• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Critical (Best) Music Tracks for Speaker and Room EQ Testing

MattJ

Member
Joined
Mar 31, 2022
Messages
45
Likes
52
The remastered "Lark's Tongue in Aspic" by King Crimson. Particularly Lark's Tongue in Aspic parts 1 and 2. Bruford's bass drum at the end of part 2 is very demanding.
"John's Song #2" by The Mahavishnu Orchestra off the Lost Trident Sessions. Dynamics, bass, clarity.....it has all of that.
"In my Time of Dying" Led Zeppelin off Physical Graffitti. Surprisingly good recording considering how ****** most LZ recordings are. Dynamic.
Copeland's "Fanfare for the Common Man" Telarc label. The opening gong (tam-tam?) and bass drum will knock your ass right off of your chair.
Anything off "Exit Stage Left" by Rush. Excellent live recording.
Anything off "Brain Salad Surgery" by Emerson Lake and Palmer, particularly "Tocatta". Horrible recording of great music. If your system makes that shit sound good, you have a winner.
Edit to add "Wounded Knee" by Primus off Pork Soda. One of the best drum recordings I have ever heard. Maybe THE best.
 
Last edited:

concorde1

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 15, 2021
Messages
362
Likes
275
Anything off "Brain Salad Surgery" by Emerson Lake and Palmer, particularly "Tocatta". Horrible recording of great music. If your system makes that shit sound good, you have a winner.
Regarding "Brain Salad Surgery", I have the early Italy Manticore CD and the Victory CD (same as Rhino) which I find are quite bad sonically. The 2014 remaster I also don't enjoy sonically.

However, I have read that the Germany Manticore Sonopress CD (below) is good. I will try to grab one some day.

https://www.discogs.com/release/4775285-Emerson-Lake-Palmer-Brain-Salad-Surgery

Which version(s) have you heard?
 

cavedriver

Addicted to Fun and Learning
Joined
Jul 10, 2020
Messages
629
Likes
602
Location
Maryland, USA
And this from a 1992 research at NRC on genre of music and its revealing nature in this regard:

Program+Influence+on+Listener+Performance.png
I love that most of the stuff stereo stores tried to play for me back in the day suck for evaluating speakers according to this list, but my choices of things like LZ, Jim Hendrix, Thorogood, Kate Bush, and so on, were much better. Granted when I first started listening to serious speakers I was ~19 and the guys working in the stores were over 50 and probably couldn't hear half the stuff I was looking for, but I used to remember this look of derision from a few of the more snotty ones. "This guy can't pick good speakers because he isn't using the standard references of jazz vocals and discrete classical music that isn't too "crowded" to appreciate."

I wonder where popular tracks for selling speakers, like Rebecca Pidgeon's Spanish Harlem, land- are they #8 - female jazz/bass/piano, or #18 - jazz vocal w/bass? Very different scores! It is basically just 2 parts- the bass and her voice, which suggests it's not very good for evaluating speakers according to Amir's comments. Granted I do use it to see how speakers reproduce the "lisp/pop" (not the right word) in her singing. Some roll it off completely, others punctuate it to a point of irritation. The best sound like she's there with you and her slight exaggerations are just the right amount of crisp, but I'm not even sure that's what she sounds like in person. I suppose you could say the recording is useful, but not efficient since a denser recording would challenge the speakers in more ways at once.
 

dasdoing

Major Contributor
Joined
May 20, 2020
Messages
4,209
Likes
2,674
Location
Salvador-Bahia-Brasil
Rebecca Pidgeon's Spanish Harlem

it's a terrible recording with an aparently heavily resonating vocal booth made worse be a strange reverb and tons of saturation in production. I wonder if people started to use it because of it's flaws (that could reveal bad speakers by overempefysing) and over time people began to think it is used because it is a good recording lol
 
Last edited:

dualazmak

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 29, 2020
Messages
2,820
Likes
2,950
Location
Ichihara City, Chiba Prefecture, Japan
So my point is, that the pipe-organ has no clear bass notes below 70Hz-ish (it's more of a "rumble"), very contrary to that huge drum that our friend posted above
this guy made this video especificly to show 32 foot pipe. The deep frequencies are there, but below the G the overtones are much louder. I checked this with a spectrum analyser and the G curiously has the most output below 30Hz.

Although quite belated, I noticed your above comments with much interests.

Just for our reference, I use CD track of this organ piece for my system check which I believe has sustaining 37Hz huge pipe sound;

WS001625 (1).JPG
 

Gringoaudio1

Addicted to Fun and Learning
Forum Donor
Joined
Sep 11, 2019
Messages
585
Likes
742
Location
Calgary Alberta Canada
Does anybody else think Fast Car by Tracy Chapman is lacking in bass, thin sounding and with a glare to the mix that sounds unpleasant? I’m confused as to it’s inclusion as a test track.

The other tracks make a lot more sense to me. Maybe there’s more than one master floating around?
Nope. Plenty of bass. Clean and clear.
 

Zaireeka

Active Member
Joined
Nov 23, 2020
Messages
285
Likes
314
Location
fRAMCE
Edit to add "Wounded Knee" by Primus off Pork Soda. One of the best drum recordings I have ever heard. Maybe THE best.
You should dig Shellac's discography, hard to beat Albini's skills when it comes to recording drums.


Concerning Primus I especially enjoy how the drums sound on this particular tune:

 

dualazmak

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 29, 2020
Messages
2,820
Likes
2,950
Location
Ichihara City, Chiba Prefecture, Japan
this guy made this video especificly to show 32 foot pipe. The deep frequencies are there, but below the G the overtones are much louder. I checked this with a spectrum analyser and the G curiously has the most output below 30Hz. personaly, when I hear more overtones then the base frequency the note sound like the loudest frequency. The G actualy has no clear frequency peak to identify it's "dominant tone". It sure has a lot of energy.
So my point is, that the pipe-organ has no clear bass notes below 70Hz-ish (it's more of a "rumble"), very contrary to that huge drum that our friend posted above


Just for my curiosity, I too analyzed the track by Adobe Audition 3.0.1.
WS003825.JPG

Please note that I adjusted/manipulated the spectral control Range, Saturation, Gamma, Resolution Band so that I can easily "see" the low Fq pipe sounds.

I could confirm your observation that the track contains much of the low Fq sound below 30 Hz. Using my multichannel multi-driver multi-way multi-amplifier stereo system with L&R huge-heavy sub-woofer YAMAHA YST-SW1000 (capable of 16 Hz - 160 Hz), I can clearly "hear and feel" the pipes over 28 Hz by "my ears and body"; I also can "feel" the sound below 22 Hz mainly "by my body" as if it is a kind of low-Fq earthquake vibration shocks and/or low-Fq strong wind bursts of a big typhoon (maybe well understandable metaphors for people living in my country, Japan. ;))
 
Last edited:

dualazmak

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 29, 2020
Messages
2,820
Likes
2,950
Location
Ichihara City, Chiba Prefecture, Japan
.... I especially enjoy how the drums sound on this particular tune

How and what do you feel bass and drums on this tune (I have actual CD album), especially at 02:55 - 03:00?
 
Last edited:

Zaireeka

Active Member
Joined
Nov 23, 2020
Messages
285
Likes
314
Location
fRAMCE
How do you feel bass and drums on this tune (I have actual CD album), especially at 02:55 - 03:00?
I'll tell you later when I'm back from work. I ordered absorbers and basstraps that should have arrived so I'll probably do some tests this evening.

I really appreciate the cover in the meantime ;)
 
Last edited:

Zaireeka

Active Member
Joined
Nov 23, 2020
Messages
285
Likes
314
Location
fRAMCE
How and what do you feel bass and drums on this tune (I have actual CD album), especially at 02:55 - 03:00?
Kickdrum is a bit too wet/shy to my taste. Super smooth cymbals, very airy. I like the wide stereo on the snare aswell. Great tune, I'll listen to the whole album in the car tomorrow...


To stay in the jazz-fusion style, I really enjoy how the drum is recorded on the old Truffaz stuff:



 

itz_all_about_the_music

Active Member
Joined
Jan 18, 2022
Messages
125
Likes
112
Bob Katz's Honor Roll makes interesting reading.

http://www.digido.com/media/honor-roll.html

Oops! (Broken link)​

You blew up the Internet.

The page you are looking for is no longer here, or never existed in the first place (bummer). You can try searching for what you are looking for using the form below. If that still doesn't provide the results you are looking for, you can always start over from the home page.
 

Ralph_Cramden

Major Contributor
Joined
Dec 6, 2020
Messages
2,574
Likes
3,468
The BeeB used this for 30 years.


 

sofrep811

Active Member
Joined
Jun 4, 2016
Messages
253
Likes
319
Bought a new cartridge/styli and used Eric Clapton's new album Lockdown Sessions (also purchased with cartridge) and I'm amazed at how well this recording sounds. Unfortunately, I don't have any testing done--just my purely 24 Parts Gold Ears I was God given at birth.
 

fordiebianco

Senior Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Mar 11, 2020
Messages
355
Likes
752
Location
British Isles
I've only 1 Joe, an orig CD of Night & Day, and indeed it's well produced.

Looked at his catalog, Blaze of Glory, Big World, and Body & Soul look to be really well produced; but I've not ever heard 'em.

Would you recommend 'em musically, along side Night & Day?

BTW, welcome to ASR.
Nothing like answering a six year old query. 'Body and Soul' is indeed amazing, not only musically (some of his best wok, IMO), but also for its then revolutionary production values. Very much recommended.

For new speaker/amp/dac day listening I usually refer to the same 5 songs

Was (not was) with Bonny Raitt: Baby Mine
Donald Fagen: I.G.Y.
Donald Fagen: Snowbound (for Walter Becker's amazing bass line)
Matt Bianco: Summer Song (some very bright eighties high hats)
Dodi Freyr: 10 years
 

concorde1

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 15, 2021
Messages
362
Likes
275
Regarding "Brain Salad Surgery", I have the early Italy Manticore CD and the Victory CD (same as Rhino) which I find are quite bad sonically. The 2014 remaster I also don't enjoy sonically.

However, I have read that the Germany Manticore Sonopress CD (below) is good. I will try to grab one some day.

https://www.discogs.com/release/4775285-Emerson-Lake-Palmer-Brain-Salad-Surgery

Which version(s) have you heard?
The Italy Manticore sounds grainy and low-generation; the Victory sounds harsh; the 2014 is just OK but dull.

But the Germany Manticore Sonopress CD sounds really good actually. It arrived a while ago and I enjoy it much more than any other.
 

dasdoing

Major Contributor
Joined
May 20, 2020
Messages
4,209
Likes
2,674
Location
Salvador-Bahia-Brasil
Although quite belated, I noticed your above comments with much interests.

Just for our reference, I use CD track of this organ piece for my system check which I believe has sustaining 37Hz huge pipe sound;

View attachment 211554

sorry for delay. it is impressive. whole church must be vibrating lol. I espacialy like the note at 2:05
 

iulianm

Member
Joined
Jan 1, 2022
Messages
73
Likes
91
Location
Greater Seattle Area
I use Roger Waters - The Last Refugee (got the album 48kHz/24bit from HDTracks).
  • the drum kick and how it blends in the subwoofer with the main speakers
  • for the first minute I'm trying to separate all those radio broadcasts, with the piano in the back that feels to me sort of a wide stage
  • then Roger's voice comes in pretty much in center
  • 3:02 is my favorite part of having the female voices over Roger's one, somewhere in the top left corner
  • then at 3:30 the voices again but more difficult to separate
 

dualazmak

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 29, 2020
Messages
2,820
Likes
2,950
Location
Ichihara City, Chiba Prefecture, Japan
sorry for delay. it is impressive. whole church must be vibrating lol. I espacialy like the note at 2:05

As I wrote here, after purchasing this wonderful DORIAN's CD, I could have a chance attending Jean Guillou's organ concert at the Saint Ustache Church in Paris. That was really one of the most fantastic music experiences in my life... I hope I could go back to there someday.
 
Top Bottom