52 Essential Albums for Audiophiles

steveledzep

ICBM said:

steveledzep said:

I have an early copy of TB I and the recording quality is poor.

It's so long since I heard an original vinyl copy that I can't comment on that.

TB2 on CD really made my ears prick up when I first heard it - there's some high-frequency content in particular that's just magical. You can get an idea of it even over Youtube...

Thank you for that.  I can't play it through my hifi, but I have tidy Quad speakers on the PC and yes, sounds very good indeed.  For such a milestone release (first record on the Virgin label), the SQ on TB I is so very poor.

RustySpanner

When visiting 'Flat Earth' Linn/Naim dealers in the 80's,  I developed a love for Clive Gregson and Christine Collister and a deep distrust of the fundamentalists who preached the gospel of Ivor and Julian. 

I settled on Rega for turntables,  Marantz for amps, Technics for CD and  initially Royd, then Tannoy for speakers. 

There is definitely a huge difference between good gear and bad gear, just as there is between good and bad production. 

The only thing you can do is trust your ears. 
If a system or a recording can reproduce well recorded voices,  solo violin, piano or a brass band  with some accuracy it's  likely to do most things well. 

It's amazing how how many so called 'High end' systems cannot. 

steveledzep

RustySpanner said:

When visiting 'Flat Earth' Linn/Naim dealers in the 80's,  I developed a love for Clive Gregson and Christine Collister and a deep distrust of the fundamentalists who preached the gospel of Ivor and Julian. 

I settled on Rega for turntables,  Marantz for amps, Technics for CD and  initially Royd, then Tannoy for speakers. 

There is definitely a huge difference between good gear and bad gear, just as there is between good and bad production. 

The only thing you can do is trust your ears. 
If a system or a recording can reproduce well recorded voices,  solo violin, piano or a brass band  with some accuracy it's  likely to do most things well. 

It's amazing how how many so called 'High end' systems cannot. 

I agree !  No Linn or Naim in my kit.  Michell, Roksan, Ortofon, Musical Fidelity and Piega.  I trust my ears too.
Unfortunately, as you say, it cannot compensate for poor production at source.  Often frustrating.

mburekenge

Personally i prefer an atmospheric, flawed recording with character than a glossy super shiny sound 90% of the time. Love oversaturated tape, bleed etc

fretmeister

At least half of those albums aren't essential listening for anyone, ever, for any reason.

Do some people really buy albums for the production and not the songs?
That's just missing the point.

JezWynd

fretmeister said:

At least half of those albums aren't essential listening for anyone, ever, for any reason.

Do some people really buy albums for the production and not the songs?
That's just missing the point.

When you've blown 20k on speaker cable, you have to justify it somehow.

steveledzep

JezWynd said:

fretmeister said:

At least half of those albums aren't essential listening for anyone, ever, for any reason.

Do some people really buy albums for the production and not the songs?
That's just missing the point.

When you've blown 20k on speaker cable, you have to justify it somehow.

My 2m pair of Mogami speaker cables cost me less than thirty quid !

HAL9000

Wasn’t Damn The Torpedoes recorded in Tom Petty’s living room (complete with the occasional voices in the background)? And that’s still more essential than the majority of albums in that list.

steveledzep

One of my favourite LPs is "Grand Funk", the debut from Grand Funk Railroad recorded on Chrysalis in 1969.  It sounds as if the recording engineer has said "OK, drummer in the middle, bassist you stand there on the left and you lead guitar, you stand there".  "Right, I'm going to turn the tape machine on now, so count yourselves in and let's get this done".  It sounds as raw as that and that's to its credit.  There is some stereo panning, but I imagine the engineer had a balance control knob !

richardhomer

The Blue Nile’s ‘A Walk Across the Rooftops’ probably should have been in there - along with any (or all) of the last three Talk Talk albums....

AlexC

That site for me won’t let me view the article unless “I answer some questions” as a pop up floats around my screen. I’m on an iPad using Safari.
Anyway - I’m sure it’s an excellent article.

ICBM

I would also say that Crowded House’s Together Alone is an astonishing sounding album... but it’s still less important than the quality of the songwriting.

not_the_dj

HAL9000 said:

Wasn’t Damn The Torpedoes recorded in Tom Petty’s living room (complete with the occasional voices in the background)? And that’s still more essential than the majority of albums in that list.

It was recorded at Sound City!

TheMarlin

I have two Rega Turntables, one stock, one highly upgraded. Both into a Schits Mani step up amp. 

Very low capacitance system. British built NVA passive P90SA pre amp, and NVA power amp. NVA Sound Pipe Interconnects, NVA LS5 speaker cable, Tannoy monitors, Sony SACD CD Player into a very lovely DAC  Apple TV 3 into Toppings D30 DAC for streaming audio. 

May upgrade the power amp to monoblocks next summer. Though, would also like to go back to valve amp, so might get a Radford STA25 MK 5. 

TheMarlin

EricTheWeary said:

I own one of them, although have quite a few tracks off others in compilations. 
I feel it's albums they've bought in the last two years plus a bunch of old, obvious stuff. 

I'm sure I'm not an audiophile at all but I think I'd have a stab at JD McPherson's Undivided Heart and Soul as for a rock record it is ( or cleverly appears to be) the sound of a few instruments well recorded with minimum overdubs. 

Signs and Signifiers is also pretty great. I do like a bit do JD McPherson. North Side Gal was a brilliant single.  Even Radio 2 played it a few times. 

EricTheWeary

TheMarlin said:

EricTheWeary said:

I own one of them, although have quite a few tracks off others in compilations. 
I feel it's albums they've bought in the last two years plus a bunch of old, obvious stuff. 

I'm sure I'm not an audiophile at all but I think I'd have a stab at JD McPherson's Undivided Heart and Soul as for a rock record it is ( or cleverly appears to be) the sound of a few instruments well recorded with minimum overdubs. 

Signs and Signifiers is also pretty great. I do like a bit do JD McPherson. North Side Gal was a brilliant single.  Even Radio 2 played it a few times. 

I even like the Christmas album Socks. Undivided came to mind for this Discussion as I remember putting it on and it was the sound of a singer, a guitar, a bass, some drums - simple done well ( I’m sounding like Gregg Wallace now...). 

richardhomer

robgilmo said:

And why isnt ''Love over Gold'' in there? Brothers in arms even?

Love Over Gold is a great analogue recording - I’ve heard it used in the last couple of years at a hi fi show to demo Spendor speakers. 

MagicPigDetective

In know they’re mainly made of samples but The Orb’s first two albums are incredible stereo audio experiences. 

Funkfingers

Hugh Robjohns of Sound On Sound magazine professes to auditioning audio systems by spinning The Nightfly by Donald Fagen. Whatever you think of the music content, Robjohns is right on the money as far as the audio quality and rendering of "conventional" rock/pop instruments is concerned. 

Nitefly

Funkfingers said:

Hugh Robjohns of Sound On Sound magazine professes to auditioning audio systems by spinning The Nightfly by Donald Fagen. Whatever you think of the music content, Robjohns is right on the money as far as the audio quality and rendering of "conventional" rock/pop instruments is concerned. 

One of my favourite albums ever.

If only I could spell...