you had and the files that the label submitted to iTunes are different takes, mixes or production from each other.

[Fearless Leader]

After many brain wracking hours (I re bought every album and deleted the originals), I figured out the one song that I really noticed the changed. Perfect Situation by Weezer's from their Make Believe album.

At first when singing along to the new everything was the same except for the ooooooh oh's. The last one in the set was different it was a little fancier with a oow sound added in.

Played the songs side by side and they were otherwise the same.

side note: Figuring out how to spell the correct sound, I noticed that all the top hits on google for the lyrics didn't include this extra bit.

[iGav]

It's entirely probable that they've been remastered.

[Roy Hobbs]

After many brain wracking hours (I re bought every album and deleted the originals), I figured out the one song that I really noticed the changed. Perfect Situation by Weezer's from their Make Believe album.

At first when singing along to the new everything was the same except for the ooooooh oh's. The last one in the set was different it was a little fancier with a oow sound added in.

Played the songs side by side and they were otherwise the same.

side note: Figuring out how to spell the correct sound, I noticed that all the top hits on google for the lyrics didn't include this extra bit.

If I am not mistaken "Perfect Situation" was tweaked a little after Rivers tried out a slightly different version at some of Weezers live shows. Early CDs had the original version, later versions of the CD had the new version of the song.

[Gallick]

If I am not mistaken "Perfect Situation" was tweaked a little after Rivers tried out a slightly different version at some of Weezers live shows. Early CDs had the original version, later versions of the CD had the new version of the song.

That's exactly correct; the first pressings of Make Believe were different than the later, which changed up the pattern of the "whoahhh-ohhh" in the chorus, and also added the little "Per-fect sit-chu-ay-tionnnn" line sung by Brian and Scott in the background during the final chorus.

Yeah, I like Weezer too much.

[Fearless Leader]

That's exactly correct; the first pressings of Make Believe were different than the later, which changed up the pattern of the "whoahhh-ohhh" in the chorus, and also added the little "Per-fect sit-chu-ay-tionnnn" line sung by Brian and Scott in the background during the final chorus.

Yeah, I like Weezer too much.

glad I'm not crazy. I found my 3rd gen iPod and it had the original version of perfect situation .

[gilgalad101]

I found it strange that, when I bought Coheed and Cambria's In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3 from iTunes a few years ago, I noticed that the ends of songs, mainly transitions to the next song, were being cut off. I ended up buying the actual cd (since I love Coheed and wanted everything from the album) to fix the problem.