If you've yet to be fully persuaded by the benefits of listening to music in spatial audio, then you may be interested in my pick of the 5 best tracks I've heard in the format so far. Each song manages to showcase the full potential spatial audio tracks can bring on the latest speakers or headphones capable of handling the new audio format.
I've been discussing spatial audio for a while now. I confess, though, I'm not always entirely convinced about the new audio format and the spatial audio mixes. After all, do we really need a more nuanced version of songs just to bring a greater sense of scale to our favorite music when played on today's wireless speaker or headphones?
An audio format that's designed to remix songs to deliver a stronger sound on today's small speakers, say, doesn't exactly feel like progress to me. To my mind, anything that messes with the original recording could be seen as undermining the original music mix that the artist(s) and record producer(s) settled on at the time the song was made, and from that point of view feels like a backwards approach.
If you really want to hear what spatial audio is capable of, play these 5 remixed songs.
As an audio expert, I have spent more years than I care to mention listening to stereo recordings on conventional speaker systems. I know all about the benefits listening to music on a good quality system can bring in terms of soundstage depth, and conjuring up a three-dimensional sonic image of a musical performance standing right in your living room simply by using a pair of Hi-Fi speakers, or the best audiophile headphones. Ironically, this is also the goal of the Dolby Atmos and 360 Reality Audio formats, but for non audiophile setups.
Of course, not all spatial audio format songs are as effective as one another. So if you really want to hear what spatial audio is capable of, play these 5 remixed songs on a Sonos Era 300 speaker, which is designed specifically for spatial audio formats. Alternatively, you can try any stereo speaker setup or pair of headphones that supports spatial audio, such as the AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods Pro Max, to discover what the format brings when done right.
1. Rocket Man by Elton John
Few tracks demonstrate the immersive capabilities of spatial audio more effectively than Elton John's remixed Dolby Atmos version of "Rocket Man (I Think It's Going To Be A Long Long Time)". The soundscape this version of the classic song manages to produce on my Sonos Era 300 smart speaker is so expansive that it defies belief that it's coming from a single source.
The exaggerated backing vocal harmonies and ramped up synth sounds in this Dolby Atmos mix make the track sound considerably different from the version I've listened to hundreds of times over the years. It's very effective, and although I don't dislike it, it does feel different. Thankfully, not everything has been tinkered with in the track's mix, and the song still has a lovely warm characteristic that evokes the original's recording style and sound of the 1970s that makes it sound familiar and different all at the same time.
2. Thriller by Micheal Jackson
Another classic pop album that's been given the Dolby Atmos Spatial Audio treatment on Apple Music is Jackson's "Thriller." There are some neat touches that make the synth sound bigger on "Beat It" than the speaker cabinet the track is being streamed on, and has a room filling sound that is very engaging.
Meanwhile, I can well imagine that there's some audio trickery applied to the howling wolves at the beginning of the "Thriller" album's title track, but it refused to play on my Sonos Era 300, informing me that 'the song is not encoded correctly.' It's not the first time this has happened when trying to stream Apple Music content to the Sonos Era 300, and leads me to suspect that there are still some encoding issues still to be addressed between Apple Music and Sonos.
3. No Time To Die (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
From Hans Zimmer's rousing orchestral score for James Bond's most recent outing to Billie Eilish's brooding performance of the title track, the No Time To Die movie soundtrack is a fine example of how orchestral pieces can work spectacularly well with spatial audio. Once again, the sound is much bigger in scale than I would typically expect from a small speaker design, and the rousing strings and lavish production of the soundtrack is projected outwards well into the room.
The track called "Matera" is a particular highlight, with all the signature elements of a Boned movie rolled into one very beautiful piece of music, and I have to confess the Dolby Atoms Spatial Audio elements make it sound pretty spectacular on the Sonos Era 300.
4. Royals by Lorde
Lorde's "Royals" track from 2013's "Pure Heroine" album was a go-to track ideal for showcasing bass performance on passive speakers and subwoofers that I reviewed at home in my previous role. I'm pleased to have discovered this Dolby Atmos version. The remixed version has all the scale to show off the bass handling of whatever speaker or pair of headphones you're listening on, and gives an extra dimension to the finger snaps and harmonies that seem to stretch beyond the confines of the speaker cabinet.
I love the way you can follow each layer of the backing vocal harmonies, and the way they seem to build on the Sonos speaker. The crashing gong sounds at the beginning of the chorus also appear to have additional presence in this mix that I wasn't aware of before, which all adds up to it being on my demo track list for spatial audio content.
5. A Day in The Life by The Beatles
The Dolby Atmos mix of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" album by The Beatles is full of special effects that show just how ahead of their time the band was back in 1967 when the album was originally released. I've often found the original mix of the album a bit too chaotic for my tastes, but this Dolby Atmos remix version unpicks the multitracked layers to give each element its own space within the soundstage.
With so many tracks on the album to showcase Dolby Atmos' capabilities with throwing sounds wide of the soundstage thanks to the likes of the cock-a-doodle-doing cockerel on "Good Morning, Good Morning", to the extra dimension given to the snaking synth sounds on "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds." Even more spectacular, though, and my favorite is "A Day In the Life."
The way the Dolby Atmos version places the instruments in their own acoustic space within the mix, and with the drum kit firmly placed behind the speaker makes it sound quite remarkable for a 55-year-old recording. It really is a neat trick, and brings the soundstage conjured up by the Sonos Era 300 to sound closer to a stereo music system, with two speakers placed several feet apart, than any single speaker setup I've heard so far.
How to hear spatial audio tracks
From Apple's AirPods Max headphones to the latest HomePod 2 smart home speaker, the idea of spatial audio seems to be finding its way into all kinds of products. Indeed, it's a fundamental part of the distinctive design behind the Sonos Era 300 smart speaker, which makes some spatial audio tracks sound so impressive they defy belief that they're coming from the relatively compact speaker design.
It is no surprise, then, that spatial audio music is taking off, and as Apple Insider points out, it's important to note that there's no fixed definition for the term spatial audio.
When it comes down to it, Apple Music uses Dolby Atmos mixed tracks that it calls Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos, while Tidal and Amazon Music Unlimited employ both Dolby Atmos and Sony's 360 Reality Audio formats in their Spatial Audio content libraries.
There are some issues with easily tracking down spatial audio version of songs, but for Apple Music subscribers using iOS, this third-party music library tracker app automatically discovers which of the tracks and albums in your Apple Music library have a spatial audio version without having to carry out lengthy searches of your favorite artist's back catalog.
I've found it particularly useful with getting to grips with spatial audio content in my own library, rather than relying on Apple Music's playlist of Spatial Audio tracks, it has made streaming tracks to my Sonos Era 300 smart speaker far more straight forward.
