Favorite Acoustic Recordings

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tkingen

Djembes Rock
What's your favorite acoustic music mainstream mixes? Here's what's in my cd changer right now:

Maria Muldaur, Richland Woman Blues - gorgeous, full mix with detail and presence on instruments and vocals.

Tony Rice, Church Street Blues - this disc captures his perfect right hand crosspicking technique. A soothing recording and during solo sections you can hear him taking breaths.

Leo Kottke, One Guitar No Vocals - Captures Leo perfectly. Seems that I remember reading that he used a pair of Schoeps mics.

Arlen Roth, Drive it on Home – captures some very intimate playing from Arlen after his wife and daughter were killed in a car accident. I’m not as much of a fan of the “chops” oriented tracks, but that’s just personal taste. The recording, mixing and mastering are stellar.

Miles Davis, Birth of the Cool – the recording may not be as pristine as current recordings, but it was done over fifty years ago so you have to take that in context. It’s a piece of musical history and changed the way jazz is viewed.

Anyone else have favorites?

Terry
 
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Listening to a lot of Elliot Smith. The eponymous album and either or. There's some realy nice bottom end to be had there for someone who recorded the albums with a bog standard yamaha.
 
tkingen said:
What's your favorite acoustic music mainstream mixes? Here's what's in my cd changer right now:

Leo Kottke, One Guitar No Vocals - Captures Leo perfectly. Seems that I remember reading that he used a pair of Schoeps mics.
Click to expand...

That's a really nice album although I always like to hear Leo Kotke's voice! He used to describe it as something like a goose fart on a muggy day! I still get a kick out of his early stuff, especially 6&12 String Guitar and Greenhouse. And if you have a multidisk changer, you really should throw on a John Fahey album next to the Kotke stuff.

Other good acoustic stuff: Joni Michell's Blue album (some nice open tunings and even a dulcimer), Robyn Hitchcock's Eye or newer stuff like Luxor, just about anything by Doc Watson, Gillian Welch's Revelator, Eutaw by the Old Crow Medicine Show, and something by Bright Eyes--maybe I'm Wide Awake and It's Morning.
 
acoustic

Check out Pink Moon by Nick Drake. GREAT acoustic album from early 70's.
 
Jules Shear Unplug This (he is the guy that started MTV's unplugged)
 
I listen to a lot of acoustic-based music. It's often hard for me to discern between albums I like due to great songwriting vs. quality recordings. Here are a few of my faves (and I use all of them as reference mixes for my own recordings):

Nick Drake -- Five Leaves Left. Somewhat noisy analog recording and the vocals are distorted, but the arrangements are perfect, as is Nick's playing.

Freedy Johnston -- This Perfect World. Just about as good a melacholy pop record as I can think of. The acoustic is good, but the electric lead playing is phenomenally tasteful.

Duncan Sheik -- Duncan Sheik. Another really well done pop album. Some may say it's too slickly produced, but I love it.

Elliott Smith -- XO. All his albums are just stellar, but this one has, imo, the best mix of great songs with good production value.

The Decemberists -- Castaways and Cutouts. Again, all their stuff is great, but this is my personal fave.

Rhett Miller -- The Instigator. This one has some heavy handed limiting, but still holds together well.

The Pernice Brothers -- Yours, Mine & Ours. Get all of them. You won't regret it.
 
big fan of I can make a mess ike nobody's business, not all acoustic but it sounds so good to my ears anyway

others include

bright eyes-fevers and mirrors
lots of bob dylan's stuff
most simon and garfunkel
the shins stuff is pretty cool too
 
Nick Drake, Eliott Smith, The Decemberists... among my favorites.
The shins i'm sort of undecided about. They went for a really raw sound which is awesome for a lot of bands, but i dont know if it was the best thing for their music or not. I do like them though.
Bright eyes.... ehh... i used to be huge fan, for some reason i had a change of heart and just view him as whiny, and the only mixes i think are good from him are on Lifted.
 
Raul Midon - "State of Mind". He is a new singer\guitarist that has a cool accoustic jazz\latin kind of flavor.
 
This one comes to mind... Joe Pass and Ella Fitzgerald, Together Again. Pass plays unamplified nylon string, fingerstyle throughought.

Tim
 
James Taylors "something in the way she moves" from 1967. Perfect
 
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I like the acoustic sound on Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and the acoustic sound on Nirvana's "Polly" on Nevermind.
 
Rocky Mountain High - John Denver. Every song on the record is amazing. It's probably the one CD that even people who can't stand John Denver will really appreciate. Has a cool cover of Mother Nature's Son, and well, a bunch of other perfect acoustic songs, with great picking and great recording.
 
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Most of the albums I listen to are mostly acoustic guitars with sprinkles of electric in there now and then...Here's my list...

Jack Johnson: Brushfire Fairytails
Beautiful Girls: Learn Yourself
Ben Harper: Welcome to the Cruel World
Bob Schneider: Lonelyland
Dave Matthews Band: Under the Table Dreaming/Crash
Elliott Smith: Everything he's got
Led Zepplin: III
The Frames: Dance The Devil/Fitzcarraldo
Jimmy Buffet: Just about anything
Xavier Rudd: Solace
 
Goo Goo Dolls... 'Iris' ... acoustic in the left channel at the very beginning of the song is marvelous... It actually sounds like wood! :D

EDIT: It is a custom-made Guild Acoustic with a fishman pickup running into a demeter DI ($$$). Sounds amazing tho.
 
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