Hi-Res Downloads

48kHz/24-bit FLAC, Warner Music Group (supplied by www.highresaudio.com)

Rarely does the evergreen Tom Petty disappoint his fans, his 13th album with The Heartbreakers proving to be no exception – except that it was three long years in the making. Perhaps because of this it feels over-produced and lacks any feeling of ‘performance’, despite the album being the band’s most rollicking and hard-rockin’ collection of tracks in a very long time. Power chords and jangling guitars combine with tremendous harmony vocals reminiscent of Petty’s outings when an angry young man in the ’70s. Of course we’ve heard it all before, but Petty’s song-writing remains as sharp and incisive as ever. Sound quality throughout is merely OK, compressed to sound punchy on the move rather than dynamically thrilling on a decent hi-fi system. So there’s nothing to be gained by downloading Hypnotic Eye in an unnecessarily large bit bucket. JB

Sound Quality: 65%

Hi-Fi News Lab Report

With a return to ‘raucous rock ’n’ roll’ comes (I assume) an applied level of compression and limited dynamic range that renders 24-bit encoding somewhat redundant. The 24kHz bandwidth offered by 48kHz sampling is well used. PM