What's the worst sounding CD in your collection?

Is there one or more CDs you guys have in your collections that you would advise other people from purchasing based on sound quality?

I'm talking about CDs with songs mastered from noisey vinyl, horrible EQ, 4th or 5th generation tape sources, or any other reasoning.

This may be helpful to some of us who might be unfamiliar with certain CD's reputations.

My vote, quite honestly, goes to the 2000 remastered, expanded version of Little River Bands Greatest Hits. As I mentioned in a recent thread, this CD sounds incredibly harsh, sterile, and just plain wrong with funky EQ or processing. The sad thing is, the CD doesn't sound all that bad on my 30 dollar back-up CD boombox that I won in a preschool raffle. Perhaps this was the kind of equipment that was in mind when this CD was remastered.

 

Gotta be the Bette Midler soundtrack to "The Rose"- no redeeming qualities whatsoever (pre-remastered copy).

James

 

Joe Jackson's "Blaze of Glory" Please stay away from this one!

 

Melissa Manchester...Greatest Hits! Horrible...AM Radio quality! Yuk...Just love "Midnight Blue", Just horrendous on this Cee Dee...Was/Is there a great sounding "Midnight Blue" anywhere?

 

Van Halen, 1984, WB Remaster HDCD.

So....damn...horrible.... O...M....G....

 

I agree...Got that one...boy does it suck!

 

First issue of Gentle Giant's Free Hand on One Way.

So bad that they promptly re-did it.

Looking on the bright side, maybe I own a collectable!

 

Grammy's Greatest Moments Vol I-IV.

When I played these on my old boombox or hyper equalized stereo they sounded great. Now that I have learned the error of my ways and have a much better stereo system they sound really bad. Stay away!

 

The Who "BBC Sessions"

Led Zeppelin "BBC Sessions"


I wanted these to sound as good as they could in the worst way and got shafted big time on both. Each time, recordings of an already lesser quality were made utterly unlistenable.


__________
AC

 

The Police "Ghost In The Machine" 1st pressing. Mastered waaaaaay too low volume wise.

 

Tommy Bolin's solo CD's

 

I have 3 of the 6 VH HDCD's, including "1984" and was really impressed with them when they came out. An instance where a loud, loud remastering going in the red actually fits the music. I have an HDCD player, and I never quite got why so many people didn't like these.

James

 

Awful. You were reading my mind.

Billy Joel - The Millennium Concert

Ditto.

 

Both were remastered by Astley. Coincidence? Methinks not.

 

Three Dog Night - Joy To The World: Their Greatest Hits --> Sux!

 

A definite stinker!

 

Cool, another pick on Astley thread...

The Judas Priest remasters were what finally made me come around to the fact that "remastered" doesn't necessarily mean better. Up until this point I would eBay my existing titles upon preordering the remasters. Now my good Priests are gone for good in favor of these mostly unlistenable pieces of crap.

Thanks John, you've saved me a lot of money over the past couple of years

The bulk of my 1100+ CDs is probably heavy metal, so it would be next to impossible to pick out the absolute worst sounding, but to keep with my rant, I've only listened to my current copy of Priest's "Defenders of the Faith" once. I don't think I'll ever work up the courage to put my ears through that again.

 

Blur - Modern life is Rubbish (US edition).
Terrible sound. I am only able to listen to this on the PC\Soundcard or in the Car.

 

Totally agree - didn't manage to listen the whole way through and they haven't been out of the case since

&ru

 

Jay & The Americans - "Legendary Masters Series"
The absolute WORSE overuse of noise reduction I've ever heard. Vacuum packed, freeze dried sound courtesy of Bob Norberg. I get a headache just thinking about this one.

 

Although I'm not a huge fan of her's, Bonnie Tyler's "Faster than the Speed of Night" I had a tough time getting through once. Strangely, it is a Columbia release from Canada, (who would have thunk it would have bad sound), and it just screeches. It made me run, not walk, to my Linn Lp12!!! Holy Cow!!

Bill

 

The CD reissue of Kinks Kontroversy with bonus tracks. Very thin sound when compared to my mono Reprise vinyl. Also, Perversely enough, I have it as my avatar. However, there is a God as it's the only CD I have which is becoming unplayable due to the layer disintegrating (see my post on the scratched CD's thread).

John

 

The first CD issue of "Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits" was very bad. A muffled mess. The Old Friends box and subsequent remasters are quite a revelation compared with that first hits disc.

 

stephen stills - illegal stills - i think the bass track got left out during the pressing. shrill as shrill can be.

 

Live At Leeds Deluxe Edition. Disc 2 is unlistenable.