Reference Tracks

[ob_kook]

Hi all, I've made some improvements to my system which I think (hope!!) will be significant, and I am wondering if any of you have any favorite reference tracks that you find to be pretty revealing?

Any genre is fine as my tastes are all over the place, but I'd like to find a few tracks that are particuarly well engineered and touch some of the sonic extremes. Any input welcomed!

THanks,

Kook

[tomsi42]

Some of my top picks are:

Steely Dan - Cousin Dupree
Ana Popovic - Navajo Moon
Stevie Ray Vaughan - Tin Pin Alley
Nils Lofgren - Keith Don't Go (from Acoustic Live)
Kari Bremnes - anything she has made

Tom

[random_tox]

Nine Inch Nails, 'Burn' from Natural Born Killers OST.
Tchaikovsky, 1812 overture, with cannons and chorus, find it on a good label.
Strauss, Also Sprach Zarathustra. (Extremities!)
Dead Can Dance, Cantara, from Toward the Within.
Tabla Beat Science with DJ Disk, Tala Matrix, from Live @ Stern Grove.

[Mark Lanctot]

I hesitated because I thought you'd laugh at me, but:

- Ashley MacIsaac, Sleepy Maggie

Bass, rich female vocals, rapid stringed instrumentation, loads and loads of spatialization/localization cues.

[ob_kook]

Tabla Beat Science with DJ Disk, Tala Matrix, from Live @ Stern Grove.

Excellent selections - looking forward to trying some of these out. Thanks all!

random_tox - Are you from the Bay Area? I live almost within walking distance of Stern Grove (the "OB" in my handle stands for Ocean Beach) and have seen many of their free summer concert series there, but had no idea that they recorded it.

Where can you get this disk?

Kook

[random_tox]

...
random_tox - Are you from the Bay Area?
...
Where can you get this disk?

Kook

Not from the bay unless you count a few years in Sunnyvale as a wee lad. Salt Lake.

Tabla Beat Science has a studio CD and the above mentioned live 2xCD or DVD. Haven't seen the DVD (just haven't gotten around to buying it...bet it's incredible) but can recommend the CDs. All are easy to locate online. Used or new. Amazon, Half... But you could probably save another buck or two at a local used shop.

I think Bill Laswell put the project together. I Got into them through collecting Karsh Kale stuff. The tabla is about the craziest hand drum set to see or hear. I couldn't begin to play one. Produces an amazing variety of tones.

[peejay]

Tori Amos - 'Father Lucifer' off Boys for Pele. Some very subtle piano - listen for the pedal noise, generally very wide dynamic range. Her husband is her recording engineer - that's how serious it gets........

[RainmanRam]

I find just about anything by Peter Gabriel or Colin James to make for good references. Many of either's tracks contain quite a bit of detail, highs, lows, mids as well as being high quality productions. I've been able to detect quite a few flaws in DAC's using them.

In particular:

Peter Gabriel:

Sledgehammer (So)
In Your Eyes (So)
Big Time (So) (in particular the intro with the feedback and him saying "High There!")
Steam (Us)
Diggin In The Dirt (Us)
Kiss That Frog (Us) -- bass response/crossover

Colin James:

Saviour (Bad Habits)
Freedom (Bad Habits)
Better Days (Bad Habits)
Bad Habits (Bad Habits)
Mary Anne (CJ and the Big Band) - piano
Tin Pan Alley (CJ and the Big Band)
Hide (Fuse)
Mystery to Me (Fuse)
Far Away Like a Radio (Fuse)
I'm Losing You (Traveler)
Make a Mistake (Traveler)
I Know what Love is (Traveler)


- Ray

[totoro]

Track 3 on Biber: Violin Sonatas by Romanesca (prelude to sonata 2). Chamber orchestra, with a lot of baroque violin and an organ playing pedal tones.

Pavane from Triangle by Arild Andersen. Nicely recorded jazz quartet (piano, drums bass). Particularly nice upright bass solo, recorded well enough that you can hear some string noise (tests driver integration pretty well ).

Blues Dream from the Bill Frisell record of the same name. Nice slide guitar, trumpet, a fair amount of upright bass, a fair amount of dynamic range.

[Patrick Dixon]

Stevie Ray Vaughan - Tin Pin Alley

Which version?

(Yes I know, they're all good)