A must for any big maclaughlin fan
J. Bescup | 09/28/2000
(5 out of 5 stars)
"the artwork on the front cover right away, can set this special boxed set edition apart from it's 2 counterparts. The complete lyric booklets of each album are printed in the entirety on the inside of the thick booklet, and it's one of those 2 in 1 CD jewel cases, so it will fit on any normal CD rack. The best thing about these two discs are the SOUND. 24k gold helps, but the fact that these are remastered from the original souce tape is a tremendous asset to this recording. The cymbols on disc 1, track 2 (wait) are the most lifelike I've ever heard on recording. I have a very nice stereo and an avid musician myself, so yes, there is a big difference made here. If you like either of these albums, and you have a stereo of high enough caliber to reproduce subtle nuances of a recording; BUY IT. Period. The hidden track on FTE is, in a word, incredible. 5 Stars. Enjoy"
Beautiful remaster
JRL | 04/11/2001
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Fumbling and the Freedom Sessions are two of my favorite albums. When I saw that they had been remastered, I had to purchase them.I am not at all disappointed that I did. The soundstage and clarity of the recordings has been greatly enhanced. Contary to popular believe, the gold does nothing for the CDs. A laser reads 1s and 0s the same if they are green, silver, or gold. Anyway...these are beautful. Highly recommended if you have a good system to listen to them on.My system:Rotel RSP 980 preRotel RB985 MKII ampACI Sapphire III speakersSVS 25-31 subYamaha CD"
Was It Really Re-Mastered??
JRL | MI USA | 06/20/2007
(4 out of 5 stars)
"This is a pretty solid item...You don't get much better than Fumbling Towards Ecstasy, the album that made Sarah McLachlan a household name...But I'm not sure if this double-disc is ACTUALLY remastered. I bought it back in '97 when it came out. The copyright, etc say '97, though it may not have been released til '98. In any case, this pressing is on gold discs which were foolishly tagged back in the day to have superior sound quality, and we all know that isn't really true. But I'm very skeptical about these 2 discs being remasters or having any sound-quality superiority over the originals."