Mike Mettler

Spatial Audio File
Hungry for Spatial Audio From Heaven
Mike Mettler  |  Mar 11, 2022
It only took Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith, a.k.a. the twin towers of Tears For Fears, 18 years to follow up what was thought to be their final album (September 2004’s Everybody Loves a Happy Ending), but February 2022’s The Tipping Point might just be the release that resides at the apex of four decades’ worth of their creative push-pull partnership. (Incidentally, you can head on over to The S&V Interview later today to catch my deep-dive conversation with Orzabal about the making of the new album and his thoughts about TFF’s long penchant for serving up great surround sound releases.)
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Spatial Audio File
Spatial Audio, You’re One of My Kind
Mike Mettler  |  Mar 04, 2022
All-channel mixing maestro Giles Martin shared some truly key insights during his sitdown with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe in a global virtual live event this past Monday, in celebration of the Atmos mix Martin had recently completed for The Beatles’ November 2000 collection of (count ’em) 27 U.S. and U.K. chart-toppers oh-so-appropriately titled 1—as well as for their groundbreaking double-A-sided February 1967 single, “Strawberry Fields Forever/Penny Lane.”
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Music Reviews
R.E.M.: New Adventures in Hi-Fi: 25th Anniversary Deluxe Edition
Mike Mettler  |  Feb 25, 2022
Performance
Sound
R.E.M. were the undisputed kings of American-bred alt-rock by the time the mid-1990s rolled around. Emerging from the college-town kudzu of Athens, Georgia, with the game-changing jangle of July 1981's "Radio Free Europe" single and August 1982's subsequent Chronic Town EP, the underground quartet perfected a more fully realized signature sound on their April 1983 full-length debut, Murmur.
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Spatial Audio File
Spatial Audio in the Sky, With Diamonds
Mike Mettler  |  Feb 25, 2022
The phrase “immersive audio” and the name of producer Giles Martin are practically synonymous terms these days, and his magic Atmos touch is out in full force on “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds (Remix),” an updated Spatial Audio take on this most head-trippy of tracks from The Beatles’ truly seminal June 1967 masterpiece, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
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Spatial Audio File
As Long As You Stand By Me, Spatial Audio
Mike Mettler  |  Feb 18, 2022
Hear ye hear ye, o fine fellow hi-fi-inclined friends o’ mine! It’s Week Three here in the always aurally intriguing world of the Spatial Audio File, and I’m more than ready to delve right on into five more choice selections for the best of this week’s Dolby Atmos mixes Made for Spatial Audio on Apple Music. Happy Spatial Listening, everybody!
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Spatial Audio File
Loving Spatial Audio Is The Right Thing to Do
Mike Mettler  |  Feb 11, 2022
Welcome back my friends, to the column that never ends—but in our case, that’s a good thing indeed. Yes, it’s Week Two here in the wide world of the Spatial Audio File—and rather than just ramble on, I’m instead going to get right into our choices for this week’s pick-six of great Dolby Atmos mixes Made for Spatial Audio on Apple Music. Happy Spatial Listening, everybody!
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The S&V Interview
Ian Anderson on the Zealous Nature of Jethro Tull's Past, Present, and Future
Mike Mettler  |  Feb 04, 2022
Ian Anderson has never taken his foot off the creative gas when it comes to both producing new music and harvesting the wealth of catalog material from Jethro Tull, the groundbreaking prog/folk hybrid band he co-founded in 1967.

That said, considering just how active an artist Anderson has been over the past six-plus decades, it might surprise you to learn the stalwart British collective's latest release, The Zealot Gene (InsideOut Music) is in fact the first new Tull studio album in more than 19 years.
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Spatial Audio File
I Hope We Passed the Spatial Audio Audition!
Mike Mettler  |  Feb 04, 2022
Welcome one and all to the inaugural weekly installment of Spatial Audio File. Some people call me the Spatial Audiophile—some people call me Maurice, though I advise against it—but at any rate, each Friday in this space, I will be reviewing select Spatial Audio releases on Apple Music by vetting and recommending key individual tracks and (occasionally) full albums via listening sessions on my home system and headphones alike.
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Music Reviews
Remaster Class: Steely Dan: Gaucho
Mike Mettler  |  Jan 14, 2022
By the time November 1980's Gaucho rolled around, Steely Dan were more than ready to close up shop and take a self-imposed two-decade hiatus. Indeed, Gaucho's sparkly veneer was a fitting then-final coating on the acclaimed jazz-leaning but genre-defying band's first decade, fully encapsulating the dark-humored observational worldview of its principal creators—bassist/ guitarist Walter Becker and keyboardist/vocalist Donald Fagen—to a literal T.
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The S&V Interview
Keyboardist Don Airey Reveals Why Deep Purple Turned to a Recorded Life of Crime
Mike Mettler  |  Dec 24, 2021
Like many of the great bands from the classic rock era of the latter half of the 20th century, British hard-rock stalwarts Deep Purple cut their teeth with an uncanny ability to turn cover songs into original statements. If it pleases the aural court, may we present the Rod Evans/Ritchie Blackmore era of the band's trippy, deeply shaded 1968 bookend renditions of Joe South's "Hush" and Neil Diamond's "Kentucky Woman" as prime evidence? (Case closed.)
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