The "Absolute, Bar None, No Holds Barred, Best Recording You Own" thread (1 Viewer)

[Brian L]

Title says it all.

Here's your chance to let the world know what you consider to be the absolute best sound quality recording that you own. Lets assume that aliens have landed, and you want to show off your rig and give them a little insight into our hobby.

Its well known that audiophiles will sometimes place greater importance on the recording quality than the performance, but sometimes the two intersect (pretty rarely, IMHO, but it does happen on occasion).

Format (CD, SACD, DVD-A, Vinyl, Stereo or MC) is unimportant, nor is the genre.

But the catch is, you can only list ONE recording; no sub species or "Best Rock", or "Best classical"...ONE choice.

And because I am a wuss, I have not yet decided which of my recordings I would nominate, but given what I presently own, its even money that it will be a DVD-A or perhaps an SACD.

So what's the point? Well, for purely selfish reasons, I hope to learn about great sounding recordings that I may never have known about, and maybe even some genres that I would not normally explore.

So, with that said, talk amongst yourselves...

BGL

 

[JordanS]

Roger Waters "Amused to Death"

 

[Angelo.M]

Jennifer Warnes' Famous Blue Raincoat

From Amazon.com:

This album's worth of Leonard Cohen tunes was originally released in 1987. It remains as an audiophile's dream, as the recording is generally regarded as one of the best engineered ever. Many cite this disc as a benchmark to really put a stereo system to the test. Not to mention the fact that the performance is brilliant. Features the guitar work of the late Stevie Ray Vaughan & includes the Cohen staples 'Bird on a Wire', 'Joan of Arc (with L.C. on the guest vocal), and seven others.

Personally, I'm not a huge fan of Warnes' voice, but it's a spectacular recording.

 

[Lewis Besze]

John Mc Laughlinromise[cd]

 

[MatS]

Flaming Lips "Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots" dvda
but I would assume that the aliens have heard it already

 

[Andrew_Sch]

I can't decide between "And Justice For All..." and "All Things Must Pass."

 

[Rachael B]

I own too many recordings to say, really. If I picked 3, they'd proably all be vinyl. They'd all be 12" singles and could be 33 1/3 or 45 RPM. I don't have too many DVD-A's and SACD's that compete all that well with vinyl.

 

[Kevin C Brown]

Brian- Ya gonna make me pick one lp from the 500 odd that I still have? Can't do it!

I do have 4 SACDs and 2 DVD-As, and Dark Side of the Moon ain't bad.

 

[ThomasC]

San Francisco Symphony - Mahler's Symphony No. 1 (SACD)

 

[Brian Perry]

Round Up (a collection of Western theme songs) by Telarc

 

[Charles Gurganus]

Tales of Mystery and Imagination- Alan Parsons Project Century LP

 

[Lee Scoggins]

Alison Krauss and Union Station: Live

Boy it's tough narrowing it down to one.

 

[chung_sotheby]

Yeah, that one and DSOTM are probably my two favorite digital recordings. Both sound fantastic

As for ALL recordings, I have a few of the MFSL Beatles albums, and they are AMAZING! I don't know if it gets ay better than listening to Abbey Rd. through a good vinyl righ (which I believe/hope I have ). Though, they do say it's getting better all the time...

I have started my vinyl collection again, and have about 700-800 albums, about twice what my CD collection is (not including MP3's). Can't wait to start cleaning all of them to really get the sound out of those grooves, and who knows, maybe my old, dusty copy of Led Zeppeling III will become my new favorite best recording.

 

[TomCW]

Not just to be different, but as AK+US has been mentioned, I will pick 'David Elias - The Window'. You may not like the music (although I can't imagine that), but you can't fault the sonics.
As for you vinyl folks... records can sound great, but are just too much hassle for me. I do kinda miss picking which side to play first, but other than that I've never looked back.

Tom

 

[ChrisDixon]

CD - Roger Waters: Amused to Death and Steely Dan: Two Against Nature (tie - can't decide)

DVD-A - Porcupine Tree: In Absentia

Chris

 

[Brian L]

More like IMPOSSIBLE.

Great suggestions thus far. As suspected, some music and genres are nominated that I tend to NOT be exposed to.

Right now, for my choice (subject to change on a whim) I am inclined to go with a mint, US vinyl copy of Dire Straits "Love Over Gold". This LP got me back into vinyl after a +10 year absence. I went out and bought the newest remastered CD, and while it too sounds very, very good, the highs on the LP just sound soooo smooth. That may well be because the LP is rolled off compared to the Cee Dee, but be that as it may, I find I can crank the LP as loud as I dare and it just sounds better and better. With the cee dee, up to a point its fine (and perhaps exceeds the LP in terms of crispness), but at increasing volume, the highs seem to sound a bit harsh.

If I could somehow get the LP to be as clean and quiet as the CD, I would never leave the house!

BGL

 

[KevinJ]

crosby&nash[new cd]...the sound quality on this disc is amazing[at least through my headphones]

 

[DavidLW]

Cowboy Junkies - Trinity Session (vinyl of course!)

 

[Seth--L]

Bruckner: Symphony No.8 - Boulez/VPO; DG

 

[Gregg Z]

Mark Levinson "Live Recordings at Red Rose Music Vol 1." Stereo SACD. One of, if not the, top demonstration discs of what SACD is truly capable of.

This disc is the result of experimentation (nice way of saying "farting around with some new technology"). It is a series of live sessions done at the Red Rose store in NYC. The mic was plugged straight into the DSD encoder and the output transfered to disc. No mixing, no editing, no takes. Truly pure DSD.