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The CD of this sounds so ropey - it sounds like it was taken from a stereo source rather than the master tapes. Is the vinyl any better?

Not my copy (French Universal), it's actually worse than the CD. The recordings from the movie set are bad.

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200 Motels - perhaps the greatest music of Zappa's career with definitely the shittiest sound on CD and album.
Any chance of a remaster?

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Is the LP considered poor SQ too then? I do hope the ZFT and/or MGM can remaster this one, as I agree, the content is great but the sound (on the Ryko CD I'm familiar with, at least) doesn't exactly do it any favours. I wonder whether this is part of it's magic/charm though? Either way I'd be curious in an alternative higher fidelity representation.

After discovering Zappa from the usual albums (Over-Nite Sensation, Apostrophe(') and Live In New York) it was 200 motels that had me hooked into Zappa the composer, it's such and original album, even Flo and Eddy don't annoy me:-) The orchestrations and compositions are great, i just hope that this one is being mastered somehow so that we can hear it in all it's glory in 2013...

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The CD is apparently a straight transfer of the original stereo master tape, so it's not going to get any better unless they do a complete remix.

I have an original vinyl release that came with the poster and booklet. If I remember correctly the advert in Record Collector stated that it was a French import. I might be wrong about that though as nothing on it says anything about this.
Anyway, yes I concur the sound is pretty bad. With my copy the first record is very flimsy and the second quite thick. I think that one was replaced from another set at some point between 1971 and 1997 when I bought it.......
Sides 1 and 2 are very tinny and there is no bass. The sound is tiny and sounds like it comes from a little box somewhere right at the back of each speaker.
Sides 3 and 4 are a great improvement, but I guess this is just because the quality of the vinyl? Would sides 1 and 2 sound as good as this, if they were pressed on the same vinyl?
Dental Hygiene Dilemma sounds great for example but Magic Fingers is muddy as fuck and the climax of Strictly Genteel is is beyond muddy. I'd have to go say it is actually Swampy.

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http://www.lukpac.org/~handmade/patio/vinylvscds/200motels.html This is pretty much all the info you'd need on it. I picked up the CDs just a few days ago in the local record store (Used, 29$ and its been OOP since 2002)

From what info you can find in that link it looks like the CD and official Vinyl were both taken from the same TWO TRACK masters that zappa sent to north america for the vinyl pressings. So basically this stuff can't possibly sound any better UNLESS the multi-track tapes are recovered and remastered. Apparently zappa didn't have the rights to re-release it or something so i guess we will just have to wait and see if the ZFT tries to do anything about it.

I've been listening to it for the past few nights and i'm really enjoying it. I actually kinda like the primitive two track sound, it has a certain charm. But a remaster with the muti-track tapes would sound awesome.