Great audiophile recordings/albums

I'll add a few: "Hands" (that came out recently) Dave Holland and Pepe Habichuela. Spacious and natural.
The original "Fourplay" 1991 Warner Very dynamic and pleasant studio recording
Steely Dan "Two against nature" absolutely their best and brilliantly recorded.
Dave Crusin "Discovered again" Sheffield remaster. Not as good as the original vinyl, no, but still warm and somehow very inviting. Beautiful record actually.
 
I'll add a few: "Hands" (that came out recently) Dave Holland and Pepe Habichuela. Spacious and natural.
The original "Fourplay" 1991 Warner Very dynamic and pleasant studio recording
Steely Dan "Two against nature" absolutely their best and brilliantly recorded.
Dave Crusin "Discovered again" Sheffield remaster. Not as good as the original vinyl, no, but still warm and somehow very inviting. Beautiful record actually.

Do you have the first Fourplay album on vinyl?
 
The Fourplay albums (I have a few) are indeed pleasant and well done. I find that they have a characteristic sonic signature though, with the bass and some other frequencies a little exagerated. I wouldn't use those as reference recordings, although the heavy bass can - indeed - be good to run some tests and detect bass response defects of the home system.

Chris.
 
I find his name in a lot of well-produced albums as the mastering or re-mastering chap. I think all my Dire Straits albums have his name, and they are some of the best-sounding, most smooth-sounding (I think people call it "analog sounding") CDs of rock that I've heard. I think he also did the recent Abkco SACD releases of the Stones albums. Is his involvement a sign that one should pick up an unfamiliar album to try out?

My anwer to this is yes if you are looking for great SOUND(you may or may not like the content). Bud Ludwig is one of the finest mastering engineers in the business, and a personal friend of mine. Bob Katz, Doug Sax, Bernie Grundman, and Bob Ludwig are all mastering engineers I have worked with, and their work is second to none.
 
While I have a list as long as the distance from San Francisco to Los Angeles, my current favorite audiophile recording is the Mahler series with Claddio Abbado and the Lucern Festival orchestra on Bluray disc. It is in full 5.1 surround which effectively captures this rather large orchestra in the wonderful sounding Lucern Festival concert hall.
 
Could this thread be made a sticky? It seems to have evolved well.

I'd also like to add my own favourite:
Dead Can Dance - Live Dublin 03-10-2005

@freax - This sounds like an absolute gem. Too bad it's not available on iTunes or Amazon (USA). Added to my discovery list regardless.

Rare limited edition two-CD set, printed CD-R only? I'm a big fan of Spirit Chaser and Toward The Within.

Recently attended their live show in Austin, Texas and they opened with this epic tune: "Children of the Sun."
 
Hi.
Give this one a try, good performance on stage. but too a very good
soundrecording. On violin Midori Seiler.
 

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Thanks Zeptoplix, I understand. Here are a few cd's (that haven't been already mentioned) that I tend to gravitate toward whenever I build/buy a new piece of equipment or change my system; Sven Grunberg: Prana Symphony, Milarepa Lou Reed: Magic and Loss Tuck & Patti (any, Windham Hill) Chris Isaak: SanFrancisco Days The Orb (any) Bill Frisell (any) Dead Man Walking soundtrack John Fahey (any, on Vanguard)
 
These days many recordings are compressed so much as to severely affect the sound quality.
The stuff I heard by Green Day is a good example, 'American Idiot' is so compressed it is unlistenable. I had to delete it from my itunes folder as it is painful to the ears, especially when played loud.
Horrible, just horrible…

On the other hand I have never come across a recording which was unlistenable due to too much dynamic range. Not necessarily ideal for background music but never unlistenable.