Best Mastered CD's

As audio fanatics we can appreciate a well recorded and mastered cd, free of perceptable distortions. Please list your favorites, eher are a few off the top of my head:

Steely Dan: Aja, Gaucho, Two Against Nature
Donald Fagan: The Nightfly, Morph the Cat
James Taylor: October Road, Hourglass
Dan Fogelberg: No Resemblance Whatsoever, The Wild Places
Joe Jackson: Body and Soul
Supertramp: Even in the Quietest Moments
The Who: Quadrophenia
Dire Straits: Brothers in Arms

This post has been edited by Affordable$$Audio on September 10, 2007 03:20 pm

the latest from Steely Dan, "Everything Must Go" sounds every bit as good as "Two Against Nature". a few others;

Elton John - "Honky Chateau", "Captain Fantastic & the Brown Dirt Cowboy"
Peter Gabriel - "Peter Gabriel" (1st solo album, others too but i like this one best)
Genesis - "Trick of the Tail"
Bela Fleck & The Flecktones - "Flight of the Cosmic Hippo"
The Police - "Message in a Box, The Complete Recordings"

last but not least, my sleeper pick:
The Carpenters - "The Carpenters 30th Anniversary" - gloriously mastered by Richard himself.

Mark Knopfler- Sailing to Philadelphia- Shangra-La
David Gilmour-On An Island
JJ Cale, Eric Clapton-The Road To Escondido
Blackmore's Night-The Village Lantern

I don't have any CD"s to add. but with the compact disc now 25 yrs old.. it's sad really to think that of the millions of CD's released in those 25 yrs that the list of really good mastered CD's is so small.

I myself can only think of a handful of them.

Why don't studios take more care in mastering a CD to a higher standard?

This is why. Not a very good reason, but the reason nonetheless.

This is why. Not a very good reason, but the reason nonetheless.

Very interesting reading.

Thank you, Clarke.

Jorge

Live at Leeds by The Who - a double cd with all the Tommy live and re-mastered by Pete Townshend.

...but, we have an interesting topic about this subject :Loudness Wars, Everything Louder Than Everything Else

I'll agree with Bela Fleck & The Flecktones - "Flight of the Cosmic Hippo", and The who- "Quadrophenia".

There's also a few MMW (Medeski, Martin & Wood) CDs too- one with a red cover, I can't recall the name, but I seem to recall the CD sounded great.

From my limited listening area of the last few years, I'll throw in a few more, with rights to extract 'em at a later date if I change my mind-

Nick Cave- Murder Ballads, and some of the Johnny Cash- "American XXX" CDs.

Holly cole- "Temptation".

Neko Case- "Fox Confessor Brings the Flood", and a few more.

I'll argue most of Tom Waits CDs are well done.

I have dozens of CD's from both David Arkenstone and Acoustic Alchemy, as well as many more from Foreplay, Dave Gruisin and Andy Narrell. As none of this material was ever released on LP, no comparisons can be made between the two formats, but just about all sound pretty good with some "outstanding" comments valid for the Fourplay, Arkenstone and Acoustic Alchemy discs.

More important, at least in my opinion, is the remarkable mastering done by Telarc on its many outstanding classical recordings. The former president and chief recording engineer, Jack Renner, knew how to use the digital medium, and his work shows it - rarely is there the "steely" sound of strings, or the harsh, "in-your-face" closeup feel of many other recordings. Jack is no longer with Telarc, but those whom he mentored are, and they are basically following in his footsteps.

I own well over 100 Telarc discs, and have to say that the best sounding of all is that of Vaughan Williams, "A Sea Symphony." Mastering was done by one of Jack's proteges, but it's the finest sounding CD I own, bar none. Anyone who thinks that CD's simply cannot ever sound good really owes it to himself to check out this recording. The orchestra sounds lush, clear, full, and above all realistic, and the chorus sounds better than any recorded chorus I've ever heard. That's saying a lot, I know, but this disc merits all such accolades.

I´ll second Emaidel´s opinions.

Unfortunately I´ve only got a handfull of Telarcs, but they all sound awesome.

If all CD´s sounded like Telarcs I would have given up on vinyl a long time ago.

Jorge

I've been trying to edit my post for a while now, but haven't been able to. Problems with the server, I guess. I wanted to say that the orchestra sounded, "above all, realistic." Maybe I'll get a chance to do that someday...

Telarc has a disc entitled, "California Dreamin'" by a group named Pappa Doo Run Run, who sound amazingly like the Beach Boys. Anyone who wants to hear how Telarc recording techniques can be applied to a very different form of music needs to check out this disc too. The bass alone will knock your socks off!

A few more well mastered cd's :

Debut by Bjork.

Elephant by White Stripes.

Painted From Memory by Elvis Costello With Burt Bacharach.

Punishing Kiss by Ute Lemper.

Mundo by Rodrigo Leão.

forgot about this one so i thought i should put it on, phenomenal.
The Cars - "Just What I Needed - The Cars Anthology"

I have to give props to just about anything by the Cowboy Junkies. All of them that I've heard sound just magnificent.

Open
The Trinity Sessions
One Soul Now
Early 21st Century Blues
Miles From Our Home
Lay It Down

But I have to consider Sarah McLachlan's Surfacing as good enough to be my system's demonstration/test disc... as well as a treat for my ears.

This post has been edited by OvenMaster on September 13, 2007 09:23 pm

Ed,

I just did. Hope its Ok with you.

Jorge