The best sounding (produced/mastered) tracks/albums

[NDA]

Just listening to the 'Toto IV' album in 192/24.... some startlingly wide soundstage, particularly on Africa, the final track.

Kalya Scintilla's album Illusions has an interesting track 'Zulu Voodoo'. It's electronic (not my thing), but an interesting production and lots of interesting sounds coming in from all over.

Anyone into Jazz (like me) should check out Joey Alexander's album Continuance. Apart from great playing, the production is superb.

[loughran]

Ok, so I'm not sure this belongs here... but I had to tell someone !

Blue Man Group featuring Venus Hum, 'I Feel Love', the number made famous by Donna Summer.

It sounds good enough on Spotify, the plumbed in percussion is epic but the point is... the video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iFBXjRbVl0

and I'm love with Annette Strean.

Thanks for watching.

As you were.

[NDA]

loughran said:

Blue Man Group featuring Venus Hum, 'I Feel Love', the number made famous by Donna Summer.

Gave the audio version a spin....

New contributions always welcome.

[Funk]

NDA said:

Anyone into Jazz (like me) should check out Joey Alexander's album Continuance. Apart from great playing, the production is superb.

LOVE this, thanks for the recommendation.

[Boleros]

Some of my go to tracks when I'm having a session (last one is an album):

Just A Little Lovin' - Shelby Lynne
Come Together (Remastered 2009) - The Beatles
Biscuits - Fink
Blueberry Pancakes - Fink
Asteri Mou - 9bach
Midnight - Coldplay
Make Us Stronger - Ghost Rider
Tin Pan Alley - Stevie Ray Vaughan
Compel - Recondite
John Taylor's Month Away - King Creosote
Stimela (The Coal Train) - Hugh Masekela
Eye In The Wall - Perfume Genius
Dark Day - Blues Company
2049 - Hans Zimmer
Says - Nils Frahm
Northern Skies - Dido
You Better Hide - Yello
Stoney Street - Amon Tobin
Chasing Utopia - xPropaganda
Music For Psychedelic Therapy - Jon Hopkins

Most of these I listen to because I really like them but one or two are in there purely for the production values, Ghost Rider in particular stands out. Not wild about the track itself but it takes you on a journey for sure. The other one is Coldplay's Midnight. I'm not fan of their stuff but this track stands out as an unusual listening experience for them.

Edited by Boleros on Tuesday 27th February 01:50

[legzr1]

Boleros said:

Some of my go to tracks when I'm having a session (last one is an album):

Just A Little Lovin' - Shelby Lynne
Come Together (Remastered 2009) - The Beatles
Biscuits - Fink
Blueberry Pancakes - Fink
Asteri Mou - 9bach
Midnight - Coldplay
Make Us Stronger - Ghost Rider
Tin Pan Alley - Stevie Ray Vaughan
Compel - Recondite
John Taylor's Month Away - King Creosote
Stimela (The Coal Train) - Hugh Masekela
Eye In The Wall - Perfume Genius
Dark Day - Blues Company
2049 - Hans Zimmer
Says - Nils Frahm
Northern Skies - Dido
You Better Hide - Yello
Stoney Street - Amon Tobin
Chasing Utopia - xPropaganda
Music For Psychedelic Therapy - Jon Hopkins

Most of these I listen to because I really like them but one or two are in there purely for the production values, Ghost Rider in particular stands out. Not wild about the track itself but it takes you on a journey for sure. The other one is Coldplay's Midnight. I'm not fan of their stuff but this track stands out as an unusual listening experience for them.

Edited by Boleros on Tuesday 27th February 01:50

I had a qobuz playlist from a few years ago playing just last night and quite a few of those tracks appeared!

The two Fink tracks you mention appear on one of my favourite live albums from around 2012 - Fink, Wheels turn beneath my feat. Just a standard 16/44 recording but excellent.

Here’s a few others I added over time to that playlist that may be of interest to you (you probably already have them judging by what you’ve posted):

Miss You - Trentemoller
GoGo Penguin - Humdrum Star
Hannah Peel - Particles in space
Jon Hopkins - Singularity (it looks like ‘immunity’ has been removed from Qobuz - the irony isn’t lost on me…)
Hania Rani - Ghosts, particularly the track 24.03. She also has an EP on Qobuz. Just four or five tracks but they’re good.
And, for a bit of fun (and probably the only one my daughter approves of) Deadmau5 - W:/2016Album/.

[Boleros]

Aye, I think a few of those are staples of any hifi diet! I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with Fink as I find some of his stuff over produced and just too clean sometimes. Some days I love hearing the tip of the drumstick hitting the bell of a cymbal and other times it just annoys me. Daft really.

Cheers for your suggestions, will definitely check some of those out. Singularity was a go to album for a while and I also think I created a Hannah Peel playlist at one point as well. I shall go and check, happy listening!

[donkmeister]

MC Bodge said:

AC43 said:

Bryanwww said:

AC43 said:

Ronstein said:

Anything by Alan Parsons (whether Alan Parsons Project or engineered by AP - Dark Side Of The Moon for instance)
Anything by Jellyfish (sadly only two albums)
Anything by created or re-mixed Steven Wilson (his own material is variable but the production is fantastic)
As others have said, Steely Dan or anything else that has Donald Fagen's obsessive fingers on it.

I've just had the final part of a £1.5k upgrade to my car audio done and almost immediately went to Fagan's New Fontier from his Nightfly album. Amazing production. The album was a vinyl staple demo in hifi shops in the early/mid 80s

Can you upgrade modern car audio systems? I thought with modern integrated headsets upgrading wasn't really a thing anymore

The amp stayed as was but I had the doors dynamat-ed and the stty factory speakers replaced. Also new tweeters. And a hidden sub in the boot.

Huge improvement.

I made a very much less than £1.5K upgrade to my wife's car -new and used parts, modified and fitted myself.

Upgraded door speakers, tweeters, sound deadening in the doors and a small powered sub in the boot.

It sounds surprisingly good now compared to the OEM.

Depending on your definition of modern, but the S2000 has a DIN sized slot and I fitted a half-decent head-unit with *shock* a CD transport as well as one of the flavours of HD Bluetooth. That was along with steering wheel interface, and hands-free microphone (which works surprisingly well even with the roof down at 60mph). In future I might add an amp and upgrade the speakers, but for now Mrs D is happy with it.

Pioneer (and I'm sure others) did model-specific speaker upgrade packages; these were standard drivers that came packaged with whatever bezel and connector adaptor you needed to fit that particular car. I had a blown speaker in a Vauxhall Vectra so spend IIRC £300-400 on a set and it really was a significant improvement over the non-blown speakers too. Unfortunately that made it clear that the head-unit was very obviously a limiting factor so far as quality went.

I did a quick check of the Pioneer website and cannot find any models of car (including the Vectra) where they still show speaker packages so this may have fallen by the wayside now. Perhaps or most people just bought standard drivers and spacers, hence the market was too limited.

[S600BSB]

Hiromi’s latest album - Sonicwonderland - is pretty fabulous from a music/production perspective.

[NDA]

S600BSB said:

Hiromi’s latest album - Sonicwonderland - is pretty fabulous from a music/production perspective.

Oooh!

New to me, many thanks - just listening now. My kind of groove and an immaculate production.

Cheers.

[MightyBadger]

Ozric Tentacles - Pungent Effulgent

https://youtu.be/65Mujnl6gNg?si=uoxQH44naQtl9ypA

[StescoG66]

I shouldn’t like this but loved it - check out Christina Pulhar with L’Arpeggiata - All’Improvviso..... lovely recording

[dickymint]

MightyBadger said:

Ozric Tentacles - Pungent Effulgent

https://youtu.be/65Mujnl6gNg?si=uoxQH44naQtl9ypA

As a huge fan of Gong it was a no brainer that I'd get into the Ozrics especially when Steve Hillage was involved.

Just did a Google and blimey this is on the week after next.........

https://www.ents24.com/cardiff-events/the-globe/oz...

[NDA]

dickymint said:

As a huge fan of Gong it was a no brainer that I'd get into the Ozrics especially when Steve Hillage was involved.

I was 16 when Motivation Radio came out, it was weird and lovely. I must have played 'Radio' off that album a million times, still love it.

[dickymint]

NDA said:

dickymint said:

As a huge fan of Gong it was a no brainer that I'd get into the Ozrics especially when Steve Hillage was involved.

I was 16 when Motivation Radio came out, it was weird and lovely. I must have played 'Radio' off that album a million times, still love it.

Damn you I'm in for a very late night now Steve 'Hillfish' one of the most underrated guitar players ever.........


https://youtu.be/ScF_2Vz8gC4

[NDA]

Colour off the album Colour by Pete Josef... not high def, but nicely done all the same.

An interesting artist, 'Many Signs' off the same album is good too. An R&B/Jazz vibe.