Albums with bad production/recording quality/sound

Frost* are a band where each album sounded worse to my ears. Especially noticed in the cymbals. No decay and they don't sound real.

Dream Theater - Distance Over Time sounds bad to me. Mastered or mixed too hot and because of that I don't listen to it much.

Greco Bastian - With A Little Hell From My Friends. Drums sound bad. Overall, messy.

The Psychedelic Ensemble - all their records sound muddy to me. Such a shame, because the music is spectacular.

Anderson Stolt - Invention of Knowledge. Crushed to the max. And Jon never stops singing... Music needs space.

Lot's of bands that compete in the Loudness Wars. Haken's last few come to mind. And yes, it
ruins the experience for me.

Edited by The Anders - August 19 2023 at 17:57

The last few by Deluge Grander. The first two sounded good but the later ones not so much. It's like the band were kicked out of a studio and forced to record in a basement or something.

The Anders wrote: I have to say, I don't find the sound of the Soft Machine that bad actually. The production is a bit amateurish (some equalizing to add more treble would be welcome, because there is a LOT of bass), but on the other hand I quite like that it isn't so streamlined. It gives it some charm and some edge. This is part of what I also like about Can's albums btw.

Agreed. I like quite the murky sound of Third and got no issues with the sound of Can's albums.

Stressed Cheese wrote: -I have to mention Metallica, who have 3 (!) infamously bad sounding albums. 1) PA's favorite, ...And Justice For All, which has no audible bass, tinny guitars, and a snaredrum that sounds like a mouse-click (which tbf is a problem for a lot of thrash metal from the era),

Sure in regards to ...Justice it's a bit of a shame, but the actual songs and compositions are strong enough, so I forget about such issues while listening. Genuinely audiable bass in classic thrash is almost a rarity, so I've gotten used to it anyway:). I suppose I would have forgiven such things in regards to St. Anger and Death Magnetic if I cared enough for the musical content. All that said, for famously treble heavy but thin/poor-sounding 1980's metal like Death - Leprosy, Morbid Saint - Spectrum of Death... (I could make an endless list really) I love them warts and all -but just about any remastering is an upgrade and welcomed by me. It's become sort of a cliché to state that remastering messes with the original art - as most obscure (or famous) bands would have loved a more professional sound. It's funny that the early True Norwegian Black Metallers tried to imitate the production from all these bands that would have preferred to sound totally different themselves.

JD wrote: I'm going to go with Rush Vapor Trails. One of the absolute worse. I can't, for the life of me, understand why RUSH would allow such a travesty with their name on it to be released. It was sooooo bad they ended up remixing the whole thing, not as a marketing gimmick, but because it was one huge steaming pile of turd. The remix was a relief to hear.

Cristi wrote: Jared wrote:  But tbh, the remix didn't come as a great relief, it just re-affirmed in my mind that the album was in fact crap... Crap?! That's harsh IMO, the remix improves on the original, makes the songs a bit more listenable.

I also want to mention Illusions on a Double Dimple by Triumvirat. The one thing that keeps this from being a total masterpiece imo is the drum sound. It has a thud thud drum sound that I find rather annoying. The next one Spartacus might not be perfect in that area but it's still an improvement over Dimple. 

Jared wrote: JD wrote: I'm going to go with Rush Vapor Trails. One of the absolute worse. I can't, for the life of me, understand why RUSH would allow such a travesty with their name on it to be released. It was sooooo bad they ended up remixing the whole thing, not as a marketing gimmick, but because it was one huge steaming pile of turd. The remix was a relief to hear. It really was very bad indeed, wasn't it? But tbh, the remix didn't come as a great relief, it just re-affirmed in my mind that the album was in fact crap...

^I agree that some magic can only happen when the band plays together. However, Steely Dan "Aja" was mulitracked out the wazoo and is a perfect record for me.

JD wrote: The Anders wrote: I often have a big issue with records that sound too clean, and the beginning of digital recording is a good example of that. The sound becomes uninteresting, and there is often a lack of dynamics. I think especially some of the "old boys" rock albums from the 1990's suffer from that. A good example would be Dire Straits: On Every Street - an album I otherwise like, but the sound is just too boring. Or Voodoo Lounge by the Rolling Stone. Some of the amazing "ugliness" of their classic era records disappears out of the window. This "ugliness" (and I love that term) is the raw, stage sound that is missing on a lot of multi-track recordings as well. While it certainly has it's advantages (re-doing takes, layering etcetera), it misses that Live off the floor magic that can happen when musicians play together in one space at one time.