Stereo Tool

i was able to easily reproduce the same texture of sound however, both of those original tracks are extremely poorly mastered.

Sadly, no, I did not.

What I most like is that almost "distant" sound. It takes the "bite" out of the transients and allows the volume to be increased without causing ear fatigue or ear pain from powerful, harsh transients.

About 10 years ago, I first heard a similar "distant" sound on a local FM station in my city. After speaking with the engineer there, he explained that the he used a combination of a Translantech Ariane and an Orban Optimod 8500.

After purchasing both for myself and doing my own tests, I discovered that the "distance" was achieved by the matrix mode of the Ariane.

Hearing the samples above (and other songs from the above samples' station stream) I do think that some form of matrix AGC is going on here as well.

Stereo Tool's matrix mode appears to have a similar effect when set to an extreme setting. Although, I do believe something else is going on in the processing of the above samples. It may just be an Omnia-specific thing, but I'm not certain.

If anyone is interested in exploring this further, I'd be more than happy to do so. I can provide more samples if needed.

Thanks.