Best produced album / song?

[ArtyBoy]

What would be your Top 3 best-produced albums, or a particular song you think sounds great? I used to pay no attention to this stuff, but now that you can mix your own stuff at home, it's become really interesting to listen closer to my CD's and hear what's done.

Albums:

1.) Led Zeppelin I
2.) Boston debut
3.) Black Crowes, Southern Harmony

Song:
Zep, Since I've Been Loving You

[wombattt]

Best Produced album

Donald Fagen - The Nightfly

The Beatles - Abbey Road

Those two immediately sprung to my mind

I’d add...Pink Floyd - Animals

[I Coulda Hada VH]

A few off the top of my head:

Van Halen - Fair Warning

GNR - Appetite For Destruction

Steely Dan - Aja

[billy007]

I don't know anymore! Plenty of albums I thought sounded great initially have been remixed - Paul McCartney's Tug Of War, some of the late-era Beatles albums, etc. But I agree on Boston - that's always sounded good. For Led Zeppelin, the gold standard is the fourth album. That album just has a great sound to it. I think Supertramp's Breakfast In America has a nice clean sound to it. Hell, Van Halen for that matter.

Don't know if I can narrow down to a song.

[JUNGLE DRUMMER]

What would be your Top 3 best-produced albums, or a particular song you think sounds great? I used to pay no attention to this stuff, but now that you can mix your own stuff at home, it's become really interesting to listen closer to my CD's and hear what's done.

Albums:

1.) Led Zeppelin I
2.) Boston debut
3.) Black Crowes, Southern Harmony

Song:
Zep, Since I've Been Loving You

I know Tom Scholz is a genius, but honestly, I don't really like the sound of the Boston albums that much. Not sure why. Something "sterile" about them, or flat, especially the drums.

LZI is definitely up there, with How Many More Times and Dazed And Confused being amazing.

Whole Lotta Love is another specific song that's sonically impressive.

I know you and I were discussing the Tool albums and how sonically well mixed they are. Lateralus, both the album and the title track is an amazingly produced album. I also love the production on Aenima and the new album, Fear Inoculum.

I still say the work that Glenn Ballard and Erwin Musper did with VH for the two BVO1 tracks in 1996 are among the greatest sonically produced tunes I've ever heard. The drum sound on those two tracks is absolutely incredible. Probably the only time in VH studio history where it literally sounds like you are sitting right next to Al in the studio.

I'll probably get some raised eyebrows on this site, but really IMO, one of the best sounding albums I've ever heard is Horrorscope by Eve 6. Eve 6 is probably not a band anyone hear liked but this is a terrific album. Powerful without being overly loud and every instrument is crisp and clear.

These are just a few I thought of right away off the top of my head.

Edit- Oops, sorry Art, I didn't pay attention to your request for "top 3" albums. That would be pretty hard. I know two of them would be LZI and Lateralus for sure. I always wondered what a VH album wouldve sounded like with Jimmy Page producing.

[fudd]

Led Zeppelin-houses of the holy
Van Halen-1-WACF-FW-DD
The Beatles- Sgt Peppers
Def Leppard- high n dry



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[JUNGLE DRUMMER]

A few off the top of my head:

Van Halen - Fair Warning

GNR - Appetite For Destruction

Steely Dan - Aja

Despite their little flaws here and there, I love the six pack albums with Ted and Donn at the helm. FW is definitely pretty terrific sonically. My ONLY gripe would be that on some of the tracks Al's kick drum sounds too "padded" or buried in the mix. Mean Street for example. Such an amazing, funky performance by Al, but it would have kicked total ass if that track had a booming Bonham-like or a Me Wise Magic kick drum sound. But all of the first 5 VH albums recorded at Sunset have a really warm, intimate tone to them for sure. 1984 is more harsh and "metallic" sounding to my ears, maybe because of the acoustics in 5150, but it is also impressive and the harsher tone definitely fits the material on that album, especially tunes like DDL, GGB, and HOP.

[JUNGLE DRUMMER]

Led Zeppelin-houses of the holy
Van Halen-1-WACF-FW-DD
The Beatles- Sgt Peppers
Def Leppard- high n dry



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WACF is the greatest raw, "live in the studio" feeling album ever, IMO. Even with the few overdubs, it still just "sounds" like the four of them sitting in one room jamming together and Ted just hit "record" on the console.

Especially Romeo Delight. I can almost imagine the walls of the studio catching on fire while the band was recording it, they were blazing so hard, particularly during the outro.

[KS 5150]

I'm going to say, from a straight production perspective, Def Leppard - Hysteria. Say what you want about the album, the production & engineering work is stellar. Watch the "Classic Albums" doc on the making of the album to understand more the genius of Mutt Lange. I'm not counting the Beatles as I think everyone realizes how innovative George Martin was. YMMV

EDIT: You wanted 3 albums. Here is my list:

1) Def Leppard - Hysteria
2) Boston - Boston
3) Beach Boys - Pet Sounds

[JUNGLE DRUMMER]

Lateralus, the title track, by Tool. Brilliant production IMO.



Ticks & Leeches off the same album. Those drums!

[JUNGLE DRUMMER]

A couple of my favorite tracks off that Eve 6 album. People here will probably hate the songs, but just from a production standpoint I think they sound excellent.

[noise next door]

The 6 Pack by far is my favorite ... but that's mostly due to EVH's amp tone and Alex's/Donn's genius drum tuning and micing which I don't know qualify as a pure production element.


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Other Favs:

Love Some Girls... nice and dirty... Mostly mixed by Chris Kimsey I believe




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RATT's "Invasion" is also very cool sounding thanks to Beau Hill & Jim Faraci

[lovemachine97(Version 2)]

This is a hard topic because a producer can be responsible for so many things that we may never know.

Take one recent example from Steve Gorman’s book. The “Stop / Understand me / I ain’t afraid / Of losing’ face” section of Black Crowes’ Jealous Again was suggested by George Drakoulias. They’d played that song around live without that part up until then. Totally changes the song.

Another example, if you have the STP Core Super Deluxe 25th anniversary edition, the demo of “Creep” has a bridge in it. They weren’t finding the song when recording Core and finally Brendan O’Brien told them to just take it out. The recording subsequently came together and it works much better.

Which brings me to, if we’re talking about sound, it’s hard to do better than Brendan O’Brien’s catalog.

A couple of my favorite tracks off that Eve 6 album. People here will probably hate the songs, but just from a production standpoint I think they sound excellent.

I actually love the songs. Eve 6 is a guilty pleasure band. And this album was ahead of its time, as this kind of sound came back into favor for a while years later. (I’ve even seen them in concert.)


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[JUNGLE DRUMMER]

This is a hard topic because a producer can be responsible for so many things that we may never know.

Take one recent example from Steve Gorman’s book. The “Stop / Understand me / I ain’t afraid / Of losing’ face” section of Black Crowes’ Jealous Again was suggested by George Drakoulias. They’d played that song around live without that part up until then. Totally changes the song.

Another example, if you have the STP Core Super Deluxe 25th anniversary edition, the demo of “Creep” has a bridge in it. They weren’t finding the song when recording Core and finally Brendan O’Brien told them to just take it out. The recording subsequently came together and it works much better.

Which brings me to, if we’re talking about sound, it’s hard to do better than Brendan O’Brien’s catalog.



I actually love the songs. Eve 6 is a guilty pleasure band. And this album was ahead of its time, as this kind of sound came back into favor for a while years later. (I’ve even seen them in concert.)


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Horrorscope has been one of my most consistently played albums of the last 20 years. It's definitely Eve 6's best album. Consistently good all the way through, not a bad tune on the album. I know they got back together a couple years back, but with a different guitarist unfortunately, but I havent listened to any of that recent stuff. If you have, is it any good?

[RRvh1]

It was producer Ted Templeman's idea to include it, yet kudos also have to go to engineer Don Landee, for Eruption... Like an old Guitar World quote - "It sounded like an atomic bomb!"

The 1984 album has perfect production and engineering. Though not one of my top ten or fifteen bands (sorry Fudd), Def Leopard's Hysteria is pristine as well.

Whitesnake (self titled) always sounded great to me.