autoboy,
Like pmbuko, I'd bet it's the source recording. You don't have to be an audio expert to detect fatiguing or EQ'd or distorted high frequencies; they tend to make themselves known immediately, and we're all equipped with the same set of hearing apparatus.
One way to check out the source recording and bypass the receiver/speaker chain is to use a good pair of headphones (they don't have to be expensive, just not really crappy earbuds) and plug directly into a CD player or DVD player's headphone jack, if you have a CD/DVD player with a headphone output jack.
If the fault is in the source recording and the headphones are reasonably good, the bad high frequencies will show up immediately. If, on the other hand, the Johnson CD sounds great over headphones, then the problem lies somewhere in the Sony receiver's electronics.
Regards,
