These opinions on the Achtung production are clouded by 15 years of hearing the material live and 10 years of digital recording, of which some of you grew up with and are certainly more accustomed to.
In 1991, it was a good sounding record.
Of course, I won't argue that the mix is not perfect with hindsight but it was supposed to be muddy to an extent. The atmospherics on the record were intentional. Look at the people associated with producing, mixing and mastering the record. Not exactly the 'B' crew.
Then you have the 21st century U2 disease, which is for the band and those associated to go back and excuse every last bit that doesn't shine with today's 'standard' and revise their own version of events, as to apologize for certain things.
Here's an idea, go back and find me a quote from anyone of the band or any of those who worked on the album prior to 1999 that bitches about the sound of Achtung Baby.
It's going to be hard to find much of that, if any. It seems as time passes and the album does indeed seem more dated, then you have the excuses from the band.
Go back and read Brian Eno's article that he wrote for Rolling Stone in 1991. Did he sound like he was lamenting the butchering of his production by the mixing or mastering etc.?
The truth is, it was a landmark album that really broke their mold at the time but because they went for something that was a punch to the face, the innovation of their own sound, years later it just sounds dated. How does this album sound any worse that Unforgettable Fire? Go ahead and tell me, with some details.
Is there a person on this thread who is over 30 years old, owned Achtung Baby for 15 years and prefers that they go back and remix the thing? I would guess most would prefer the original. That doesn't mean it would sound better than a remastered version, it just means that we appreciate the context of the album on it's own as opposed to comparing it to the ear bleeding audio murder of albums like HTDAAB, where the thing is so loud, you'd have to wonder who could appreciate such a calamity of dynamics as anything released in the last 10 years, even compared to muddy waters of Achtung.
I also think there is another factor at play here for some. The aboslute dearth of atmosphere on the latest albums, which probably attracted some of you to U2 in the first place. This is just sheer preference of sound.
Take Philly's gripes, which make some sense and they are those shared by many I'm sure but just let me do my own 'apologizing' for U2.
Zoo Station chorus, two vocal tracks, one beautifully harmonizing and clear and the other is just him just basically talking. You can hear both really well. You can hear the flange of Edge's guitar, which is the atmospehric rising above the mix. The drums sound great, the bass sounds great. But because you can't hear the guitar picked in full it sucks? This doesn't make any sense to me as the whole thing sounds incredibily well put together. Had Edge not picked out that 'riff' on ZooTv, would this opinion be different?
EBTTRT
You have what I call 'digi ears' if you can't hear the riff in this one. Yeah, it's not as loud as say... I dunnoo, ZooTV from Sydney? or any live performance but they didn't have to mix two vocal tracks in the middle during those performances. There are also two guitar tracks at times throughout the verses. You've got to 'free' up space to mix it all together. If you bring that riff up as loud as the digi ears need, you're going to lose something else. Some of us prefer the whole sound, not just the rocky sugar riff. I love that riff myself by the way, just saying.
The reason you won't hear complaints about this (buried tracks) in the 21st century is because everything is fucking loud loud loud. Funny that the griping would be mostly about volume. I'd rather have retained the atmosphere of this song than to push something up so loud as to 'be demanded to be heard' like say, the bassline in COBL! Which is nothing short of atrocious. I have a dozen more examples of this but I'll save them.
UTEOTW
Outro gripes here are nothing more than a direct comparison to the live versions.
Believe it or not, this is the way this song sounded until U2 took the stage to perform it.
This was how it was written. There is one outro voice here. I think it's even Edge. Not random voice noises. Go back and listen, I've heard it eleventy billion times, I don't have to. The gripe here again is the guitar. Edge is not going off like a cock rocker here on the album like he does live (that's not a gripe on my behalf, I love the live version). I just think again, this is case of not understanding the context of the album and the song.
The Fly guitar I've always thought sounded too quiet in parts of the song. To me this is because of the wah Edge is using which pushes the tone of the guitar on the high and low ends, so he loses the 'crunch' in lieu of the effect itself. Again, the solo on all the live versions, is IMO Edge's best solo. Easily. So to listen to the album and compare it to those versions where he is just able to wail, it's not fair to the album version. It could have sounded better, maybe they all could sound better that by itself doesn't mean the production sucked. Zooropa is their best sounding album, period but even it could conceivably be better.
When 2005 (or whatever) U2 is revising their own history, they want the riff as direct as possible and in your face, the way they've done everything this century with as little subtlety as possible and with an ambition to make the thing as accesible as possible. What's more accessible to a big anthem loving arena rock audience than a big rock song with a big fat riff? Vertigo anyone?
Mysterious Ways, hard to argue with this, although I don't like the song enough to care to defend it. I would just say they figured out a way to perform it better. That's not really a production beef. He's not playing the same bit anyways, I don't think. Anyways, fuck this song unless there is a hot chick dancing with Bono.
TTTYAATW-
This was always and still is just an atmpospheric love song. It wasn't meant to be a guitar laden poppy love ballad. When they performed the thing live, how else to carry the melody without the top end of those atmospherics (which could be a synth or an envoloped guitar) than to have Edge just pick something out? Again, just comparing it to the live version here. This wasn't a song meant to have a guitar tab, other than perhaps a chord version.
LIB-do I need to even state it one more time? Live version comparison much?
It's one thing to say "They could have made the album so much better had they mixed it differently" (which is essentially to say, had they composed it differently) it's another thing to say the production sucks, when you really just don't like how they composed it.
They didn't make a version that mirrored the later live versions. This album sounds fine, in fact it sounds great. I wouldn't expect some of you guys to understand that because you are just as biased as I am. It's all good.