ABC - Traffic (2008)

Posted By: Designol

Date: Oct. 11, 2024

Traffic is the first new album of original material released by English band ABC in eleven years. The album's songs were written by lead singer Martin Fry while he toured the United States in 2006. Critics have described the album as the most 'satisfying ABC album since the mid-'80s by far'.

Surprise, surprise, but that ABC magic is back again! In the first half of the '80s, Martin Fry enjoyed world-wide success with his band ABC on the back of two albums that were not just fascinating in themselves, but seemed to promise quite more to come. As part of the british New Romantic scene, their debut album, Lexicon of Love, perfectly fit in with the tastes of the time, what with the desire for an artificial blend of (white) soul music mixed with certain '50s conservative sensibilities, all served up with a lot of hollow posing, thank you. ABC were an instant success in that climate, but definitely had more to offer than the surface sheen of most of their contemporaries. Their music had richer layers of meaning, which, over time, started to make them seem like a long-lost treasure. The much more obviously "deep" second album, Beauty Stab, which included the feat of uniquely melding Black Sabbath-type riffs to sultry progressive soul (both typical of the early '70s) already "threw" many of their newfound fans. They weren't counting on such a change of style, or on that much intelligence coming from this band. Third album How to Be a…Zillionaire! (with its uneven attempt at reverting to the charms of the debut album) sadly caused even more people to lose interest, and what followed were decades of ABC albums with music actually conforming to the dictate of hollow dancefloor tastes, with spaces in between albums growing ever longer, all to no avail. Since no one expected it, hardly anyone noticed that in 2008, Martin Fry pretty much delivered the album that ABC fans were probably hoping for in 1985. His lyrical mastery was back in place, an elegant mix of soul and style fully revived in the songwriting and production departments, and there were even some of those fascinating rock amalgams from the second album back on board. Opener "Sixteen Seconds to Choose" is one such song, followed by the soulful elegance of "The Very First Time" and then "Ride," which strikes a perfect rock-soul balance. Thus the tone is set for the rest of the album, the first really satisfying ABC album since the mid-'80s by far. Absolutely astonishing how Fry has managed to shrug of all the years of uninspired "making do" recordings and tap right back into that well of inspiration. He acquired lasting admiration worldwide for this kind of quality all those years ago; now the world would do good to start paying attention again.

Review by Alan Severa, Allmusic.com

ABC at Allmusic
ABC at Wiki

Tracklist:

01. Sixteen Seconds To Choose (03:13)
02. The Very First Time (03:40)
03. Ride (03:39)
04. Love Is Strong (04:08)
05. Caroline (04:47)
06. Life Shapes You (03:51)
07. One Way Traffic (03:46)
08. Way Back When (04:14)
09. Validation (03:58)
10. Lose Yourself (04:04)
11. Fugitives (04:04)
12. Minus Love (04:07)

EAC log

Exact Audio Copy V1.0 beta 3 from 29. August 2011

Отчёт EAC об извлечении, выполненном 19. октября 2015, 15:15

Abc / Traffic

Дисковод: Optiarc DVD RW AD-7243S Adapter: 3 ID: 1

Режим чтения : Достоверность
Использование точного потока : Да
Отключение кэша аудио : Да
Использование указателей C2 : Нет

Коррекция смещения при чтении : 48
Способность читать области Lead-in и Lead-out : Нет
Заполнение пропущенных сэмплов тишиной : Да
Удаление блоков с тишиной в начале и конце : Нет
При вычислениях CRC использовались нулевые сэмплы : Да
Интерфейс : Установленный внешний ASPI-интерфейс

Выходной формат : Пользовательский кодировщик
Выбранный битрейт : 768 kBit/s
Качество : Высокий
Добавление ID3-тега : Нет
Утилита сжатия : C:\Program Files\Exact Audio Copy\FLAC\FLAC.EXE
Дополнительные параметры : -6 -V -T "ARTIST=%artist%" -T "TITLE=%title%" -T "ALBUM=%albumtitle%" -T "DATE=%year%" -T "TRACKNUMBER=%tracknr%" -T "GENRE=%genre%" -T "COMMENT=%comment%" -T "BAND=%albuminterpret%" -T "ALBUMARTIST=%albuminterpret%" -T "COMPOSER=%composer%" %haslyrics%–tag-from-file=LYRICS="%lyricsfile%"%haslyrics% -T "DISCNUMBER=%cdnumber%" -T "TOTALDISCS=%totalcds%" -T "TOTALTRACKS=%numtracks%" %hascover%–picture="%coverfile%"%hascover% %source% -o %dest%

TOC извлечённого CD

Трек | Старт | Длительность | Начальный сектор | Конечный сектор
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––-
1 | 0:00.00 | 3:13.43 | 0 | 14517
2 | 3:13.43 | 3:40.46 | 14518 | 31063
3 | 6:54.14 | 3:39.25 | 31064 | 47513
4 | 10:33.39 | 4:08.70 | 47514 | 66183
5 | 14:42.34 | 4:47.14 | 66184 | 87722
6 | 19:29.48 | 3:51.45 | 87723 | 105092
7 | 23:21.18 | 3:46.23 | 105093 | 122065
8 | 27:07.41 | 4:14.51 | 122066 | 141166
9 | 31:22.17 | 3:59.00 | 141167 | 159091
10 | 35:21.17 | 4:04.51 | 159092 | 177442
11 | 39:25.68 | 4:04.12 | 177443 | 195754
12 | 43:30.05 | 4:07.56 | 195755 | 214335

Характеристики диапазона извлечения и сообщения об ошибках

Выбранный диапазон

Имя файла F:\Временная\Abc - Traffic.wav

Пиковый уровень 98.8 %
Скорость извлечения 4.0 X
Качество диапазона 100.0 %
CRC теста 2FD3CC7F
CRC копии 2FD3CC7F
Копирование… OK

Ошибок не произошло

Конец отчёта

==== Контрольная сумма отчёта E23FDA899D97C4BA89325EFEDC047C0FBE1F4EB4139B999327D53A3F023D58FE ====

DR log

foobar2000 1.2 / Dynamic Range Meter 1.1.1
log date: 2015-11-02 15:30:27

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Analyzed: Abc / Traffic
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

DR Peak RMS Duration Track
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
DR6 -0.10 dB -7.52 dB 3:14 01-Sixteen Seconds To Choose
DR6 -0.10 dB -8.76 dB 3:41 02-The Very First Time
DR5 -0.60 dB -6.89 dB 3:39 03-Ride
DR5 -0.10 dB -7.60 dB 4:09 04-Love Is Strong
DR6 -0.10 dB -8.48 dB 4:47 05-Caroline
DR5 -0.10 dB -7.03 dB 3:52 06-Life Shapes You
DR8 -0.10 dB -9.98 dB 3:46 07-One Way Traffic
DR6 -0.10 dB -8.17 dB 4:15 08-Way Back When
DR6 -0.10 dB -8.09 dB 3:59 09-Validation
DR5 -0.10 dB -6.55 dB 4:05 10-Lose Yourself
DR7 -0.10 dB -8.55 dB 4:04 11-Fugitives
DR7 -0.10 dB -8.90 dB 4:08 12-Minus Love
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Number of tracks: 12
Official DR value: DR6

Samplerate: 44100 Hz
Channels: 2
Bits per sample: 16
Bitrate: 945 kbps
Codec: FLAC
================================================================================

All thanks to original releaser

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