This is Kylie Minogue’s sixteenth studio album, to be released on September 22, 2023. Her previous album “Disco” was released in 2020. The album contains 11 tracks, including the first single from the album, “Padam Padam”, and the second, “Disco”, a hypnotic electro song written by Ina Wroldsen and Peter Rycroft, aka Lostboy.
The album also features a collaboration with Dutch DJ and producer Oliver Heldens, on the track “10 Out of 10”. Kylie Minogue has stated that she didn’t want to worry about a particular theme for the album. She recorded the album in a number of locations including Melbourne, Brighton, London, Surrey, Croatia and Paris, with the help of collaborators such as Richard “Biff” Stannard and Duck Blackwell.

For this review, you will find 2 versions tested: Amazon Music UltraHD and Dolby Atmos.

First we will analyze each edition in detail (technical and qualitative analysis), then we will compare the successive editions with their dynamics and assign a final score, and you will be able to listen some samples.

The streaming versions may evolve over time, those presented here correspond to the version tested at the date of publication, or update of the review.

Waveform and dynamic

The waveform represents the 2 tracks of this album (Padam Padam, Tension).

The waveform of the Amazon Music digital stereo version clearly shows the zones with an almost constant maximum level (yellow zone), demonstrating the use of a brickwall limiter, as confirmed by the DR5 .

The waveform of the Dolby Atmos version, downmixed to stereo, shows a good dynamics, without the extreme use of limiters, unlike the digital stereo version (Ed2).

Spectrum comparisons

The Spectrum allows to check the tonal balance of the music (balance between treble, medium and bass sounds) and to detect process that may have been carried out during the recording, the mixing, mastering or manufacturing phases. It is also possible to detect frequency interference issues.

The graph below compares the spectrum of the Amazon stereo version. The yellow arrow indicates the maximum CD frequency at 22 kHz, due to the 44.1 kHz sampling frequency.

The spectrum of the Dolby Atmos version decoded in 5.1 shows that the left and right front channels are the most used, followed by the surround channels, which have an average sound level between 5 and 10 db lower, . The bass channel is filtered at 120 Hz, as indicated by the green arrow. The yellow arrow indicates the high-frequency limit at 20 kHz due to Dolby Digital Plus encoding.

Spectrogram comparaisons

Spectrogram is another representation of frequency versus time of a track. For each channel (right and left), horizontal axis represents time, and the vertical axis represents frequency. The amplitude is represented by the intensity (brightness) of the color of each point in the image.

The spectrogram of the digital version is limited in frequency to 22kHz (yellow arrow) with no signal above (white arrow). This limitation is due to the 44.1kHz sampling frequency used for streaming of this album.

The spectrogram of the Dolby Atmos track downmixed in stereo is limited to 20kHz (yellow arrow) with no signal above (white arrow). This limitation is due to Dolby Digital Plus encoding, which is a lossy encoder that limits bandwidth to optimize data size for a bit rate of 768 kbits/s.

Spatialization

Spatialization allows you to define the sound distribution of the music on all the channels. The spatialization indicator and the description of the graph are described here.

Spatialization is available for Tidal Dolby Atmos .

The Spatialization of the Dolby Atmos version varies from track to track, with values ranging from 5.5 to 8.9. The track “Padam Padam” makes full use of all the channels, immersing us totally in the music.

Summary, scoring and Samples

Ed 1: Amazon UltraHD – 2023

There are no pleasant surprises in this digital stereo version which, despite its 24-bit presentation, is compressed with DR5. In comparison, the dolby Atmos version brings more dynamics and detail.

Rating:

• Dynamic: ●oooo (1)
• Bandwidth: ●●●●o (4)
• Restitution: ●●●oo (3)

Sample : ”Tension” 16 bits 44.1 kHz:

Ed 2: Amazon Dolby Atmos – 2023

The Dolby Atmos version is more dynamic (DR13/DR14), with excellent use of the channels on the track “Padam Padam”. The music makes excellent use of the positioning possibilities in 3D space.

On “Padam Padam”, the music swirls around you, exploiting all the channels, especially during the song’s chorus.
A 360-degree space is created, with the channels present at the top.
the song “Tension” has a slightly less demonstrative Atmos mix, but a very successful one, with all channels exploited, especially with the backing vocals.

Rating:

• Dynamic: ●●●●● (5)
• Bandwidth: ●●●●o (4)
• Spatialization: ●●●●●●●ooo (7)
• Restitution: ●●●●o (4)

Sample : ”Tension” Dolby Atmos downmixed in 5.1:

The sample is in 5.1 wav format, if you can not play the sample in your navigator, you can save it, right button menu and “Save Audio As…” and play it with an external player.

The first two tracks “Padam Padam” and “Tension” give us a first preview of Kylie Minogue’s new album “Tension”. The stereo version, unsurprisingly, suffers from loudness war, unlike the Dolby Atmos version, which brings real dynamics to the tracks and beautiful spatialization thanks to a good Dolby Atmos mix.

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Detail of the ratings :

• Dynamic :
  1. Significant dynamic compression, DR less than 7
  2. Compression of the present dynamics, DR between 7 and 9.
  3. Correct piece DR >=10
  4. No dynamic compression (DR >12), dynamic rendering
  5. No dynamic compression, high DR and very dynamic sound rendering
• Spectrum :
  1. Spectrum cut and less than 15 khz
  2. Spectrum cut at 15 khz
  3. Spectrum not conforming to the original and cut (not HD) or original but limited bandwidth (but less than 20 kHz)
  4. Spectrum conforming to the original (but not HD)
  5. Spectrum conforming to the original with HD resolution (higher than 24kHz)
• Surface noise (only for vinyl):
  1. Continuous audible noise
  2. Audible surface noise except on passages with a high level of noise
  3. Reduced surface noise, barely audible on low level crossings
  4. Low surface noise, very good quality
  5. Very low surface noise, no defects, almost inaudible on the quiet passages (exceptional disc)
• Spatialization :
  • Between 0 and 5 for 5.1 or 7.1 channels configuration
  • Between 0 and 10 for Atmos configuration (7.1.4)
  • For more information on spatialization, you can read the article describing this parameter here.
• Restitution :
  1. Low quality of the restitution mixing dynamics, clarity, separation of voices and instruments.
  2. Average quality of the restitution mixing dynamics, clarity, separation of voices and instruments.
  3. Quality of the restitution mixing dynamics, clarity, separation of voices and instruments. Good record.
  4. High quality of the restitution mixing dynamics, clarity, separation of voices and instruments. Very high level disc.
  5. Maximum quality of the restitution mixing dynamics, clarity, separation of voices and instruments. Exceptional disc.

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