On a different note, share the artists you own that DON'T sound good

The wild cards in all of this are the pressing plant and mastering.  The sonics can vary wildly even with first pressings.  Not all remasters are bad.  @rtrlover The impex remaster of Souveniers is outstanding.  In general, though, I think a lot of the Stone's recordings sound muddy.

@rbgator94  Agreed on U2's earlier stuff, Though I love Joshua Tree so much I'm willing to tweak it with EQ to make it a little more palatable. I think Achtung Baby and All That You Can't Leave Behind are pretty decent or at least better recordings.

Rush Vapor Trails sounded so bad that I threw the CD in the garbage. About 10 years later they remastered the CD and it is one of their best releases.

@orthomead 

Not all remasters are bad.

Imagine any other industry having that reputation.

-- Not all Nissans are bad.

-- Not all Pioneer receivers are bad.

"Come to Bob's service station  Not all repairs are bad."

"Rent an apartment from World Wide realtors.  Not all apartments are bad."

"Bring your children to Big Kid medial services.  Not all of our doctors are bad."

Every re-master should have outstanding sound quality.  That the public has to hope that their re-master has good sound quality is shameful of the record companies.

Record companies should make their motto "Even a blind squirrel occasionally finds a nut.

@seymour-krelborn I can't argue with your logic.  I think that first pressings usually sound best, but not always.  Many of the AP remasters are superlative and are the definitive version.  Kind of Blue as an example. But the reality is most tape has lost its luster and original vinyl first presses are hard to find in great condition.  The other thing about remasters is they usually sound sonically different than the OG depending on who is pushing the faders.  Some are cleaner with more pronounced upper end details.  One might argue this isn't what the bands musical vision was, but most likely they were given the final product and didn't have a whole lot of input anyhow. So, remasters aren't all perfect, but there is a place for them.  And, by the way I'm referring to vinyl in my post, but the loudness wars in CD's also benefit from remastering IMHO.