I visited (in SF) for the first time a few nights ago and just keep thinking about it!
It's a space for immersive audio. You sit in the center of a room, surrounded by a 32-channel hemispherical speaker array. I heard a mix of Dark Side of the Moon—really amazing.
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I've heard the 5.1ch mix, and this was quite different: the extra degree of freedom let them create a lot of spatial separation between the instruments. Drummer there, choir on ceiling, keys at 2:00, etc. Made it easy to follow each instrument, almost like listening to stems.
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Thanks for listening with us! You heard the quadraphonic version of DSOTM, unaltered yet upmixed for the 32 speaker sphere of sound in Envelop SF. This creates 4 walls of sound instead of 4 speakers. We didn’t pan or adjust any stems, we want the artist’s vision to be heard 🔊🌐
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Wow—that's fascinating. So what seemed to be vertical distinctions were actually just perceptual! Even more reason for me to come back and enjoy audio created specifically for the full hemisphere.
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There are speakers above you which you’re hearing. Upmixed quadraphonic in Envelop SF, in this case, can be thought of as 4 curved walls of sound. This is just one of many immersive mixing strategies we deploy. Anything is possible especially when using Envelop for Live.
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