Here are a few more ideas, some are DVDs but there is software to rip the music and burn to disc. The Bryan Ferry DVD features an absolutely stunning band, the Pete Townshend band is pretty special too, with David Gilmour on guitar.
Peter Townshend's Deep End Live DVD
Bryan Ferry Live in Lyons DVD
Rough Mix Pete Townshend and Ronnie Lane
Paul McCartney Live at the Cavern DVD (also with David Gilmour)
Leonardo's Bride Angel Blood
Cyndi Lauper Memphis Album
Kate Bush Hounds of Love or Aerial
Sam Brown Stop or 43 Minutes
Heart Greatest Hits Live or Ann Wilson Live DVD
Nirvana Unplugged
Garbage Anthology
Jimi Hendrix Band of Gypsys
Powderfinger Odyssey #5
Lucinda Williams Live
Robin Trower Live 1973
Something for Kate Echolalia
Eric Clapton From the Cradle
Jon Lord Pictured Within
Pretenders Isle of View Unplugged
Faces A Nod's as Good as a Wink to a Blind Horse
Rod Stewart Every Picture Tells a Story
These are regular stars on our CD player; add to this almost anything by the Beatles, Hendrix, Kate Bush, Sarah McLachlan, The Band, Faces or Pink Floyd. Don't overlook compilations, either: "I am Sam" soundtrack has some great Beatles covers, for example; Standing in the Shadows of Motown is excellent.
Happy exploring!
Geoff
Peter Townshend's Deep End Live DVD
Bryan Ferry Live in Lyons DVD
Rough Mix Pete Townshend and Ronnie Lane
Paul McCartney Live at the Cavern DVD (also with David Gilmour)
Leonardo's Bride Angel Blood
Cyndi Lauper Memphis Album
Kate Bush Hounds of Love or Aerial
Sam Brown Stop or 43 Minutes
Heart Greatest Hits Live or Ann Wilson Live DVD
Nirvana Unplugged
Garbage Anthology
Jimi Hendrix Band of Gypsys
Powderfinger Odyssey #5
Lucinda Williams Live
Robin Trower Live 1973
Something for Kate Echolalia
Eric Clapton From the Cradle
Jon Lord Pictured Within
Pretenders Isle of View Unplugged
Faces A Nod's as Good as a Wink to a Blind Horse
Rod Stewart Every Picture Tells a Story
These are regular stars on our CD player; add to this almost anything by the Beatles, Hendrix, Kate Bush, Sarah McLachlan, The Band, Faces or Pink Floyd. Don't overlook compilations, either: "I am Sam" soundtrack has some great Beatles covers, for example; Standing in the Shadows of Motown is excellent.
Happy exploring!
Geoff
Thank you. I have a question about the quality of live recordings, is there a wide variation? I have a Diana Krall live in Paris CD and it sounds great.
What I am also finding is that I have shifting music tastes. At one time my favourite was a "Curves Ahead" by the Rippingtons.
Right now playing - Boston - Third Stage, Lisa Stansfield - Affection - streaming service, downloaded mp3 from streaming service and various artists on You Tube including SEAL - SEAL of which there is what seems to be a high quality recording.
Anyone use You Tube?
What I am also finding is that I have shifting music tastes. At one time my favourite was a "Curves Ahead" by the Rippingtons.
Right now playing - Boston - Third Stage, Lisa Stansfield - Affection - streaming service, downloaded mp3 from streaming service and various artists on You Tube including SEAL - SEAL of which there is what seems to be a high quality recording.
Anyone use You Tube?
There is naturally a large variation in the quality of live recordings in , from awful (e.g. Beatles in Hamburg, any number of bootlegs by various artists) to excellent, such as Rock of Ages, Concert for George, or Deep Purple's Made in Japan. The Diana Krall album sounds great.
However, the music itself is more important than the quality of the recording: Band of Gypsys, no matter which mix, has a rather dull sound compared to Live at Winterland but 'Machine Gun' is perhaps Hendrix' greatest track and you wouldn't wish to miss out on that. Same goes for Dylan's Basement Tapes, his live shows from 1966 or Miles Davis 'Birth of the Cool' from 1951.
The Beatles' Hamburg tracks, in mono and recorded from what might be the toilet, have a fantastic energy, with bum notes and swearing adding to the experience. Hearing Rachmaninov playing his own works is treasurable, even with harsh and bass-shy sound.
There are of course some issues with alleged 'live' albums where the artist(s) have overdubbed or re-recorded some of the material; sometimes this works and doesn't sound too phony, other times, bleah.
It's years since I went to rock concerts, but almost without exception the sound was average at best, usually far too loud and harsh, so I don't want to have that replicated on a live album!
YouTube is a great way to discover new artists or find rare material. The quality of the sound varies but is usually OK for listening through PC speakers; sometimes it's more than OK, with for example, the Tedeschi-Trucks Band putting up some great shows in very good quality.
Geoff
However, the music itself is more important than the quality of the recording: Band of Gypsys, no matter which mix, has a rather dull sound compared to Live at Winterland but 'Machine Gun' is perhaps Hendrix' greatest track and you wouldn't wish to miss out on that. Same goes for Dylan's Basement Tapes, his live shows from 1966 or Miles Davis 'Birth of the Cool' from 1951.
The Beatles' Hamburg tracks, in mono and recorded from what might be the toilet, have a fantastic energy, with bum notes and swearing adding to the experience. Hearing Rachmaninov playing his own works is treasurable, even with harsh and bass-shy sound.
There are of course some issues with alleged 'live' albums where the artist(s) have overdubbed or re-recorded some of the material; sometimes this works and doesn't sound too phony, other times, bleah.
It's years since I went to rock concerts, but almost without exception the sound was average at best, usually far too loud and harsh, so I don't want to have that replicated on a live album!
YouTube is a great way to discover new artists or find rare material. The quality of the sound varies but is usually OK for listening through PC speakers; sometimes it's more than OK, with for example, the Tedeschi-Trucks Band putting up some great shows in very good quality.
Geoff
Recording quality varies a lot, independently of the music itself.
Plenty of classic albums terribly produced, then amazing Three Blind Mice recordings of standards.
Great music greatly recorded is harder to find than one would believe, but it’s out there.
Plenty of classic albums terribly produced, then amazing Three Blind Mice recordings of standards.
Great music greatly recorded is harder to find than one would believe, but it’s out there.
To me the music is always more important than the recording, as long as the recording's at least listenable.
Of my favourite albums I would guess that about half are OK or good in terms of sound; maybe 40% are what I'd call very good/excellent and 10% are pretty dire. The 'dire' sounding include audience recordings of Hendrix' 1970 LA Forum and Copenhagen shows, in which you can barely hear the bass or drums other than the snare, but what performances. Of course, I'd love professional issues of those concerts but that's never going to happen.
Geoff
Of my favourite albums I would guess that about half are OK or good in terms of sound; maybe 40% are what I'd call very good/excellent and 10% are pretty dire. The 'dire' sounding include audience recordings of Hendrix' 1970 LA Forum and Copenhagen shows, in which you can barely hear the bass or drums other than the snare, but what performances. Of course, I'd love professional issues of those concerts but that's never going to happen.
Geoff
Seeing these replies after some time.
The other aspect of quality is the media. After listening to the eye-opening interview with Tom Sholz of Boston, and his issues with CD recordings, or digital recordings, I seem to hear a kind of metallic ring to my CDs and digital music. I have on disk recorded professionally (but the vinyl was scratched) to a CD and the sound is very much different, the saxophone in the background is more subdued and natural, maybe the result of compression.
Here is a controversial question: CD, Tape, or Vinyl? My system is modest at the moment, but I can still hear a difference between compressed and digital music and the other stuff I have. More importantly, could I convert my analog source, tape, vinyl etc to digital and still come away with something worthwhile?
The other aspect of quality is the media. After listening to the eye-opening interview with Tom Sholz of Boston, and his issues with CD recordings, or digital recordings, I seem to hear a kind of metallic ring to my CDs and digital music. I have on disk recorded professionally (but the vinyl was scratched) to a CD and the sound is very much different, the saxophone in the background is more subdued and natural, maybe the result of compression.
Here is a controversial question: CD, Tape, or Vinyl? My system is modest at the moment, but I can still hear a difference between compressed and digital music and the other stuff I have. More importantly, could I convert my analog source, tape, vinyl etc to digital and still come away with something worthwhile?
Here is a controversial question: CD, Tape, or Vinyl? My system is modest at the moment, but I can still hear a difference between compressed and digital music and the other stuff I have. More importantly, could I convert my analog source, tape, vinyl etc to digital and still come away with something worthwhile?
The question of CD, tape or vinyl has been discussed many times, here's my 2 cents worth: some LPs and CDs sound great; some don't: I really don't think I can say 'LPs always sound better/CDs always sound better'; the only thing I can say, based only on our collection, is that pre-recorded tapes (cassettes, not reel to reel) don't have the clarity or convenience of either.
There are all sorts of variables, including the country of manufacture (esp. for LPs), quality of playback equipment and of course, your ears. When I first started to seriously listen to music, I found that Australian pressed LPs were usually inferior to imports - particularly UK imports. The covers were often much better on the imported product, too. For example, Santana's Abraxas was a single sleeve in the Oz version and a gatefold with poster in the import, for only 50 cents more. The sound quality difference between local an import was sometimes negligible, other times, night and day.
As for conversions, I transferred most of our LPs to CD for convenience: I recorded them as WAV (not MP3) files from the receiver's line out jacks using an "XP201" magic box, cleaned them up with Audacity to remove pops, clicks etc and sometimes 'normalised' them if they were cut to too low a level. No compression, that's not what 'Normalise' is about. Happy with the results, too.
We have some CDs on which the sound is rather harsh and in some cases, un-listenable; we also have CDs where the sound is more enjoyable than the LP: Band of Gypsys, All Things Must Pass (2001 version) and Highway 61 Revisited, for example.
Another issue, now that LPs are popular again, is cost: in Oz, LPs range from $40 to $60 each; CDs from $10 to $30 and much less second hand. I bought a special issue (2 CDs and a DVD) of Kind of Blue for $15 new and it sounds great: I've heard the $60 LP and it too sounds great - but four times the damage!
Geoff
The question of CD, tape or vinyl has been discussed many times, here's my 2 cents worth: some LPs and CDs sound great; some don't: I really don't think I can say 'LPs always sound better/CDs always sound better'; the only thing I can say, based only on our collection, is that pre-recorded tapes (cassettes, not reel to reel) don't have the clarity or convenience of either.
There are all sorts of variables, including the country of manufacture (esp. for LPs), quality of playback equipment and of course, your ears. When I first started to seriously listen to music, I found that Australian pressed LPs were usually inferior to imports - particularly UK imports. The covers were often much better on the imported product, too. For example, Santana's Abraxas was a single sleeve in the Oz version and a gatefold with poster in the import, for only 50 cents more. The sound quality difference between local an import was sometimes negligible, other times, night and day.
As for conversions, I transferred most of our LPs to CD for convenience: I recorded them as WAV (not MP3) files from the receiver's line out jacks using an "XP201" magic box, cleaned them up with Audacity to remove pops, clicks etc and sometimes 'normalised' them if they were cut to too low a level. No compression, that's not what 'Normalise' is about. Happy with the results, too.
We have some CDs on which the sound is rather harsh and in some cases, un-listenable; we also have CDs where the sound is more enjoyable than the LP: Band of Gypsys, All Things Must Pass (2001 version) and Highway 61 Revisited, for example.
Another issue, now that LPs are popular again, is cost: in Oz, LPs range from $40 to $60 each; CDs from $10 to $30 and much less second hand. I bought a special issue (2 CDs and a DVD) of Kind of Blue for $15 new and it sounds great: I've heard the $60 LP and it too sounds great - but four times the damage!
Geoff
To enlarge on an obvious contradiction on my effort above: "the music is always more important than the recording, as long as the recording's at least listenable".
Given the choice of the same album or piece of music in recordings which sound OK vs very good, I'll go for the second as it means I enjoy the music more. For example, I love 'All Things Must Pass' but I hear more of the instrumentation on the 30th Anniversary re-issue.
Geoff
Given the choice of the same album or piece of music in recordings which sound OK vs very good, I'll go for the second as it means I enjoy the music more. For example, I love 'All Things Must Pass' but I hear more of the instrumentation on the 30th Anniversary re-issue.
Geoff
This is all very helpful. The best thing is to go out and but them. I purchased a CD off e-bay once for $5 and I could not believe how bad it sounded but it could have been a legal re-issue, one never knows.
More questions: if you want to preview an album, is it worth going to YouTube or streaming or will it turn you off the album or, once again, is there a wide range of quality? I am listening to SEAL and it sounds fine. Boston "Don't look back" not so much.
Also the preview site I mentioned on internet archive:
https://archive.org/
https://archive.org/details/lp_stan-getz_stan-getz-stan-getz-quartet-stan-getz-quin_0
More questions: if you want to preview an album, is it worth going to YouTube or streaming or will it turn you off the album or, once again, is there a wide range of quality? I am listening to SEAL and it sounds fine. Boston "Don't look back" not so much.
Also the preview site I mentioned on internet archive:
https://archive.org/
https://archive.org/details/lp_stan-getz_stan-getz-stan-getz-quartet-stan-getz-quin_0
I listen to a lot of music from YouTube, but the quality varies from very listenable to s- - house., depends how it's been uploaded, file size etc; as far as I can tell, music previewed through iTunes - only 30s worth of course - is of higher quality. I haven't used other streaming services so can't comment on those.
However, there's quite a bit of good music on YouTube which isn't available in other formats, so there's that.
Where I've enjoyed the music, I've purchased it or borrowed from our local library. Comparing the YouTube tracks to a CD or LP is difficult as I listen to YouTube on a PC with a good quality sound card and 2.1 Boston speakers, but play CDs and LPs through our hi fi, so the music will sound better anyway.
If you want to dive into a particular catalogue, say, Miles Davis, most of his output is available on YouTube. His material is of such width, variety and nature that you won't like everything, but you can preview the albums and see what you do like, then buy that if you like.
Geoff
However, there's quite a bit of good music on YouTube which isn't available in other formats, so there's that.
Where I've enjoyed the music, I've purchased it or borrowed from our local library. Comparing the YouTube tracks to a CD or LP is difficult as I listen to YouTube on a PC with a good quality sound card and 2.1 Boston speakers, but play CDs and LPs through our hi fi, so the music will sound better anyway.
If you want to dive into a particular catalogue, say, Miles Davis, most of his output is available on YouTube. His material is of such width, variety and nature that you won't like everything, but you can preview the albums and see what you do like, then buy that if you like.
Geoff
Here is a short list. There is sooo much music from 60's thru early 90's, too much to list. But firstly, if you like Nick Drake, check out Alexi Murdoch's Time. Other things to check out
Alison Moyet Rain Dancing
Bronski Beat - Age of Consent
Joe Cocker - With a little help from my friends
Bangles - Everything
Mark Almond - Tenement Symphony
INXS - kick
Human League - Romantic
Annie Lennox - Bare
Icehouse - Man of Colours
Alison Moyet Rain Dancing
Bronski Beat - Age of Consent
Joe Cocker - With a little help from my friends
Bangles - Everything
Mark Almond - Tenement Symphony
INXS - kick
Human League - Romantic
Annie Lennox - Bare
Icehouse - Man of Colours
And two more. I've been transferring a few SACD's to hdd including Roxy Music Avalon and Sting Brand New day. Surprised I don't think I saw Roxy in anyone's list and did see Bryan Ferry.
NB I'm pretty sure anything uploaded to YouTube will be compressed, even when identified as "HQ".
Geoff
Roxy Music's 'Viva' live album from the mid 70s is excellent. My sister saw them in Melbourne, she was in the front row; some idiot shouted out 'play some rock n roll' and Mr Ferry retorted "we ARE rock n roll"!
Geoff
There are two different versions of this album: the original Quadrophenia LP set, including a book and the film soundtrack which deleted a few tracks, added the song 'Joker James' and included a side of the oldies featured in the film, such as Be My Baby and Louis Louis. The soundtrack had a clearer mix and I think, some brass overdubs from the late John Entwistle. You need to have both sets if you're a Who fan. If you see the film, see how many future TV stars are in the cast!
Geoff
I originally discovered new music via mixtapes, them radio, I used to o listen to BBC radio 6, and found a few new bands but haven't bothered with the BBC for years because of the politics. I just listen to planet rock now, not much good for finding new music though...
It really depends on your taste in music, personally I'd recommend the first 6 albums of Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, and RUSH, to start of with, possibly "the best of Yazoo", tubeway army, Joy division, Rodrigo y Gabriala, perhaps if you like heavy stuff, Opeth.
If I hear a tune I like, I'll check out the band on you tube to see it it's worth ordering a CD, you don't need exceptional sound quality to tell if a band has talent or not.
A work colleague has discovered many (about 500) new bands on Spotify.
I quite like compilation CDs, it one way to hear different bands. I wonder if there's an ideal ratio for money spent on HiFi, to money spent on CDs. I've spent about £1,500 on CDs, about £300 on my current HiFi .
It really depends on your taste in music, personally I'd recommend the first 6 albums of Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, and RUSH, to start of with, possibly "the best of Yazoo", tubeway army, Joy division, Rodrigo y Gabriala, perhaps if you like heavy stuff, Opeth.
If I hear a tune I like, I'll check out the band on you tube to see it it's worth ordering a CD, you don't need exceptional sound quality to tell if a band has talent or not.
A work colleague has discovered many (about 500) new bands on Spotify.
I quite like compilation CDs, it one way to hear different bands. I wonder if there's an ideal ratio for money spent on HiFi, to money spent on CDs. I've spent about £1,500 on CDs, about £300 on my current HiFi .
Hi-Res from the Studio or as CD from the studio...
Linn Records:-
Thomas Tallis:- Spem in allium, Lamentations, Mass & Motets Album, sung by Magnificat, Directed By Philip Cave....
Naim Records:-
Antonio Forcione & Sabina Sciubba "Meet me in London" Album
Linn Records:-
Thomas Tallis:- Spem in allium, Lamentations, Mass & Motets Album, sung by Magnificat, Directed By Philip Cave....
Naim Records:-
Antonio Forcione & Sabina Sciubba "Meet me in London" Album
I'd also recommend as CD (no studio downloads yet) or original vinyl (expensive if you can find it) :-
Sheffield Labs Records:-
"Sheffield Drive" Album as a good "mix" of their recordings.
Harry James & His Big Band, "Still Harry After All These Years" Album
Harry James & His Big Band, "Coming From A Good Place" Album
Harry James & His Big Band, "The King James Version" Album
Too many other "Direct to Disc" albums by Sheffield Labs to list...
Sheffield Labs Records:-
"Sheffield Drive" Album as a good "mix" of their recordings.
Harry James & His Big Band, "Still Harry After All These Years" Album
Harry James & His Big Band, "Coming From A Good Place" Album
Harry James & His Big Band, "The King James Version" Album
Too many other "Direct to Disc" albums by Sheffield Labs to list...