Records you truly love in spite of genuinely awful sound

Easily the Stooges' Raw Power. Loudest album ever?

 

"Sally Go 'Round The Roses" by the Jaynettes (muddy, but sounds best on the Time Life compilations)
"Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me" by Mel Carter (doesn't sound terrible, but is pretty bad)
"California Sun" by The Rivieras (never heard a decent sounding version on CD, but the 45 might be decent)

 

That record sounds great, it's perfect.

I've only heard the vinyl, but I've always thought that record sounded perfect, too.

That's my first choice - such great music, such lousy sound. But since it's taken I'll go to Plan B, Roy Wood's Wizzard's "Wizzard's Brew"

 

In complete agreement and one of my top deserted Island records even with the wanting sound.
listening to Soft Machine 4 and 5 right now.
Great Band with and without Wyatt

 

Well, Director's Cut's audio is the least of its problems (heh.)

Yeah, pretty much any Roy Wood stuff that isn't ELO. Of course, I like him a lot more than ELO. That flattened sound is great...Sparks wanted him to produce Kimono My House, I'm fascinated at the thought of what it would have ended up sounding like.

 

Cosmogramma by Flying Lotus. I don't remember how the vinyl stacks up, but the digital version is completely squished.

 

Jim Jones Revue - S/T. Distorted to to hell mix. Great album though...at a low volume

 

'w.l-w.h.' does sound great for what it is and what the band was trying to do, even though both lou and john have said that it didn't turn out quite the way they had intended and that it was impossible to do what they wanted using the technology available at the time- but objectively speaking the sound is atrocious. i think it's down to the band's vision that it works as well as it does.

cheers,
rob

 

I think Shel Talmy`s remix sounds awesome.

I would add the original 1968 mix of The Mothers of Invention`s We`re Only In It For the Money. I love how that record sounds. Like a dark, disturbing cartoon. Zappa absolutely ruined it in 1986.

 

Bo Diddley's Beach Party- one of the worst sounding live LPs but it sounds perfect in context! Makes me feel like I was there and loaded up on Falstaff beer...
a lot of the Kinks 60s stuff...

 

You're right, that album does sound terrible.

 

Do you like the sound of War & Pain?

 

I always thought this album sounded good..

 

Lol. I don't completely dislike it but, yeah, I hear ya.

 

It sounds too good

 

I think good sound would actually work against that particular album.

 

Rosie Hamlin on the story of the recording of "Angel baby"

The crude recording gives it it's charm.

http://www.rosieandtheoriginals.com/wordpress/biographies/autobiography-of-rosalie-hamlin

 

The entire Oasis catalog. Sigh.

 

i do definitely find that much of the charm of many old recordings is the 'primitiveness' of the tech of the time. a lot of what i listen to is mid-60s garage and guitar pop or music that builds on that era, plus a lot of indie and some punk- and t.b.h, a pristine, perfectly mastered sound does not really work for that. the early stones and the velvets have already been mentioned, but i'd like to bring up also the first few belle and sebastian albums and eps. though the sound is by no means 'atrocious', their rather lo-fi recording , i.m.h.o., adds to the feeling of intimacy in hearing the performance which is a great part of why i like them. it is a similar thing with punk- a rather dirty, overloaded recording style (for me at least) gives more of a feel of the energy and urgency in the music and attitude. sure it would be nice to hear all the words in huker du's 'celebrated summer', but i don't think a cleaner recording would have had the same rush.

on the other hand, while i feel that the sonic overload of 'white light white heat' is pretty much just what that album needs i also love the pristine airiness of the velvet's 3rd album. it suits the material. like the brits say- horses for courses, i guess.

cheers,
rob

 

What about Metallic KO? I love both records but I'd easily give the nod to Metallic KO in a crappy sound face-off between the two.

 

You can say that again. Don't get me wrong... It's a great album. In fact it's in the player now. You know what? If you crank the volume up... It does sound pretty good!

 

Even if War and Pain is far from being an audiophile record, it sounds much better than Rrooaarr.

 

I agree. I love the sound of War and Pain. Its fits for there first record. but Roar is not a progression forward. I think there is a story behind F off and die and
the label at the time but i cant remember what it was its been a long time.

 

I have to get myself a copy of War and Pain on vinyl!

RIP, Piggy.

 

I don't really mind crude sound for garage rock or primitive folk--that can be part of the "charm." And, objectively, the worst-sounding recordings in my collection would be those from the pre-magnetic tape era of the '30s and '40s. But somehow the stuff that bugs me most in terms of audio quality tends to be modern, mainstream, major-label albums where there's just no excuse for it to sound anything but great. The examples that come immediately to mind are the Flying Burrito Brothers' Gilded Palace of Sin and most of John Lennon's post-Imagine stuff. It's just a mystery to me why those records sound so thin when they were professionally recorded in big-time studios with lots of working ears in the vicinity.