Want to try something new, try La Spagna from BIS records.
Its old spanish music recorded on site with minimal micing and original dynamics and a super clean sound. You have all the soundstage you wish for, super resolving &clean, clean mids, dynamics through the roof.
The music is unusual but as a test track its works just fine.
Mike
Just adding my recent playlists here. I may do a separate thread for playlists specifically at some point but for now it can live here.
List 1:
List 2:
Hi guys, maybe interesting to some of you? Here is an article on some of the reference audio tracks we use within HEDD QC and beyond.
[ The HEDD Team's Go-To Reference Tracks | HEDD Audio]
Many thanks, hope everyone is well.
Freddy // HEDD
Thanks Freddy, that was really useful. I like it when people say what they’re listening for in a test track.
This is an awesome thread, my test playlist just got a lot longer.
One that I listen to as a sort of “final exam” is U2’s “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”.
That song is almost 100% a Daniel Lanois production, so very interesting textures on every guitar part. And there are a lot of guitar parts, 15-20 different ones, with Mr. Lanois treating the final mix like a performance in and of itself, weaving those different parts in and out of each other.
On average or even decent setups, the song’s a nice poppy thing with what seems like a simple chimey guitar bit, but with a really good setup, headphones or speakers (especially when it comes to imaging and soundstage, an 800s will bring you to tears), all those guitar parts separate, and it becomes something else entirely. Plus, with so much of the song in the mids/upper-mids, if something in the setup is going to get a bit peaky or sibilant, it’s 100% going to happen here.
If a setup doesn’t tip that song over that line from “80’s pop hit” to “Daniel Lanois Masterpiece”, it’s not gonna hit many high marks anywhere else.
Btw that’s not 15-20 track guitar part in the least.
Maybe you are confusing The Edges delay setting?
If I remember correctly his delay of choice ( and his Sig sound) is a Korg digital or analog delay. Can’t remember. And it’s set to 1/8 note delay. Through his Vox AC amps.
There’s like two guitar parts on that song unless they double tracked some parts. But I doubt they did that on the delayed guitar.
Lanoi is panning the guitar parts. Why you hear them coming everywhere. It’s like a ping pong delay setting. Half of the 8th notes are on the left and the other half on the right.
Beautiful song and Engineering for sure. They really don’t make music like they used to. But it’s a completely different industry now.
Hope that didn’t come off as dismissive. Didn’t mean for it. Rather just wanted to show his settings.
Btw if you like Daniel Lanois check out Rick Beato.
As a musican , I’ve been subscribed to his channel for years.
Amazing song breakdowns and interviews.
Enjoy!
This is a great interview of Daniel L.
https://youtu.be/vxP9kKzbCFA?si=TVIrM4iB7p9DXVak
And I found the breakdown of Where the streets have no name.
Rick absolutely rules.
To also breakdown (for the reviewers GoldenSound, DMS, Resolve and Listener etc.)
When analyzing different traits what tracks do you feel exhibit those traits the most?
i.e. Soundstage, Spatial Separation, Sibilance, Transients, Timbre, Tonal Accuracy, Tonal Balance, Attack and Decay, Dynamic Range, Microdynamics, Treble emphasis, Midrange emphasis, Bass emphasis, Sub bass extension, vocal clarity.
Having categories like this, with exemplary songs in each category would be great to know.
Look at some of @SenyorC ’s reviews from a year or so ago. He had a list and would go through it regularly. Much of this list was derived from folks on this forum.
There are a few other reviewers that have posted similar lists. I have my own (I’m not a reviewer) that include a some very specific songs as you suggest.
Many of us use Chameleon, by Trentemoller for bass - it comes in at about 0:27
I like to use Mercy Mercy Mercy, by Cannonball Adderly from Live at the Club for location accuracy. It’s actually not a live album, but the glasses clinking at the tables are expertly mixed for spatial location.
Daamn, that Mort de Socrate track is wild, it has such good out-of-head localization of the vocalist, it must have been recorded with at least two microphones if not an actual binaural rig. (Of course it helps quite a bit if you close your eyes for it, so your brain won’t know from the visual info that the singer isn’t actually in the room with you.)
I actually googled for this specific answer, these specific 2 songs, registered here just to like the comment. Cheers to you. Thosr are the 2 songs that define sound for me, when evaluating headphones, speakers or whatever.
This track is for drum tactility and overall headphone technical performance, especially at the 10min mark. Incredible piece of music.
Switched to Tidal Today from Qobuz & Apple Music. Here are my test tracks