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Topic: Metal albums with great production? (Read 16243 times) previous topic - next topic
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Metal albums with great production?

I'm just posting a quick one about Metal and Lossless
Basically, there are a good amount of albums that I have which are more than worth keeping in lossless because of the quality

On the other hand, there are alot of Metal recordings which are very rusty sounding or just plain badly produced...

Heres a few pristine metal recordings I have in lossless... (To give an example)

Scarve - Irradiant [2004] [Monkey's Audio Lossless]
Samael - Reign Of Light [2004] [Monkey's Audio Lossless]
Hypocrisy - The Arrival [2004] [FLAC Lossless]
Haggard - Eppur Si Muove [2004] [Monkey's Audio Lossless]
Dark Tranquillity - Projector [1999] [FLAC Lossless]
Vintersorg - Visions From The Spiral Generator [2002] [Monkey's Audio Lossless]
Nile - Annihilation Of The Wicked [2005] [FLAC Lossless]
Bloodbath - Nightmares Made Flesh [2004] [Monkey's Audio Lossless]
The Sins Of Thy Beloved - Perpetual Desolation @APE
Opeth - Blackwater Park @APE
Septic Flesh - Sumerian Daemons @APE
Tristania - Ashes @ APE

They are more than worth it as far as quality is concerned if compared to their mp3 sister-files.

Could anyone reccomend some more well produced metal recordings to look into for my collection?  It would be well appreciated.

Maybe the site admin could add his 2 cents?  He has great metal taste as far as I remember...

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #1 –
just look 10-15 years back and you will find plenty of good (pristine) metal recordings from major companies
Friends don't let friends use lossy codecs.  (char0n)

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #2 –
A whole lotta well-produced Hair and Power metal  Yah, I've got a bunch of that..

But I'm just thinking in the last 1-15 years for metal album ideas that benefit from Lossless 

I'm a fan of newer Death/Symphonic/Melodic/Black/Industrial metal stuff... cause its just too good. But theres so many bands I havnt heard of that sound great... which is why I have this thread

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #3 –
check out the ipecac label. (url: http://ipecac.com )

they have a lot of great bands, and good mastering (from what i have - i don't have a lot of metal/etc).


later

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #4 –
Quote
I'm a fan of newer Death/Symphonic/Melodic/Black/Industrial metal stuff... cause its just too good. But theres so many bands I havnt heard of that sound great... which is why I have this thread
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=306177"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]


Sorry for my ignorance. You may have heard of this "loudness race" thing - people like to  produce their stuff loud & clipping, which is why I prefer to purchase used discs from Ebay, which do not suffer from this. If you ever manage to find current discs not suffering from this problem, just let me know.
Friends don't let friends use lossy codecs.  (char0n)

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #5 –
I know all too well of the loudness race, and yes its horrible

Alot of good metal seems to be excluded from the horrible masterings for loudness, but theres alot of bands that are just "loud"...

I don't get clipping, most of my stuff is RG'd. Alot of indie metal is produced flat as well...

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #6 –
Tomahawk's albums (produced by Ipecac) are pretty good.

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #7 –
just for the hell of it, i checked the album replaygain values of the tomahawk/fantomas stuff i have (all of it).

pretty good range, average = -6

that's pretty good considering dave lombardo is pounding the *&^% outta them drums


later

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #8 –
One standout album from last year is Invisible Circles by After Forever. It's loud, but the mastering is absolutely superb (IMHO).

And of course I need to mention Tool. All their album have excellent mastering.
Over thinking, over analyzing separates the body from the mind.

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #9 –
anathema - the silent enigma
the guitars are so good i use one song as a part of my reference cd's... (a dying wish)

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #10 –
Ok, here are some killer albums;

The Haunted - rEVOLVEr (violent thrash with superb production)
Testament - The Gathering (yeah! Dave Lombardo on drums:))
Scar Symmetry - Symmetric In Design (kinda like Dark Tranquillity, only better and beefier sound!)
Demonoid - Riders Of The Apocalypse (monster guitar riffing and furious drumming! Cool concept! My fav!)
Soilwork - Stabbing The Drama (Scarve's drummer plays on this one)

All these albums have great production (IMO) and are just plain awesome. They are my favorites (in this genre). Check em out! I have them as flac's but I have recently been checking out wavpack.

edit: typo
//From the barren lands of the Northsmen

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #11 –
Sins Of Thy Beloved - Lake of sorrow

Dan Swano - Moontower

The Gathering - Mandylion

Paradise Lost - Icon, Draconian Times, One Second,  Host, Symbol Of life

Left Hand Solution - fevered

Nightwish - Wishmaster
 

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #12 –
Oh, well, check out these:

Sanitys Dawn - mangled in the meatgrinder (groovy, interesting sounds: european gore grind) 

Vomitorial Corpulence - skinstripper (no other has their sound: brutal gore grind noise power violence) 

Inhume - Decomposing from inside (good artificial - pods & triggers - sound: european brutal grind) 

Scrawl - Q (really dynamic: jazz-ska-grind !) 

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #13 –
My recommendation is Prog-Rock, kinda sorta related to metal, in a couple ways I guess..

Porcupine Tree - In Absentia
It's the ultimate speaker/headphone show-off album for it's fantastic fidelity. Get yourself a copy, it's easily accessible for pretty much all listeners.

-joe

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #14 –
Samael - 'Ceremony of Opposites'

Opeth - 'Still Life'

Death - 'Symbolic'; 'The Sound of Perseverance' (both quite good in terms of production, considering the genre)

As for the somewhat lighter music, Tool - 'Lateralus' and King Crimson - 'The Power to Believe'.

Maybe: Danzig - '4p' and '6:66 Satan's Child'. Both are horribly overcompressed, but somehow manage to sound really good (but different).

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #15 –
All "tristania"(gothic-metal) albums to which i've listened, were heavily compressed, but did sound suprisingly well to me. I would even say awesome.

But don't make the mistake of asuming that this is also the case with their successor-band "Sirenia" - which sounds really squashed and loaded.

- Lyx
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #16 –
Regurgitate - Carnivorous Erection 

this is the best sounding grind-record i've listened so far

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #17 –
Dunno if I got you right: You're looking for metal albums to add to your collection based purely on their production quality? From the other answers so far I assume you mean good music that also happens to be produced well, right?

Which brings me to an important though probably stupid question: What are you guys' criteria for a production of "pristine quality"? Unfortunately, I don't have a very good ear for hearing subtleties in music - hell, mp3@128cbr often enough sounds perfectly good for me  . So the only indication I can really count on is the RG value - and there nearly all albums of the last few years that I have range in the -8.5 to -10.5 area.

Still, being totally subjective, I'd list these albums as recommendations:

Pain of Salvation - One Hour by the Concrete Lake [1999] [AG -8.41]
>ProgRock with a lot of experimenting, but still great melodies. From a creative pov much more impressive than Dream Theater

Savatage - From the Gutter To The Stage [1996] [AG -6.13]
>Power/Symphonic Metal. For me, all of there albums sound brilliantly produced, and the music might not be innovative, but extremely catchy. I often use their Dead Winter Dead album to get people interested in metal

Jeff Beck - You had it coming [2001] [AG -7.33]
>Famous Rock guitar player. This album has a very "fat" sound, but still sounds extremely crisp to me.

Trans-Siberian Orchestra - Beethoven's Last Night [2000] [AG -7.81]
>Bombastic, symphonic Metal. Savatage + Orchestra - which isn't merely a comparison, but actually the core of this project.

Karmakanic - Entering the Spectra [2002] [AG -7.61]
>ProgRock. Quite complicated, but still good to listen to. And this is one album where I'm certain that the production is without any fail, every detail is absolutely precise.

Liquid Tension Experiment
>crazily complex instrumental ProgRock. HAs to be produced superbly, or you couldn't bear listening to it.

One where I'm totally not sure is "Rage - XIII". Produced in 1998, with an AG of -5.93. Still sounds a bit, hmmm, rough to me. Anyone got an opinion on that one?

And also, what's you guys' opinion about Metallica's S&M? I personally never liked it too much, preferring Rage - Lingua Mortis as a classical & metal crossover. I often suspected this might be because S&M is terribly produced, but I can't really put my finger on it.

Oh well, I guess I could find some more, but this has gotten longer than I wanted, anyway.

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #18 –
cyde > I don't get clipping, most of my stuff is RG'd

The boo-hoo on the loudness race is that the music on the factory CD is already clipped...and no amount of RG can undo the damage. Good pre-amp / amp hardware should easily handle the dynamic range of 16 bit audio.

As far as metal goes ... give Virgin Black a whirl. Very unique blend of rock, orchestral, and even opera! The lead guitarist (a chick) wails.

xen-uno
No one can be told what Ogg Vorbis is...you have to hear it for yourself
- Morpheus

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #19 –
Age Of Silence - Acceleration
avant-garde metal, that's all I can say

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #20 –
Aeternus - ...and So the Night Became
Great Production, Very Dynamic and one of my all time favorites.

Cradle of Filth - Dusk and her Embrace
Great production. broke with the standard black metal intentional crappy production.

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #21 –
Rebellion - Sagas Of Iceland - The History Of The Vikings Volume 1 (Heavy Metal)
Great production & mastering, great band, too.

In Extremo - Mein Rasend Herz (Folkish Gothic Metal)
Superb production & a great album. A must-have.

Judas Priest - Angel Of Retribution (Heavy Metal)
Well produced, solid album with some really good tracks.

That would be the first ones which came to my mind. 

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #22 –
Dream Theater - Pretty much any of them.  "Images and Words" stands out to me, though.  Also check out their live albums which have top notch production.

Rush - "Moving Pictures", but again, can't really go wrong here.  Live albums astounding too.

Tool - "Lateralus" I find to be the best, but all of them are benchmarks.  Unbelievable clarity and depth. 

Symphony X - "The Odyssey" is unbelievable.  Just, wow.  This is the only CD I have by them and needless to say I will be getting more.  Highly recommended.  Again, clarity and depth.

I like prog...

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #23 –
Albums that sound good are a rarity these days. Before grunge exploded onto the scene with its disgruntled, half-baked ethos, recording engineers used to take pride in their well-honed sonic skills. Nowadays the muddier the mix, the more "hip" it is to most. It does nothing but make me cringe and eventually stop listening to the disc.

With this out of the way, here are some well-recorded albums that rock hard:

"Pull" by Winger
"Cuatro" and "Drift" by Flotsam & Jetsam
"America's Least Wanted" by Ugly Kid Joe
"Images And Words" and "Awake" by Dream Theater
"Cowboys From Hell" by Pantera
"The Great Southern Trendkill" by Pantera
"Dog Eat Dog" by Warrant
"Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia" by Dimmu Borgir
"Horror Show" by Iced Earth
"Dysfunctional" by Dokken
"Demolition" by Judas Priest
both albums by Liquid Tension Experiment
"Kings of Metal" by Manowar
"Cryptic Writings" by Megadeth
"Metallica" by Metallica
"Still Life", "Blackwater Park", "Deliverance" and "Damnation" by Opeth
"Empire" and "Promised Land" by Queensrÿche
"Bust A Nut" by Tesla
"Low" by Testament (dark, but gets clear over time)
"Exposed" by Vince Neil

Metal albums with great production?

Reply #24 –
@KyPeN:

If you like prog, check out James Labrie's solo album Elements Of Persuasion. What a production!!! Just amazing... and the album smokes as well.

I like Symphony X's  the Odyssey too, but I think it lacks bass. Sounds kinda flat to me.
//From the barren lands of the Northsmen