I finally watched/listened to
2112 Five Point One over the weekend. I had read some reviews of it, so the relatively conservative use of the surround channels was expected, but still somewhat disappointing. I had hoped that the few reviews I'd read (before I stopped reading them) were exaggerated due to the reviewers being disappointed, but they really weren't. The presentation is similar to that of a movie which is dialogue-heavy. The vast majority of the soundstage is in the fronts, with the rears/surrounds used only for some ambience from time to time. Not really a very immersive experience, but I don't think that that was what they were going for. It was simply an artistic choice (by Richard Chycki, by the way).
I do recall a few times when I heard guitar parts and/or percussion coming from corners of the room where I don't even have speakers. This of course was achieved by mixing partway between the left front and rear, or right front and rear, with the apparent location of the sound somewhere in between. That was nicely done. I suppose that if the effect were used too much, it would become tedious, but overall I prefer a more immersive experience from 5.1 music. This is practically a stereo mix with just a little extra space maybe 10% of the time, 20% tops. So if you were expecting Neil's tom fills to wrap around the room or the layers of guitars spread around the room, you too will be disappointed.
What I was not expecting was the graphic novel which accompanied the story. Actually, the entire album is accompanied by illustrated panels. The "super deluxe" version contains a 40-page comic book, and I'm assuming that that is what we get to see here, synchronized to the album as it unfolds. The "story notes" part of the title suite is included, which was nice, and the lyrics themselves appear in speech bubbles as spoken/sung by the characters. "2112" was done pretty well, with most of the story laid out pretty much as I'd imagined it in my head. The only real deviation was "Discovery" which I found interesting, but ultimately the artist's interpretation didn't make much sense to me.
Once the title suite was over, I was somewhat surprised that "Side Two" of the album was also illustrated, so that was cool. It was a huge task in the first place, so I shouldn't really harp on the shortcuts taken by the graphic artist, but by the end it was downright distracting. Most of "Something for Nothing" was a single illustration with the lyrics added as they came up in the song. Each song had a somewhat different feel, which was cool, and it's possible that that was just how the artist had envisioned the song, but since it was the last song on the album, it had the effect of seeming like he was just tired or out of time and used a huge shortcut at the end.
Overall, it was great. While the surround was not as immersive as I would have liked, hearing
2112 in 96kHz / 24-bit PCM on my home theater system, very loudly (no one else was home) was worth the price, and the graphics only added to the experience.
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