Musical Badness

[Rip Van Woofer]

<font color='#000000'>Let's have some cheap fun at other people's expense!

Nominate your worst recordings -- be it due to performance, recording quality or both. Extra points for how completely and colorfully you describe the suckiness that makes it so...special. No fair picking on early recordings due to the limitations of the technology available then, though. And no easy targets like Backstreet Boys or Celine Dion.

Here's mine (a bit obscure):

Poulenc's Concerto for Two Pianos. Elan CD 82298 &quot;20 bit digital&quot;. Perfomed by the Clinton-Narboni piano duo, Orchestre du Conservatoire du Centre du Paris.

I like Poulenc and set out to find a recording of this piece. It seems to be little recorded. Too bad, because it's a good work. And too bad I got this turkey! Nothing wrong with the performance, really, but it has to be the driest recording ever made. It sounds like the entire orchestra and soloists were crammed into a small padded room with a couple of microphones! Hall ambience? Zilch. Front/back soundstaging? Fuhgeddaboutit! It does have stereo separation but otherwise it sounds like a '30s movie soundtrack with a better frequency range.

OK, your turn. And can anyone suggest a good recording of this piece?</font>

 

[A. Vivaldi]

<font color='#000000'>Finally! A thread were I can flaunt my expertise, which is criticizing and bitching about stuff that sucks!  I'll have to get back on you with the bad classical, Rip. I usually sell all my bad ones so I can't remember. There's been too many. I'm very picky with classical. One bad rock recording I had was The Dave Clark Fives Greatest Hits. All the songs sounded like they were recorded under a metal garbage can. What was worse was it was a newer remastered cd! I don't think it was the cds fault though, just that The Dave Clark Five sucked worse than I thought. I was used to hearing them on the oldies stations on cheap radios, and their cd on my nice system really brought their suckiness through. I can't believe these guys were once compared to The Beatles! There were better bands making far better recordings in the sixties then The Dave Clark Five. A great performance, but bad sounding recording on remastered cd (I'd hate to hear the early cd version) is Genesis: The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway. It's one of those annoying inconsistent recordings where some parts sound good and others bad. Peter Gabriel's vocals are too closely miked on certain parts, other sections suddenly get very loud and harsh for no apparent reason, Phil Collins drums sound thin and weak, Steve Hackett's guitar does little else but make barely audible fart noises throughout the whole thing, and Tony Bank's keyboards dominate everything, which is the only thing that saved it because I love his keyboards. What's strange is all the other Genesis albums sound pretty good. I don't know what went wrong here. There aren't too many performers that I can't at least tolerate in the rock world, except two. Bruce Springsteen and Meatloaf. I can't stomach ANYTHING they do. Bruce Springsteen is the biggest overrated non-talent I've ever heard, and Meatloaf will drive me out of a room. Come to think of it, another overrated performer I think sucks is David Bowie, but at least he made one song I kind of liked. That's it for me.

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[Rip Van Woofer]

<font color='#000000'>How can you dis the Dave Clark Five!?! They were only surpassed by Herman's Hermits, IMO. Sing along now: &quot;I'm 'En-er-y the Eighth I am, 'En-er-y the Eighth I am, I am...&quot; Doesn't get any better!

Gee, I had hoped this thread would arouse the baser instincts of more around here!</font>

 

[Guest]

<font color='#000000'>as much as I like eric burden and the &nbsp;old animals with sky pilot, monterey and the house of the rising sun, that dvd of his, eric burden and the new animals, live at the coach house, makes any herman hermit's crooning sound good. this dvd was so bad I returned it, and was lucky they didn't have another one to replace it with. wasn't even close to the sound I remembered.</font>

 

[jeffsg4mac]

<font color='#000000'>The new Journey on SACD, I love the songs and a couple are fantastic, but the quality sucks bad on some and really sucks bad on others. The sound engineer should be fired

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[goodman]

<font color='#000000'>I like SACD. &nbsp;I have about a dozen SACDs so far, and most are excellent. &nbsp;But this is a thread for bitching, right? &nbsp;Well, when you spend $25 for an SACD, you have a right to expect superior sound quality. &nbsp;Well, I'm stuck with two that suck: The first is Johnny cash's &quot;Live at Folsomn Prison.&quot; &nbsp;I love Johnny, but this SACD sounds awful. &nbsp;I have a redbook Johnny Cash CD that is far superior. &nbsp;Another SACD I hate is an ABKCO Rolling Stones release. &nbsp;I can't rememver the title, but it sounds terrible. &nbsp;I have a redbook of the Stones that is much better. &nbsp;Yuk. &nbsp;We coulda had a couple steak dinners at the Outback for the money thrown away on those two pieces of garbage.</font>

 

[A. Vivaldi]

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goodman : <font color='#000000'>I like SACD.  I have about a dozen SACDs so far, and most are excellent.  But this is a thread for bitching, right?  Well, when you spend $25 for an SACD, you have a right to expect superior sound quality.  Well, I'm stuck with two that suck: The first is Johnny cash's &quot;Live at Folsomn Prison.&quot;  I love Johnny, but this SACD sounds awful.  I have a redbook Johnny Cash CD that is far superior.  Another SACD I hate is an ABKCO Rolling Stones release.  I can't rememver the title, but it sounds terrible.  I have a redbook of the Stones that is much better.  Yuk.  We coulda had a couple steak dinners at the Outback for the money thrown away on those two pieces of garbage.</font>

<font color='#000000'>Hmm... I have some sacds that performed below my expectations, but I never had one that sounded worse than a cd. You didn't say if the redbook cds of The Stones and Johnny Cash you have are the same titles as the sacds. Those may just be bad sounding recordings in any format. Did you do any comparisons between the redbook cd and sacd?</font>

 

[A. Vivaldi]

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Rip Van Woofer : <font color='#000000'>How can you dis the Dave Clark Five!?! They were only surpassed by Herman's Hermits, IMO. Sing along now: &quot;I'm 'En-er-y the Eighth I am, 'En-er-y the Eighth I am, I am...&quot; Doesn't get any better!

Gee, I had hoped this thread would arouse the baser instincts of more around here!</font>

<font color='#000000'>At least the Hermits had a half-way decent sound!

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[A. Vivaldi]

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jeffsg4mac : <font color='#000000'>The new Journey on SACD, I love the songs and a couple are fantastic, but the quality sucks bad on some and really sucks bad on others. The sound engineer should be fired

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<font color='#000000'>I was just curious to know if you listened to it in multi-channel or stereo?</font>

 

[jeffsg4mac]

<font color='#000000'>Vivaldi; the Journey disk is only stereo on the SACD, I am talking about their new release with the new singer not the older ones. I have not heard those. I only have one other SACD that is just stereo and that is the Footloose soundtrack my wife wanted. It sounds better than the new Journey recording

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[goodman]

<font color='#000000'><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Hmm... I have some sacds that performed below my expectations, but I never had one that sounded worse than a cd. You didn't say if the redbook cds of The Stones and Johnny Cash you have are the same titles as the sacds. Those may just be bad sounding recordings in any format. Did you do any comparisons between the redbook cd and sacd?</td></tr></table>
No. &nbsp;These were not direct comparisons of the same title in SACD and Red Book. &nbsp;Although it would be interesting to make such comparisons, I'm not wasting any more Outback steaks on those turkeys!</font>

 

[goodman]

<font color='#000000'>Incidentally, A. Vivaldi, I enjoy your work very much, especially The Four Seasons. &nbsp;I have it on vinyl and CD, and &nbsp;I intend to buy it on SACD. &nbsp;My granddaughter plays it on her violin. &nbsp;She's not too bad. &nbsp;I'll have to tell her that I know you.</font>

 

[Rip Van Woofer]

<font color='#000000'><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Incidentally, A. Vivaldi, I enjoy your work very much, especially The Four Seasons.</td></tr></table>

That's a different A. Vivaldi. Rumor has it that our A. Vivaldi took his handle from a little-known Italian death-metal band...only a rumor, though.

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[A. Vivaldi]

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goodman : <font color='#000000'>Incidentally, A. Vivaldi, I enjoy your work very much, especially The Four Seasons.  I have it on vinyl and CD, and  I intend to buy it on SACD.  My granddaughter plays it on her violin.  She's not too bad.  I'll have to tell her that I know you.</font>

<font color='#000000'>Grazie senore, I'm touched, but I have written other works you know! Dosen't anybody care about my operas anymore! Anyway, if you must have yet another recording of my most famous compostion, I'd recommend Violinist Rachel Podger's new one on sacd by Channel Classics. It is of reference quality.

www.channelclassics.com</font>

 

[A. Vivaldi]

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jeffsg4mac : Vivaldi; the Journey disk is only stereo on the SACD, I am talking about their new release with the new singer not the older ones. I have not heard those. I only have one other SACD that is just stereo and that is the Footloose soundtrack my wife wanted. It sounds better than the new Journey recording

Sorry, The only one I knew of on sacd was their greatest hits. I didn't know if it was only two channel or not. I wasn't even aware that Journey was still making albums or that they had a new singer! Shows how out of touch I am with the new pop/rock scene.  

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[rorythedog]

<font color='#000000'>Anything by 'Heart'.

Total Bo****ks!

Red Hot Chilli Peppers - Californication
Great Music - Crap sound.</font>