Expecting Rain

fresh dylan and band at wolfgang's vault.go see

I wish they'd release some more RTR stuff rather than '74...and that they'd offer them for download in FLAC...

I must say, RTR is my least favourite period of Dylan's touring. He just seems to shout through a lot of that stuff.

It's not my favorite either but I like it better than '74...which, by the way, is when the shouting started.

Yes indeed. But I like the '74 shouting better.

I see the complete, chrono Last Waltz is streaming, though it looks like it is not for sale.

Yes, and it's astonishing how poor the Band's performance actually was on tracks like HAZEL and FOREVER YOUNG; you'd never know after all the remixing and overdubbing that was done for the official release.

Unfortunately as the Mighty Monkey of Mim knows he is dreaming in technicolour here folks, correct me if I'm wrong but have FLAC files ever been sold comMERCIally? Apple charges extra for the upgrade from a 128 to a 192 bit rate while FLAC files offer as i recall 1411. It's just better sound (but not 5x better or anything).

According to their FAQ, all of the Wolfgang's Vault concerts that are available for download are available in FLAC. However, none of the Dylan-related concerts are available for download at this time. (Probably because Dylan's management hasn't given permission.)

In addition, these online music stores all offer FLAC among other options:
http://musicishere.com/
https://www.hdtracks.com/
http://bandcamp.com/

However, once again, you won't find any Dylan there. These seem to be mostly independent artists although you will find some major label names in the catalogue as well. (A couple Joan Baez albums, for one example.)

Ongoing discussion of more here:
http://www.last.fm/group/Free+Lossless+ ... 8/_/276748

None of the big name, mainstream stores such as iTunes, Rhapsody, or Amazon have the option as of yet, but you can expect that as faster connection speeds and larger harddrive storage space continue to become more prevalent, lossless downloads (be they FLAC or any of a number of other lossless formats) will eventually gain more popularity.

Indeed, thanks for the scoop and links. Actually I don't think there's much added value when it comes to 70s live recordings in FLAC, the distinction btwn it and a 320 mp3 is detectable but negligible given the source recordings, would you agree

To each his own, though my take would be that if the source is not of the best fidelity that is all the more reason to preserve it in the best quality possible. And even if the audible difference is very slight, why not get the most for your money? You can always make MP3s from FLACs if that suits your purpose, but you can't reverse the process.

The way I see it, lossy encoding is an artifact of a rapidly-passing era of limited storage space and slow internet connections that made small downloads a necessity. For many, these factors are becoming increasingly negligible, and that trend will no doubt continue to develop in the future. Plus, along the way we'll probably find new methods of lossless compression that allow for even smaller file sizes than FLAC and Apple Lossless currently offer, narrowing the gap further still. But who knows, we'll just have to wait and see...

For sure, but unless you're listening to them back to back, as live recordings they're not going to stand out any extra at some awesome resolution. Listen for yourself to grateful dead recordings before and after compressing them into mp3s, the compressed version often sounds better as it tightens up the inevitable arena-sized thuds and fluffiness of the FLAC version.

Yes.

However you'd be hard pressed to find a recording engineer who'll tell you that compression is a bad thing.