oldred Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 I usually just use this list http://portable-speakers-review.toptenreviews.com/top-ten-songs-to-test-your-speakers.html G.E.M Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wvu80 Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 Here are three quick and dirty Youtube vids, male vocal, female vocal and piano. They are fun to watch and have pretty good quality for Youtube vids. Randy Travis singing starts at :50. This exposes a string bass and an incredible male vocal. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgJXbIP83A8 Dixie Chicks vid also has some good drums and good bass for a music video. This is one of the best recordings of a grand piano I've ever heard, Chick Corea is not boring to listen to. This will stretch out your speakers from high notes to very low notes, and if you play your system LOUD (with sub), it will SOUND like a grand piano does live! Good stuff everywhere, and great drums. Check out Spanish Fantasy Part 3. which starts 1:04:40. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teaman Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 Michael Jackson - Dirty Diana. Pitchy Jackson vocals with hard strumming bass and some wild guitar. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimjimbo Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 Just about anything from the Steely Dan "Aja" album... 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MORE KLIPSCH PLEASE Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 Just about anything from the Steely Dan "Aja" album... I was just playing that this weekend and I said to myself........................... damn that sounds good MKP :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MKP'S BOSS Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 many many moons ago..... we found Klipsch LaScalas in the paper (yes, the paper). Bought them, Loved them. My favorite song to play on them LOUD was C&C music Factory GOTTA LIVE HAPPY. Crisp soprano vocals and deep rich bass. That is my go - to test song when we buy speakers. mkp does all the techy stuff. i just listen. Every set of speakers we have bought/looked at since has to pass the GOTTA LIVE HAPPY test. A lot of them stay with the sellers. Haven't found a set of klipsch that fails the test yet. lol we were friendly with a guy from Gramophone. Nice boutique type stereo store. He INSISTED that we take home a set of KEF. i really did not want to - afraid we would blow them up. he swore by them, and would not hold us accountable. well.... we blew them up. now i have a new favorite in addition to that song -- Black Box RIDE ON TIME i love testing speakers.... 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChuckAb3 Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 Among others, I always take something classical and it's often overtures from Wagner's operas. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shiva Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 (edited) I have often brought this song to test a speakers bass. It sounds quite nice on my Epic CF3's. It is an easy to remember bass tone and if the speaker doesn't hit it with the right fullness that i am used to, I am not interested. Massive Attack, the song Sly. Edited June 1, 2016 by shiva Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shiva Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 (edited) This is another song I like to use. It has a simplicity that is good for the somewhat fleeting music memory that people often refer to. The dynamic finger snapping in the beginning, placed somewhat high and to the right in the soundstage, the full-bodied upright bass, the power of the simple vocal, some reverberant sounds of the room. If the speaker does not convey some of those things, move on. Edited June 1, 2016 by shiva 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
muel Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 My favorite is Prokofiev, Romeo and Juliet, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, London Records. There was a direct-to-disc phonograph recording of Romeo & Juliet by Sheffield Lab done in the late 1970s by Doug Sax with Erich Leinsdorf and the LA Philharmonic that was my test disc. No mastering on that recording. The dynamics were difficult to keep the needle in the groove and the loudspeakers from sounding "loud", i.e., in my non-Klipsch era using planars from the early 80s to the mid-2000s. That recording is spectacular still, if you can ignore the ticks and pops that have built up over 3 1/2 decades of use--something that I've always found difficult to do. Chris I'm listening to a two-CD set of these same recordings--Leinsdorf and the LA Philharmonic playing Prokofiev's Romeo & Juliet plus Stravinsky's The Firebird, and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, Die Walküre, Der Götterdämmerung, etc. These are the most live CDs that I own. They were produced direct-to-tape then transferred to CD with no mastering. These two discs are my new CD reference for orchestral recordings. Caveat emptor applies: they're extremely dynamic recordings--much more than anything else in this genre that I've heard. Chris Are these the same as the Leinsdorf Sessions Vol 1 and 2? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wolfbane Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 I'd find a couple of Jazz albums I like with both female and male solo's in seperate tracks and minimal background instrumentation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris A Posted June 1, 2016 Share Posted June 1, 2016 (edited) Are these the same as the Leinsdorf Sessions Vol 1 and 2? Yes. Note that I'm having to do some unmastering of these tracks on the second disc, but mostly it's restoring the bass below 400 Hz linearly down to 40 Hz (+6 dB) on disc #2. There's also a little 4-6-9 kHz boost (+3 dB) needed in the Firebird tracks. These are fairly mild mastering curves, and really are there for those that have the older preamplifier tone controls that typically turn over about at 400 Hz and ~4 Khz. Chris Edited June 2, 2016 by Chris A Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MORE KLIPSCH PLEASE Posted June 2, 2016 Share Posted June 2, 2016 i love testing speakers.... You've also tested the "headroom" of alot of amps MKP :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fromnowon Posted June 4, 2016 Share Posted June 4, 2016 Back in the 70s . . . I remember hifi stores with rows of speakers that you could test. This album was one of the ones that was known for being good for testing. I didn't see it mentioned so felt obligated to contribute! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fromnowon Posted June 4, 2016 Share Posted June 4, 2016 Oops the attachment didn't make it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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