Top production albums everyone should have?

[Plasmaterial]

Mercenary - The Hours That Remain
Machine Head - Burn My Eyes/The Blackening
Fear Factory - Demanufacture
Darkest Hour - Deliver Us
At the Gates - Slaughter of the Soul

 

[P-E]

Surprised to see so much love for Ghost Reveries, IMO Blackwater Park and Watershed are both better mixes (they sound vastly different, but both sound great, loving the kinda washed-out, beautiful mids on Watershed).

 

[PhilTheBeard]

Bury Your Dead- Beauty and the Breakdown

kinda surprised no one put this on here yet.

 

[aramism]

while we're at it - michael jackson - thriller

most natural sounding like anything ever. there is soo much dynamic range and space and it accents the super super fine playing of all the session musicians and michael's fine vocal performances. i read bruce swediens books and he barely compresses anything at all and relies on a sound performance which is naturally even. you could really hear that on thriller.

 

[Harry Hughes]

Good list by Ermz, but yeah like Morgan said, I do find the guitars to be on the harsh sounding side on some of the songs on the Nickelback album. Fight For all The Wrong Reasons stands out in particular as having a kinda scratchy, annoying guitar sound IMHO. But again, as Morgan said, goddamn dynamic mix. Now if only the music was better...........

I'll have to throw in Linkin Park's "Hybrid Theory". The guitars always sounded sexy to me, that perfect amount of high and upper mids and total lack of fizz.
It also has some of that sexy Andy Wallace guitar and bass guitar blend happening. Not quite as good as the Korn album that Ermz mentioned, but pretty damn nice for an album released in 2000 nonetheless.

Another vote for Riot!, Organic Hallucinosis and Rhythm Chord & Melody.
Organic Hallucinosis just sounds like a death metal album should, which is just straight out ridiculously brutal. The music and production just go together so well for that "Gonna go and destroy buildings with heavy machinery" vibe.
Rhythm Chord & Melody is just beautiful. Song writing is just absolutely top notch and the production is the icing on the cake. Very talented band indeed.

 

[Ermz]

I've been trying to find somewhere to purchase a lossless version of 'Rhythm, Chord & Melody' for a while but can't turn anything up. I don't want the actual CD, just a FLAC or wav download. The band's webstore doesn't seem to even be distributing it at all.

 

[Acesulfame]

Just buy the CD mate, so worth it. Such a nice clean sound but has so much depth as well. "Great Blue Sea" makes me want to slip into a coma (but a really fucking good coma). I don't understand why this band is still so unheard of.

 

[Cheesebone]

Dead Letter Circus - This is the Warning

Karnivool - Themata

Extol - Undeceived

Metallica - Metallica

This or the Apocalypse - Haunt What's Left

All That Remains - The Fall of Ideals

Nine Inch Nails - The Fragile

Ten Foot Pole - Insider

Beerbong - Beerbong

 

[Jarkko Mattheiszen]

Forgot this one:

Beck - Sea Change

 

[P-E]

Forgot one of the best ever : Underoath - Disambiguation.

Amazing vibe, low-end and drums; great everything else.

 

[Skaldir]

Forgot this one:

Beck - Sea Change

I like this album, but its fuckin' DRY!

 

[dan weapon]

Just some personal favourites:

Metallica - Metallica
Devin Townsend - Ocean Machine (also love Terria and SYL's City)
Fear Factory - Demanufacture
Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here
Yes - 90125
Machine Head - Burn My Eyes
Deftones - Diamond Eyes
Tool - 10,000 Days
Pantera - Far Beyond Driven
Michael Jackson - Bad
Seal - Kiss From A Rose

And too many of Andy's work to mention individual albums.

 

[Revson]

Dark New Day - 12 Year Silence
Alter Bridge - Blackbird
The Contortionist - Exoplanet
Karnivool - Sound Awake
The Ocean - Heliocentric/Anthropocentric
Thrice - Alchemy Index Vol. I-IV
Beneath the Massacre - Maree Noire EP
Mastodon - Blood Mountain
Sikth - Death of a Dead Day

 

[jeb]

+ 1000 on blackbird from alter bridge!!

 

[CAlexanderParra]

Surprised to see Rhythm, Chord, & Melody getting some love on here. Great sounding album.

For Devy I'm gonna have to say Synchestra, hands down. It is by far the most creative mix I have ever heard.

 

[prostetnic]

The vocal production on this album is just ridiculous. The overall mix is huge win in my book, and the songs are taaaastyy - like Rob Zombie, FF and Meshuggah had a bastard catchy child.

 

[botus99]

Mr Bungle - Self-titled (clarity and has a nice "snap")
The Mars Volta - Frances the Mute (fat drums and bass and excellent guitar textures/placing in mix)
Omar Rodriguez-Lopez - Xenophanes (my favorite drum production of the moment, excellent rhythm sound overall)
Pantera - The Great Southern Trendkill (sharp, hard, and aggressive in such a pleasing way: Eargasm)
Robert Randolph & The Family Band - Colorblind (FATTEST sound I've ever heard, EXTREMELY well produced)
Rage Against The Machine - Self-titled (why has no one mentioned this one yet? We all know why its great)
Soundgarden - Superunknown (not even sure why I love this one, but I do)
Slayer - God Hates Us All (insanely aggressive, love the vibe of the drums and vox)

 

[Mattayus]

The vocal production on this album is just ridiculous. The overall mix is huge win in my book, and the songs are taaaastyy - like Rob Zombie, FF and Meshuggah had a bastard catchy child.

Good call man
I fuckin love Sons of The System, it's possibly the heaviest production put to disc, but don't you find the mastering on that album incredibly irritating? Pumps like a son of a bitch and is just suuuuuppper crushed.

Example:



Bass tone = hench.

 

[Severu]

... and with the risk of being flamed, "Somewhere in Time" for the absolute BEST hi-hat sound I've ever heard (especially tasty if listened on expensive hi-end speakers), you can really feel it on the back of your throat (only on CD).
That's the CD I always take with me to speaker auditions, it seems to reveal lots of things about the system's hi-end response. Just check out the beginning of Wasted Years and Loneliness of the long distance runner (again, CD version only) to hear what I'm talking about...

 

[prostetnic]

Good call man
I fuckin love Sons of The System, it's possibly the heaviest production put to disc, but don't you find the mastering on that album incredibly irritating?

I assume we are talking about TAIS - I have never found it irritating. They really pushed it, but it seems they knew right when to stop. It fits the mechanical/industrial/pseudo-digital vibe of the overall sound and makes the music sound even more explosive... so much energy, even if it lacks dynamics. I haven't listened to their later stuff with Guilewhathisname... I saw a video with him butchering Door 2.12 and acting like a 12 year old on stage and that really turned me off. His former band Scarve is killer though