Best Sounding Album of all time

  • Thread starter Thread starter Tim Walker
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I agree about overproduction. One of the things that rubs me the wrong way sometimes is how "produced" soundging (and by that I mean sterile and inhuman) a lot of pop and R&B stuff sounds.

It's funny, because I think that's one of the dangerous things about home recording, too. You can spend a year reworking something until you've beaten every last little drop of humanity out of it.

I used to love the live Misfits stuff when I was younger, and frankly, those recordings sounded aweful. In the end, in the big picture, being well-engineered is pretty irrelavant, if the material sucks.

And it's debatable whether great material can survive being beaten into a perfectly executed machine-like "product."

As you've often read, i'm sure, the heirarchy goes like this:

The Song
The Performance
The Engineering
 
mshilarious said:
That album does kick ass, even if it didn't win a Grammy for engineering :cool:
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Was that 14 distortion pedals chained together for the lead tone? :rolleyes:

........groundbreaking :cool:
 
Ok Computer by radiohead, as well as Pinkerton by Weezer. I really love the live sound of the Pinkerton album, although it is very rough.
 
Im gonna go for the album im listening to right now - Sgt Pepper.

The arrangments are just stunning. I dont know if the songs or what but the whole FEEL of it is concise, a perfect snapshot of sound. Im not sure how much is the songs themselves or the production but it just gets me everytime. Its like being transported to another place.
 
Confessions . . .

I heard "Armageddon It" on the way home. Cheesy '80s drums; vocals oversmoothed, but dammit that song has a nice sheen :D

Gimmie all of your lovin'
Gimmie all that you got
 
SouthSIDE Glen said:
I think that question is somewhat academic. It's like asking if today's New York Yankees are better atheletes than the Yankees of DiMaggio, Mantle and Ruth's day. It's not a fair question because the playing fields (figuratively, if not literally) are not the same.

However, Alan Parsons, who was an engineer on Abby Road, is one of the great engineers of the last 30 years, no question. He also had a hand in Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon." You'd be OK to pick Abbey Road. I had both that and Parsons' own "Turn of a Friendly Card" as finalists in my decision.

G.
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Yeah, I understand what you are saying. I mean, you know, fair or not, is it considered on a par with the best of today? Does it still rival awesomely produced contemporary albums? I suppose it does.
 
Monkey Allen said:
Yeah, I understand what you are saying. I mean, you know, fair or not, is it considered on a par with the best of today? Does it still rival awesomely produced contemporary albums? I suppose it does.
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I'd personally have to say yes.

Although I personally could go the rest of my life without hearing another Beatles tune and it would probably be too soon, that's not the fault of the Beatles, Alan Parsons or George Martin. I just tend to get tired of songs after the first 17 million listenings. ;)

But that doesn't take away from the fact that Abbey Road is sonically a pleasure to listen to four decades after it's release, and that the engineering and production itself does not sound "dated", even if the music has been run into the ground.

Yes, today's Big Boys have the advantage of 128 track, 192k digital editing and processing behind converters alone that cost as much as my automobile that they did not even dream of back then, so the sonic quality of todays best is going to be superior. Perhaps that makes the results of albums like "Abbey Road" (or my choice, "Back To Back") that much more incredible.

The classic Yankees did it without multi-million dollar contracts, steroids, scientific training programs or Gatorade too.

G.
 
Water Sucks! Gatorade is Better...

I like the Steely Dan album... Dark Side of the Moon... Dr. Dre The Chronic.... and Mechanical Animals....
 
Sorry, but I got to do it:

It's a toss up between Pink Floyd: Dark Side of the Moon

and Nine Inch Nails: The Fragile

Dark Side of the Moon: It just "takes you somewhere"... on a journey. The production is perfect for the mood and the songs ALL totally rock! It's short and sweet!

The Fragile: I can't believe the production on this one... and it's 2 albums long! Holy crap! It really is a modern masterpiece that has been overlooked because no one song really stands out on it in a "hit" sort of way. All the songs are totally solid though, and the clarity with that sort of density makes me want to quit mixing.
 
Hmmm, This is tough...

I'd say the two that still blow my mind, after hundreds of listenings, are Tool's Aenima, and A Perfect Circle's Mer de Noms.

Aenima, to me, is what a mix should be. Every single time I listen to it on headphones, I hear something new, no joke. The panning is amazingly innovative, with guitars going from stereo in the verses to mono during choruses (Now, who the hell does that :D ), and the bass going wherever the hell it feels like. It's got quiet, loud, and everything inbetween, plus some craaaazy backing vocals that you don't hear at first. The drums sound kickass, and everyone in the band knows when NOT to be in the front of the mix.

Mer de Noms, on the other hand, is straightfoward, but it still sounds better than everything else. I can't get over how sweet the bass is, it fills up the soundstage without being overpowering. The high end is crisp, not brittle, and the overall balance kicks ass.
 
I'd have to personally go with the Jesus Lizard's Goat LP.
 
Fireal402 said:
Hmmm, This is tough...

I'd say the two that still blow my mind, after hundreds of listenings, are Tool's Aenima, and A Perfect Circle's Mer de Noms.

Aenima, to me, is what a mix should be. Every single time I listen to it on headphones, I hear something new, no joke. The panning is amazingly innovative, with guitars going from stereo in the verses to mono during choruses (Now, who the hell does that :D ), and the bass going wherever the hell it feels like. It's got quiet, loud, and everything inbetween, plus some craaaazy backing vocals that you don't hear at first. The drums sound kickass, and everyone in the band knows when NOT to be in the front of the mix.

Mer de Noms, on the other hand, is straightfoward, but it still sounds better than everything else. I can't get over how sweet the bass is, it fills up the soundstage without being overpowering. The high end is crisp, not brittle, and the overall balance kicks ass.
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Good stuff Fireal402. You are someone that can spot great mixing. I agre with every word you said man. But listen to 13th step by A Perfect Circle as that is a work of art. Alot more complicated than Mer de noms, but the production and mixing is pure genius.
I aint too sure about the mono guitars in Tool at the choruses. But it is something away from the norm which people need to be doing so that mixes soon dont all sound generic and clones of others.
I love on one of the songs on Tool where the vocal backing is echoed and comes in and out of the mix at the exact right times and is also panned to perfection in relation to the volume automation.
Ohhh. Who mixed Tool anyway?
Andy Wallace is fekin god.
 
I think I'd have to go with Pink Floyd The Wall.
It just sounds so damn good.
 
Anyone know of Outkast? Everytime one of their songs comes on in WMP shuffle it blazes out of the speakers. It sounds really clean and well recorded. It's loud anyway. Anyone have an opinion on their expertise in recording?
 
godrich...

i think anything nigel godrich does is very good...all of the radiohead albums since the bends have been produced/mixed by him. he also did a really great job on that beck album from a few years ago. him or eno...they do great jobs, i think my favorite is Kid A...
 
OK Computer - Radiohead
XO - Elliott Smith
Kind of Blue - Miles Davis

Not necessarily the "best" sounding, but I like the way they sound, the style of the sound.
 
I hate to say it, but Michael Jackson's 'Don't Stop Til You Get Enough', I have heard, is the greatest produced song of all time. It sure does have a good sound.
 
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