Six Blade Knife is one of my favorites from that album (I think it is on their first).
As far as rock demo tracks, I would favor the Rolling Stone's "Can't You Hear Me Knocking" from Sticky Fingers, esp. the extended jam at the end. Again, a good indicator as to how your system is going to sound when turned up LOUD. Clean or congested?
I guess I am kinda strange but talking heads 77 and Depeche Mode speak and spell are the first two I spin when I make a change. Then it is on to more traditional stuff like telegraph road and the planets by Mehta on London
Any Bon Scott-era AC/DC is good for testing if your speakers sound harsh or if the tonal balance is off 😈
I also like to play Handel’s Messiah with Gardiner, the one from 1982 on
Philips. Great recording and performance. It really shines on good systems, and sounds dull on bad ones.
I also like to play Handel’s Messiah with Gardiner, the one from 1982 on
Philips. Great recording and performance. It really shines on good systems, and sounds dull on bad ones.
Attachments
I went to a Julian Lage concert which of course brought out a bunch of guitar nerds. The guy next to me kept looking at me for my reaction through out the concert like I was supposed be mesmerized by every riff. Made the concert completely unenjoyable and furthered my hatred of guitar nerds.
Hate all the gold plating on the turntables. Reminds me of an infamous persons bathroom. 🙂
jeff
jeff
There is a need for reference tracks. The only thing we can hope for is that they are good enough recorded so that they don't hinder progression. Next hope that they are musically satisfying. The title mention two good compositions - but there might be a curse involved - a ref track is doomed to get boring in the end...
//
//
..and David Knopfler can...? The Dire Straits CD that is most often used for its tracks as reference (Brothers in Arms, 1985) is actually very good in terms of dynamic range, other production quality and interesting musical compositions, but I have to say that the vocal "style" has always left me cold. Perhaps Auto-Tune? (Would that work on Bob Dylan's vocals, too?)
I've noticed that a lot of motion pictures nowadays put not-so-spectacular vocalists on the end credit rolls (I'm talking about the sort of vocal quality that allows you entrance into a high school choir and the like). I don't know why producers do this, but it certainly makes it much easier to turn off the end credits quickly after the feature has run...which must the reason why they chose the vocalists that they do. 😛
Chris
I can't imagine "Mark" needing or wanting auto-tune. David left the band in 1980, long before BIA.
jeff
Sorry, you're correct. Mark is the correct individual. You can see how much I pay attention to that particular individual's albums... 😉
Good question! 🙂
First of all, I don't believe in the merit of listening tests of a single track and/or a single piece of audio equipment outside my system except as taking it as a very general indication or, much more significant, for fun.
Since the brain listen-to in a memory-comparative way then the use always of the same tracks is a serious practice that makes sense.
Whether or not one likes them is a different thread.
However in my system, after changing "something" I listen to maybe 8 albums and to maybe 15 tracks during the day in a recursive way trying to notice the kind of the differences in sound.
Albums often have a similar quality of recording in all tracks, but not always.
Obviously, for the same reasons mentioned above if you don't know the track that is playing because it is the first time that you listen to it is like listening to a whole new system for the first time.
(IMO, of course.)
Last edited:
That song in the youtube video posted demands very little from a playback system and it's integration into the room. So it's perfect demo music.
Using music to evaluate qualities of a playback system seems quite counter intuitive anyways. Reception depends so much on the listener's daily shape and mood, takes forever and there is no objective data that can be stored and compared. It's much faster and easier to measure what you believe is necessary to measure and if after that listening is still necessary I use a W&G noise generator which tells me in seconds what I subjectivly might want to gather.
Using music to evaluate qualities of a playback system seems quite counter intuitive anyways. Reception depends so much on the listener's daily shape and mood, takes forever and there is no objective data that can be stored and compared. It's much faster and easier to measure what you believe is necessary to measure and if after that listening is still necessary I use a W&G noise generator which tells me in seconds what I subjectivly might want to gather.
Why, how many ears would you have wanted to have? 🙄
It seems obvious to me that this is just the physiological human condition of a healthy person: what did you mean to say with that?
See, I did not understand your statement since it is obvious that any human audio recording/reproduction system is based on human physiological anatomy and that the whole Audio world is based on this simple observation, so I'm just curious to know about the meaning of your expression.
Thank goodness I hope we are not talking about human anatomical exceptions here.
However, the experience posted by @Cask05 was interesting and not OT at all, indeed it was an enrichment of the topic. IMO
Last edited: