Well Engineered Audio

Igo

Lots of stuff in this direction on several threads lately. I thought I'd get some of us to list recordings we think are exceptionally well engineered/recorded. Ya don't particularly have to love the music or the artist but you must have been seriously impressed with the sonic qualities of the CD or album. Let's just go with music and leave movies for another thread.
Let's hear it!

Igo

Michael Franks - anything he's recorded in the last 20 years
Most consistant quality engineering from recording to recording that I can think of at this moment.

mhardy6647

pop/rock/folk is springing to mind tonight:

Wailing Jennys Forty Days
Patty Larkin Regrooving the Dream (virtually all of her albums are excellent)
Beatles Abbey Road (actually all of their output is good; Let it Be (Naked) is pretty sumptuous sonically)
Pink Floyd The Dark...
Pete Townshend/Ronnie Lane Rough Mix
Steely Dan Aja (virtually any SD, vintage or modern, though I never much cared for Gaucho)
Grateful Dead American Beauty (Workingman's Dead ain't bad, either)
Grateful Dead Reckoning (live, acoustic)
Jennifer Warnes The Hunter and Famous Blue Raincoat
Antigone Rising From the Ground Up (stunning live recording of a so-so, all-female band)
Eric Clapton/BB King Riding with the King (Three O'clock Blues is a hifi torture test)
Wayfaring Strangers Shifting Sands of Time (the intesection of a Venn diagram of folk, bluegrass, classical, and klezmer music. Remarkable stuff)
Live from the River Music Hall (Amazing live in studio recordings of popular alterna-acts at the turn of the last century from WXRV-FM in Haverhill MA, three volumes that I know of)
Blue Man Group Album (I think that's what it's called...)
Paul Simon Graceland
The David Grisman Quintet (basically any David Grisman)
Jerry Garcia/David Grisman Not for Kids Only (one of Jerry's last recorded efforts, I think. Warm and fun; beautifully recorded)

Igo

Dire Straights
Spyra Gyro
Diana Krall
Al Di Meola
Later Steeley Dan
Guns n Roses - some
Sanatana - after the mid 80s
Jan Hammer
A lot of Modanna
Russ Freemon and the Rippingtons - ALL (I love these guys)
Alan Parsons
Hiroshima - some
K.D. Lang
Rush after 1990 - to bad their best tunes were pre 1980
Later James Taylor
Accoustic Alchemy
More coming

Igo

Fantastic start mHardy! I fully agree with the artsit and recordings I know and I'll hunt down the ones I don't know and pick up the ones whos music I like. Thanks

timlitton

I was just thinking of this TODAY on the drive home from work. I am looking forward to the results.

Danny Tse

Steely Dan - Gaucho
Dire Straits - Brothers in Arms
Most albums on the Windham Hill label

comfortablycurt

Any of the Grateful Dead albums that were remastered on HDCD have excellent sound quality. American Beauty, Anthem Of The Sun, Workingmans Dead etc...

The sound quality on my Pink Floyd DSOTM hybrid SACD is phenomenal...I've never even heard the SACD layer, but the standard CD layer sounds awesome.

The newer remasters of the Beatles albums, Sgt. Pepper, The White Album, Abbey Road all have excellent sound quality.

Igo

timlitton wrote: »

I was just thinking of this TODAY on the drive home from work. I am looking forward to the results.

Well, I mined some major jackpots with new finds when somebody put up a thread about favorite female artist. I just did a search for the ones I didn't know, listened to a few tracks and bingo. I thought this would be a great way to go straight to a bunch of really well mastered recordings to check out stuff new to me. I can't wait to see what comes up either.

Igo

comfortablycurt wrote: »

Any of the Grateful Dead albums that were remastered on HDCD have excellent sound quality. American Beauty, Anthem Of The Sun, Workingmans Dead etc...

The sound quality on my Pink Floyd DSOTM hybrid SACD is phenomenal...I've never even heard the SACD layer, but the standard CD layer sounds awesome.

The newer remasters of the Beatles albums, Sgt. Pepper, The White Album, Abbey Road all have excellent sound quality.

Didn't Alan Parsons engineer some of Pink Floyd? Pink Floyd did some really good recordings.

mhardy6647

umm... well I prefer the Dead on vinyl, but the Rhino remastered/expanded CDs are pretty good, too :-)

Igo wrote: »

Didn't Alan Parsons engineer some of Pink Floyd? Pink Floyd did some really good recordings.

umm, yeah. The Dark Side of the Moon . Pretty obscure album; kind of a cult thing.
It was recorded at a funky little no-name studio on a street called Abbey Road in England, too...

;-)

Igo

This one's for you Sid!

Cardinals-1

Dire Straights Brothers In Arms

Igo

I raelly thought this would do better. Dang.

reeltrouble1

well, some get paid to think and some get paid to know.............dont think about it.

Fact is this rodeo has been played before but knock yourself out.

RT1

ben62670

Alison Krauss and Union Station Live.
A lot of Gordon Lightfoot. A friend just gave me Sundown on vinyl. Killer album.

mhardy6647

Cardinals-1 wrote: »

Dire Straits Brothers In Arms

Igo wrote: »

I really thought this would do better. Dang.

Brothers in Arms is a very good album, and it does sound good, but I've always felt that it was a little dry/digital sounding. I am referring to the LP, which I purchased back when this album was new; I cannot speak for subsequent, small-disk versions :-)
Dire Straits' eponymous debut LP is a fine sounding album, though... not to mention extremely good music of its time.

As to Alison Krauss and Union Station Live; yup, that one definitely belongs on the list. Listen to the track Ghost in This House and see how cleanly your system (speakers) reproduces her voice when it soars. This track is an excellent demo to hear what's wrong with the cast aluminum MR horns on the vintage Klipsch Cornwalls (trust me on this).

Cardinals-1

mhardy6647 wrote: »

Brothers in Arms is a very good album, and it does sound good, but I've always felt that it was a little dry/digital sounding. I am referring to the LP, which I purchased back when this album was new; I cannot speak for subsequent, small-disk versions :-)
Dire Straits' eponymous debut LP is a fine sounding album, though... not to mention extremely good music of its time.

As to Alison Krauss and Union Station Live; yup, that one definitely belongs on the list. Listen to the track Ghost in This House and see how cleanly your system (speakers) reproduces her voice when it soars. This track is an excellent demo to hear what's wrong with the cast aluminum MR horns on the vintage Klipsch Cornwalls (trust me on this).

I think a lot of the albums of that era sounded that way. The sound engineers were trying to still figure out digital recording techniques. Point well taken though

mhardy6647

Yup... and a lot of the mid-80s output on LP is, sadly, all but unbearable sonically (IMNSHO).

oh, btw, another, only slightly newer album that belongs on this list (IMO): The Grateful Dead tribute album Dedicated. I think this came out ca. 1987. I only have it on CD; it'd be very cool to find on vinyl. Some of the tracks are outstanding, and most sound great, too. Los Lobos doing Bertha, Jack Straw by Bruce Hornsby and the Range, an amazing recording of Friend of the Devil by Lyle Lovett, China Doll -> Cassidy by Suzanne Vega,and a transcendent To Lay Me Down by Cowboy Junkies...

Ohh, Cowboy Junkies! Don't forget to include a copy of The Trinity Sessions!

Igo

reeltrouble1 wrote: »

well, some get paid to think and some get paid to know.............dont think about it.

Fact is this rodeo has been played before but knock yourself out.

RT1

Yeah. I learned a long time ago that after 5 or 6 thousand post there just isn't anything new that can be said.

mmadden28

Danny Tse wrote: »

Dire Straits - Brothers in Arms

+1
I only recently got this--on SACD MC it sounds incredible on my system

Bass_Pedal

Joe Satriani - Joe Satriani (1995)
Phil Collins - Face Value (1981)
The Tragically Hip - Day For Night (1994)

kuntasensei

Nickel Creek - This Side

One of my favorites for imaging is Punch Brothers' Punch. It's a bluegrass group with Chris Thile (of Nickel Creek), and was recorded with the whole band standing in an open studio around old-fashioned mics. The instrument and vocal placement mimics where they were standing in the room, and they recorded each track straight through together. Fantastic CD that really shows off how good speakers can effectively recreate the original environment the music was played in.

obieone

As mentioned b4, DSOTM on SACD. The only other is Roger Waters 'In The Flesh' concert DVD.

Btw, is Dire Straits 1st album avail. on SACD? Brothers in Arms seems to be the only one I've seen?!

Bass_Pedal

Almost forgot... Sea Change - Beck SACD