Air - Talkie Walkie
It's not my favourite album in the world, in fact I do not like it very much at all but I have to give it to these guys that they are pretty genius with sound. Take Alpha Beta Gaga for instance which is one of their most famous tunes as it is has been played on EVERY ADVERT EVERYWHERE, you can really hear the acoustic guitar creeping through the primary whistling sections although it doesn't feel like a very acoustic song and the way this perfectly levelled orchestra and acoustic sound is trying to break out center and right, this synth swell comes up left panned and you don't even realize that you are listening to classical orchestral/acoustic music and synth-pop at the same time. The whole album doesn't drop a beat all the way through, I think it is one of the best productions on an album that I own.
Amon Tobin - Foley Room
One of the main things you will notice about any amon tobin track is that it doesn't sound like HEY I AM A WELL PRODUCED album because he really plugs for all these vintage sounds that make his songs feel like something out of a 50's movie soundtrack and the fact that he succeeds in doing this is amazing. This guy manages to do things with sounds that I can't even comprehend. I'd really like to say BLOODSTONE BLOODSTONE BLOODSTONE for the way he blended this creepy orchestral theme and modern day electro music by using a printing press for a percussion instrument. The amazing thing about it is the fact that he just takes SOUNDS and turns SOUNDS into songs instead of instruments. Like on the track Esthers where he takes a motorbike engine, morphs it with a tigers roar and turns it into a lead instrument for an entire song. I don't know anybody else that does that and it sounds fucking ace.
Rob Dougan - Furious Angels
WELL HERE YOU GO JOKE ENTRY RIGHT!? Yeah sorry, I have a Rob Dougan album, it's not great but now that's out the way this dude is a production demon. I mean I have huge respect for ONE MAN BANDS that can WRITE music and then actually produce the sounds together that will make it listenable. Severing all matrix connections I think it really stands out on three of the tracks, the title "Furious Angels," "Clubbed to Death" and "I'm not Driving Anymore." Ragnar if you have not heard this I recommend you listen to this:
THIS I think with PRODUCTION the main importance is to really be able to fill all aspects of the sound and I do not know the technical term for this I'm afraid but when listening to music their area areas that when left absent will make a song sound flat and that's a big production let down. Amon Tobin, Air and Rob Dougan are the people who have so far managed to fill these voids outstandingly with these albums. I mention these albums because these are the ones that keep up production quality ALL THE WAY THROUGH despite the fact that Air's Talkie Walkie album is debatably NOT GREAT, Amon Tobin's Foley Room is NO WAY NEAR the best Amon Tobin album and Rob Dougan is notious for having JUST ONE SONG PLAYED EVER as part of the matrix soundtrack.
So, I hope I'm not accused of just listing shit that I think sounds good because these are not exactly the highlights of my musical collection, just the outstanding production quality pieces.
a couple of albums that I felt like mentioning but didn't are "Dial "M" for Monkey" by Bonobo, "Exit Planet Dust" by the chem bros and "Man with a Movie Camera" by the Cinematic Orchestra.
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Well-produced Albums