Journey – Freedom

I can't wait until they remaster this one....I mean really?....Can anyone say over-compressed? I personally like the music on the CD, but it sounds like they were playing under a thick blanket.

Mixing is horrible, vinyl pressing is bad and center hole barely fits spindle. Never had the interest on playing it again.

Flip the album over and you’ll see the track listing where you’ll find arguably the most uninspired song titles of all time. It is quite indicative of the album you’re about to hear.

Nice autographed og copy .perfect shape..decent album for journey .wall hanger for me. autographed collector

My First Copy was chipped on Track 1 - Side A 20 Seconds in out of the shrink wrap, the chip was deeper than the stylus and lasted 3 rotations and unplayable, second copy is dirty, hopefully that's all but not good enough from Frontiers. I should not have to wash a brand new record like it's a used one from a charity shop.

I must echo the other reviews here. This pressing is crap. The songs themselves are typical Journey greatness and the vinyl itself is fine (hardly any pops/clicks), but the mastering sucks. Arnel's voice sounds like it's coming from another room. It's just really muddy, bass heavy, and completely lacking in high frequencies. I believe this was produced by Narda Michael Walden, who, while a great drummer, has proven himself lacking in the production department. I'm not sure if the band even heard the final mix before it was released. I find it hard to believe they would have given this the ok. With any luck they'll release a remix of it sometime in the future. If you really must own a physical copy, just buy the cd.

Sound this release is a bit muddy, bit this seems to be the way the album was mixed as opposed to any issues with the mastering or pressing. Vinyl is flat, had some debris but plays quiet after a vacuum cleaning. There is no mastering credit in the liner notes, so this is likely the same master used for the CD/digital versions, so unless you are just big on owning the album "on vinyl" then you're just as well off with a cheaper version.

As for the album itself, there is A LOT of great material here, and a handful of the songs are some of the best the band has ever released in the post-Steve Perry era. Unfortunately though, it suffers from a problem that many of the veteran rock bands putting out new material seem to have: inability to self-edit. At 16 tracks and over 73 minutes long, it's a slog to get through and the better/more memorable songs get lost in the wash. Trim this sucker down to around 9-10 tracks, 40-45 minutes and you could have the best Journey record since Raised on Radio. The recent releases from Def Leppard and the Scorpions suffer from the same issue - some of their best ever latter day material, but an overload that melts into a faceless whole because it's too much.

Plenty here for you to love if you're a Journey fan, but sonics are mediocre and vinyl version is not an essential purchase.

This is the worst quality vinyl and record in the last three years. Disappointment. No need to spend money on this album.

Unfortunately I must echo what other reviewers are saying. The mix on this album is rather poor. Arnel sounds like he is singing in the next room. Narda M. Walden is a fantastic drummer, but he missed the mark on the producing of this album. I used a parametric equalizer to isolate the majority of the vocals and pull them to the front as much as possible. It did help some but it by no means corrected the issue. Everything sounds very muffled. Nothing at all is crisp. The drums and bass are very muddy. The guitar is the most clear instrument and even that sounds to wet.

Yes, the mix on this release is unfortunately not great. I'm a big Journey fan and I was looking forward to this Freedom release. But what the first reviewer said is exactly how it sounds to me too. The high frequencies, higher range sounds are just not great. It's not terrible but it isn't as good as it could have been.

The band put this album together via the internet from different locations around the world during COVID. And then they mixed it themselves rather than having had it mastered elsewhere is what I have understood. I don't know if they've even played the songs together in a studio. They definitely didn't play any of them live on their 2022 Freedom Tour.

It's a shame really. This album has some great songs on it. But the sound is subpar in my opinion and in the opinion of many others. The brightness seems to be muted to an extent.

There's a lot out there on the internet as far as reviews and details go regarding Freedom. Maybe they will do a remix someday?