Do you listen to ATMOS music remixes?

[Dave Bryce]

I have a 7.1 surround system, and I recently started listening to the ATMOS mixes on some of my Blu-Ray surround discs.  
 

Gotta say, I’m kind of digging it.  

 

With 7.1 and normal 5.1 mixes, I either get the back and side speakers coupled or I get some DSP in the back two.  With the ATMOS mixes, all seven sneakers function as distinct parts of the system, with purposed content placed and/or moving smoothly.
 

I also have to say I find the bass integration of the ATMOS mixes to be more coherent than the conventional 5.1 mixes.

 

Anyone else have experience with ATMOS on a home system?

 

dB

[Werno]

Just stumbled upon this thread and felt obligated to reassure you that yes, there's someone else out there/here checking out atmos remixes.

 

I'm heavily invested in 5.1 and have had a setup for a decade or two, but since many artists I've been collecting in 5.1 on DVD-audio, SACD, Blu-ray, and downloaded files have started including Atmos mixes on Blu-rays, I wanted to hear them- while spending as little as possible. I bought Onkyo's cheapest receiver that supports 5.1.2 Atmos and augmented my B&W 5.0 speakers and Velodyne sub with a couple of Sony angled speakers that allegedly bounce the 'height' channels off my ceiling. It does add something to the 5.1 experience, how much varies with the particular mix. I agree that in general bass, and other elements, have an extra sense of solidity, precision of placement and scale in a well-done Atmos mix. The Atmos spec alleges 'scalability', i.e. is supposed to direct sound 'objects' via whatever number and arrangment of speakers is available to recreate the virtual space of the mix. I'm not sorry I made a small investment to get a sense of what I was missing, but the outlay to take it to the next level isn't small. 

 

FWIW, AFAIK, etc. you're not hearing actual official 'Atmos' when playing an Atmos mix through a 7.1, or 5.1 system, what you're getting in the absence of Atmos processing is the 'base' mix without any elements directed to height- kind of like if you were playing a 5.1 mix through a stereo setup configured to downmix to the available speakers. I took a few of my better Atmos Blu-rays to an audio shop with a nice 9.2.4 Atmos room, with multiple speakers in the ceiling as Dolby intended, and the experience was pretty impressive. I popped in the recent Steven Wilson remix of 'Moondance' and was wowed. My little B&W 5.1 + Sony bounce-it-off-the-ceiling setup is a faint approximation of the real deal, but I still enjoy it, and since I also enjoy being married I have no immediate plans to tear holes in the living room ceiling to install overhead speakers. 

 

When you say you're listening to the Atmos mixes on your Blu-ray surround discs, I'm curious if you're talking music-only or movies/video- what mixes do you happen to have? Musicwise there aren't that many on Blu-ray that I'm aware of, maybe a dozen or so of Steven Wilson recent remixes, a couple of Beatles, Band, & Zappa box sets, a standalone DSotM, Peter Gabriel's i/o, Loreena McKennit's 'The Visit', Van Morrison's 'Moondance', and whatever very-limited run special SuperDeluxeEditions projects that have been offered here:  

 

https://www.thesdeshop.com/collections/spatial-audio?page=3

 

My 'best of' the SDE discs that I've acquired would be the Tears for Fears 'Tipping Point', the Eno 'Forever...', and in terms of Atmos mix (but not my fave musically) the Duran Duran 'Danse Macabre' via Bob Clearmountain. Steven Wilson's new Atmos mix of King Crimson's 'Lark's Tongues' is great, though pricey, and still available unlike the others I cited. A24 is releasing the recent restored version of Stop Making Sense with Atmos on both Blu-ray and 4k Blu-ray; the $50+ price tag for the 1k Blu-ray is a bit steep, but I'll probably succumb eventally.

 

https://shop.a24films.com/products/stop-making-sense-collectors-edition?variant=40138572431409

 

Movies and series disc sets tend to reserve Atmos mixes for the 4k discs, but there are some 'normal' Blu-rays with Atmos mixes including 'Everything Everywhere etc', the recent Dune, LaLa Land... but they're few and far between, and not easy to search for on Amazon or elsewhere. Blu-ray.com is your friend for doublechecking disc specs.

 

If you like Classical works mostly for strings, with the occasioinal jazz trio or folk group, the 2L label excels at pushing the envelope both specwise (192kHz sample rate where possible) and spatially with Atmos and Auros mixes. I also recommend a Blu-ray Atmos disc of Gabrielli works for choir with 'the Kings' sackbuts and coronets' recorded with The Kings' College Choir in Cambridge -it's a great Atmos demo, and it includes a 5.1 mix both on the blu-ray and a hybrid multichannel SACD/CD. 

 

Guess that's enough of a brain data dump. Perhaps TMI. Long story short- you're not alone.