This is a question maybe not best suited for the loudspeaker area, but wasn’t sure where to post.
My question is why do most of my cd’s sound unlistenable as I improve my system. It almost seems counterproductive to be spending thousands of dollars not to be able to listen to music that I love listening to.
Believe me that well recorded cd’s sound amazing, but starting to question what I’m trying to achieve.
Any thoughts on this?
I think this is a pretty common experience for those with resolving gear, especially when listening to CDs of popular music from a few decades ago. Some recordings are just so poorly engineered that they sound edgy, muddled, compressed or all of the above when played at significant volume on a good Hi-Fi system.
(I like to think they are perfect though for the boom boxes and car audio head units of yesteryear.)
I have learned to accept this and either don’t listen to certain CDs or never turn the volume level above “background” when listening.
Since I came of age in the 80’s, I have a lot of favorite music from my youth that sounds great in the car over the FM radio with the windows down and the volume cranked. “Wheel In the Sky”, anyone?
At home, in the sweet spot…not so much.
On the other hand, it does not matter which decade most of Bruce Springsteen’s music was recorded in. I find most of his more energetic songs to sound like crap on my system. Something purposeful about the way he likes his studio albums to be captured just doesn’t sit well with me (in most instances). 
I can’t believe you mentioned Springsteen. The reason being that I put on ‘Darkness on the Edge of Town’ and realized how horrible it sounds on my system. ‘Adam Raised a Cain’ I couldn’t hear his vocals on my system.
That is what prompted this thread. I hope others join in
All my bad sounding CDs were ripped into AIFF files. Somehow, they are more listenable through streaming.
I only listen to SACD and excellent recorded CDs from PST nowadays. As my system gets better my tolerance for bad recording has been shrinking at the same time.
I listen to much early Sinatra, Elvis, 40’s music. Am I going down the wrong path?
Ha!
I never had the pleasure of seeing Springsteen and the E-Street Band live but I believe the music would be raucous and a whole lot of fun live.
Most of his recordings just don’t cut it to my ears. There are a few exceptions in the form of cuts from live recordings though. I also can enjoy his stuff that is more acoustic in nature.
But, repeating myself here, I can’t stand the muddy, indistinct “wall of sound” that comes at you all too often from his recordings (and I am pretty sure its purposeful).
Cheers.
Ah yes. Bruce. What many fans would give to have a great sounding burn to run album. Darkness is actually better than that -at least the 96/24. I’d say his best recording is Ghost of Tom Joad.
Yep. Born to Run is great music (a great example) but its not very musical to my ears on a decent system.
On the other hand, the Doors’ L.A. Woman recorded in 1971 sounds phenomenal in the lowly CD format.
Highly recommended at any volume.
Bruce is just one example, but i’m glad that y’all are experiencing the same. For years on a cheap system everything sounded great.
Now that I’m older, and can afford an expensive system, I’m so confused
Listen to Rickie Lee Jones first release on Warner CD. No high-res. No MQA. And on digital, no remaster since about 1984.
It sounds magnificent, especially the all acoustic fifth track, Easy Money.
CDs and digital could deliver incredible sound quality from the beginning, yet the majors really didn’t care even while introducing a new medium that made them fortunes for many years.
Well, maybe it’s the bands. I mean Springsteen is pretty terrible. Maybe try some good music like Genesis? 
I rip all my CDs and run them through a program that tells me what their dynamic range is for each track.
“Decades old” CDs usually have better than 10db and sometime up to 15 dB dynamic range. Anything made in the last ten years, including “ReMasters” of the the “Decades Old” CDs have a dynamic range closer to 5 dB, sometimes up to 7 or 9 dB.
I am glad I have my old CDs. I also have many newer, Remastered versions. I like them both I but I prefer CDs from the early days before this mad “Compress the hell out of everything” madness took over.
In the early days they were trying to make use of the wide dynamic range that a CD is capable of. These days they seem to want to put out junk so people stop buying CDs and they can just sell data.
So I strongly disagree with those who believe things are better now than they once were.
I never got Springsteen. Still don’t. Never will.
And if crap also sounds crappy, what’s the point?
What this world needs is a decent or better recording of Layla by Derek and the Dominos. The best I’ve found is a murky mess.
a 1980s release:
A Remastered version of the same album:
The latter was compressed. but not too badly.
While I famously dislike Bruce (Nebraska excepted) I’m honestly just kidding.
It’s not about Springsteen…that just happened to be an example…how about all the great SONGS from the 40’s , 50’s and 60’s
I will never understand why dynamic recordings are being monstrously compressed. I like quiet parts.
I promise, I was just kidding with you and hijacked the point to attack Bruce.
I’m done. I won’t say more.
Here is a fine example:
Iggy and the Stooges Mixed by David Bowie:
Here is the Iggy Pop Mastered version:
Easily the most compressed version of any album I have ever encountered