Loud Albums You Wish You Could Like

I second the nomination for Clockwork Angels. It just sounds like a bunch of noise.

 

Get them on Vinyl

 

The Pursuit Of Happiness-Love Junk. Painfully loud, but the songs are so good.

 

As much as I love Megadeth’s “Dystopia”, it bothers me to listen to sometimes due to the production. “Thirteen” and “Super Collider” had the same issues which is why I only listen to the 24 bit versions of those since they sound much better. I wish the same treatment would be given to “Dystopia”.

 

Ojos de Brujo - Techari CD has a DR of 7 but sounds much worse than that to me. A shame because it's a wonderful flamenco-rock fusion album that's crying out for great dynamics.

 

QOTSA- Villains CD

 

Of course there are many many new albums from the last 20 years or so. I'd describe the effect of loud compressed music as suffocating, the aural equivalent of humid (don't know if that makes sense or indeed if others have used the same words to describe it). For example, with Aimee Mann's Bachelor No.2 I just can't get to the end of the song without feeling nauseous. Oh and then next on my A-Z there's Amy Winehouse Back to Black CD, again same effect.

 

I'm re-ripping my CD collection to FLAC and ALAC to replace the old mp3 rips. There's a lot of stuff I've skipped over, and my Paul Weller CDs are part of the bunch I've skipped. I don't like them enough to go searching for better releases, but I did go out of my way to get better sounding versions of a couple of The Style Council CDs. I love Our Favourite Shop and Café Bleu. Fortunately, The Jam CDs I have aren't too bad, although Sound Effects and Setting Sons could stand replacement.

 

Every Queens of the Stone Age CD I own is horribly loud and compressed. It is too bad, because I love their music. Suitable as background music on speakers only. Listening on headphones would drive me batty.

I have 3 Iron Maiden albums that are done nicely - probably could be a bit fuller, but I'll take light and airy over loud and compressed any day of the week and twice on Sundays. Found a really, REALLY old release of Back In Black that I enjoy (also releases of Highway to Hell and Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap). I'll need to round out my collection if I can find decent releases.

 

Snakes and Arrows is total trash, too.

 

Mother's Milk and Blood Sugar Sex Magik are pretty good - especially the Mobile Fidelity release of Mother's Milk (UDCD 683). The Warner Bros. 1991 (266812) release of Blood Sugar Sex Magik is the one I have, and I can listen to it with no problems - even with DT880s. Everything else I have is horrible, although the HD Tracks versions of Californication and Stadium Arcadium, in spite of looking bad numerically from a DR and Replay Gain perspective, are oddly OK for me. Original CD releases? Not so much!

 

The last 5-6 Jeff Beck and Robert Plant records. The brickwalling borders on criminal.

 

I really like Eyes Open by Snow Patrol. A shame it’s sonic mush. Bought the double LP but you guessed it, cut from the CD master.

 

Most new releases and remasters suffer from this terrible affliction.
Off the top of my head I'll nominate:

Bowie - Reality
Noel Gallagher Who Built The Moon

 

Nichole Nordeman's Every Mile Mattered CD sounds much more distorted than her other stuff although they are all loud and compressed.

 

I do not consider this album a loudness war victim at all and the CD was mastered in the 1980s.