Great reviews. Mine are a little different. Thanks for throwing a bit of love for "Tonight". It's always so heavily criticised. Not his greatest l know, but still has some great songs on it.
@alansteadreviews3 күн бұрын
Glad you enjoyed it! 😊
@EverestNZ9 күн бұрын
Not bad ...being a Bowie fan for 55 years I would put Low number 1.....but that could change tomorrow....lol
@EverestNZ9 күн бұрын
the redone version of Never let me down is much better...but still average
@EverestNZ9 күн бұрын
Same...www.youtube.com/@EverestNZ
@jasejj25 күн бұрын
This doesn't account for all of them, but a large part of the issue here is that a lot of recent "CD" players on the market (made in the last 15 years) are actually repackaged cheap DVD players. The original DVD player designs that these came from play CDs in software rather than just streaming the data direct from the disc and reset the buffer every time they move to the next track (in effect they treat each track as a file). The problem is that there isn't much of a market for CD-only players anymore and this forced manufacturers down the DVD route.
@dumpwoodhereАй бұрын
Good personal best of but for me tonight, never let me down and tin machine is the bottom of the list. Good to see his first album mid way. But, man who sold the world is a brilliant masterpice and Bowie and Ronson at their most extreme unbridled peak. No.2 for me with Hunky Dory at no.1. Also, the Ziggy motion picture Has to be in there because it was so important to us first gen fans at the time and contains very important material. A very enjoyable and well made best of.
@alansteadreviews29 күн бұрын
Cheers for watching. Glad you enjoyed it. 🤠
@michaelfoley5932Ай бұрын
The problem with your Abbey Road CD creating gaps might have something to do with an unusual feature of all the Beatle 2009 STEREO CDs. They all contain an extra VIDEO track about the album. I've never found any problem ripping them and all my CD players play those albums perfectly but maybe this extra video track is affecting your car CD player. It may not be the explanation but you did mention your Sgt Pepper album played okay - but maybe that was an earlier edition which did not contain the video track. Incidentally, my son bought that very Topaz player some years ago. It took him a while to notice the gap problem. He contacted Cambridge Audio and was told it was a "design feature"!!!!!
@alansteadreviewsАй бұрын
The Sgt. Pepper CD is indeed an earlier version, but weirdly the 2009 version of The White album doesn't have any gaps in the car, so it may just be a quirk with the way the video file was just put on that CD or something else entirely. Who knows? As for Cambridge Audio, when I rang them about it I was told a similar thing. Very frustrating. Fortunately their latest products seem unaffected though.
@mrscenescof47472 ай бұрын
3. Ziggy Stardust 2. Hunky Dory 1. Aladdin Sane
@davejones5382 ай бұрын
Sometimes you have to change the output on cd player. Think its encode of the dacs that course the gaps? Is the a gap if you use as transport
@alansteadreviews2 ай бұрын
On my brother's Topaz CD10 system there is sadly no cure for the gap. Others have the option of firmware updates to solve it, but I don't think it's anything to do with the dac, but I might be wrong.
@davejones5382 ай бұрын
@@alansteadreviews Yep had a quick look at manual nothing you can change on it ☹I've got Marantz cd 6007 and it been excellent 👍its almost like when you play from a NAS and you transcode flac to mp3 the transcoding makes gaps
@stephenc66482 ай бұрын
There will be people whose CDs contain only distinct songs and don't care about the gaps separating them. They probably won't even understand what this video is about. Perhaps the designers of modern, gappy, CD players are among them. For listeners to classical music, the gaps are disastrous. Many classical CDs, especially ballet and choral music, have tracks that aren't there to provide breaks in the music; they're just to indicate where you are on the disc. In the early days of the CD, some discs had index marks, separate from the track numbers and players had the ability to show them but I haven't seen either for many years. CD Text, as demonstrated on the Yamaha, seems to have been added and died out much more recently. I don't think I've ever owned a player that could do it. That Yamaha looks like a nice little system. There aren't many like that on the market now.
@alansteadreviews2 ай бұрын
Yeah I hope my Yamaha keeps going for a bit longer yet. 🤞
@alainbaars2 ай бұрын
Heroes by far, the whole album Low Ziggy Stardust Hunky Dory Songs: Neukoln Rock 'roll Suicide Look back in Anger
@johnpownall77202 ай бұрын
Good ranking for the top 6 - I’d probably relegate Space Oddity, and put Lodger and Young Americans higher. I agree about Heathen, by the way, it restored my faith too. Heroes divides opinion these days, as an album, but at the time I recall it being viewed as stronger than Low. It’s just a very different album, and lyrically miles ahead. Sonically, though, Low is hard to beat. I’d probably put Low on the turntable before Ziggy these days, so might have Low at 1 and HD at 2.
@alansteadreviews2 ай бұрын
Cheers. Glad you enjoyed the video. 🤠
@alansteadreviews2 ай бұрын
And yeah... You're right, Heroes has a lot more going on lyrically compared to Low.
@paulsontag92332 ай бұрын
Your accent reminds me so much of Pete Townsend. Are you from Shepherd’s Bush?
@cutalin3 ай бұрын
My favourite albums are at the bottom of the top. All the Let's dance-Never let me down era and Outside-Reality era, plus the Heroes album are absolute masterpieces
@peternelson55344 ай бұрын
Watch that man is a great track and a great opener. It’s one that id like to do on karaoke sometime. I enjoyed this programme. I didn’t agree entirely but that’s never a bad thing. I don’t often subscribe to anything but I have here.
@alansteadreviews4 ай бұрын
Cheers. Glad you enjoyed it! 🤠
@johnpownall77202 ай бұрын
That track and the cover, possibly Cracked Actor and Jean Genie all sound they belong on Stones albums.
@gabix74884 ай бұрын
My father had some Bowie's vinyls , he wasnt the biggest fan but whatever he could get on vinyls during the dark days of Communism in Romania. But...thats how i discovered Bowie and he became my fav artist of all times. Image, voice, creativity hitting the sky, never will be another musician like him. My favs from him are Honky, Alladin, Ziggy, Low, Heroes, Station, Diamond dogs. Cant pick one, keep changing for the last 10 yrs. Great video, great ranking. I am also jealous off your Bowie's collection.
@alansteadreviews4 ай бұрын
Thanks. Glad you enjoyed it!
@RWL20124 ай бұрын
Based on people on forums and on here saying that the Marantz CD5005 (2014) and CD6007 (2020) are gapless, I've just bought a CD6004 (2011) with recently cleaned lens and recently lubricated tray mechanism, as that was what I could afford. I hope it's also gapless, and will be seeing (hearing?) if it is as soon as it arrives. (EDIT 6 days later) to my relief, yes my CD6004 does play gapless! The short is on my channel.
@alansteadreviews4 ай бұрын
Hope it works out for you. 🤞
@RWL20124 ай бұрын
@@alansteadreviews thanks, 🤞🏻 indeed.
@johnjackson37354 ай бұрын
The top ones for me are Dark Side of the Moon, Piper at the Gates of Dawn, Animals, Meddle, Wish You Were Here and the Wall.
@kennethbent55864 ай бұрын
Watching this just reminds me how pointless ranking videos are you can pick literally any Bowie album and use it to get into his music my favourite albums changes every week
@BenJoSon4 ай бұрын
Suffragette City? Did you miss it or did I?
@risboturbide93965 ай бұрын
"Lodger" must be #1, folks 🍻🍻
@Watcher41115 ай бұрын
I always smile when i hear about Bowies "phil collins " period. Pop music should relax you, makes you comfortable. And Bowie on Never let me down put words like chernobyl and hitler , wich are disturbing (especially hitler makes you think abou war and all its atrocities)
@antalantal23665 ай бұрын
We are music-mates: I share your thoughts on momentary lapse (awful record), I do find the division bell mediocre. The final cut is a Waters' album but is far from being as bad as people rate it (well crafted songs even if not really inspired)and Atom Heart is a brilliant record. Only discrepancy : The wall, I liked it a lot but the fourth side is a "skip side" and there are too many fillers
@alansteadreviews5 ай бұрын
Cheers... I respectfully disagree about side 4 of The Wall though. I think it's epic and a necessary wrap up of the album, but I guess everyone hears different things. Glad you're on the same page with my other choices though. Cheers for watching. 🤠
@antalantal23665 ай бұрын
@@alansteadreviews Thank you for answering! A swap between Animals and The Wall would match our rankings but what is interesting is listening to other point of views: I am deeply respectful and interested about what other persons think and feel. That said, as far as my understanding goes, I will never understand those who claim that MLOR and the DB are great records. DB is well crafted but very few moments manage to surprise and involve my listening experience. I thought that my perception coud have been a general one but it is not the case
@martindoyle6905 ай бұрын
Why does nobody ever include Toy in their Bowie rankings?
@alansteadreviews5 ай бұрын
I personally haven't because it was a posthumous release. Though the album was recorded before Heathen its release was cancelled at the time. I didn't like it either, but that wasn't the criteria for me leaving it out.
@dumpwoodhereАй бұрын
You're right. I had the bootleg for years before the official release. It deserves to be in there.
@iCampos-h4d5 ай бұрын
MARANTZ M-CR612 CD same problem. es una verguebza
@alansteadreviews5 ай бұрын
Thanks. I'll put it on my list of non gapless players.
@JeremiahPickardMusic5 ай бұрын
My personal favourite is Scary Monsters. I also thoroughly enjoy Earthling, Station To Station, Aladdin Sane and The Next Day
@onlyonce17075 ай бұрын
Ha ha" Please show respect even if you disagree" - yes great track!
@KevinWayne6 ай бұрын
No mention of the re-recorded version of "Never Let Me Down?" I didn't like the production on the original either, but the tracks are pretty damn strong in the songwriting department. "Time Will Crawl" is up their with classic Bowie. But then again you sold Young Americans & Tin Machine 1 waaaaayyyy to short IMHO. "Middle-of-the-road hard rock?" Not even. Not with Reeves Gabrels riding shotgun 🤨 It's an unsettling Dystopian Future almost concept album like one usually expects from David Bowie, but he doesn't always deliver.
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
I do love a lot of Reeves Gabrels - his best moments...👌 As for the re-recorded / remixed version of Never Let Me Down - weirdly despite my production criticisms of the original I was not a fan to my recollection - but these things being said, when I get round to doing my individual album review which I will do eventually I will certainly re-evaluate the remixed version for sure. 👍🏻
@johynnelseth22116 ай бұрын
The Philips Micro Music System M4205 is gapless. It's a mini stereo, and it's perfect for my needs.
@Tasman_Tea6 ай бұрын
I recently purchased a 1994 Marantz CD-53 at a very reasonable price. It works a treat and is gapless, so am very happy!
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
Good old 90s cd players!
@EElgar18576 ай бұрын
You don't even mention classical music, where gapless playback is even more important. It's hard to believe that Cambridge Audio would screw up on this; they're a high-end brand. My PS Audio Transport will even play separare WAV files continuously.
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
Cambridge Audio seem to have sorted it for now which is good but yeah you're right. The only reason I don't mention it with regard to classical music is because I've not specifically encountered it myself on a cd with tracks that segue etc... I know that is a thing with opera, but certainly with progressive rock stuff which has a lot in common with the stylistic approach of classical / orchestral music it has definitely been impossible to ignore.
@pc750-V46 ай бұрын
I think its an important issue but please knock 8mins off the length would be good... You have pointed the problem out on a pretty old player (seems to be from around 2010) so not perhaps representative of current players. There are plenty of Hi-Fi CD players that do gapless playback but it's worth checking first as you say.
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
8 minutes off so... basically a KZbin short (ish)... Yep fair enough... I may do a concise version / re-take at some point.
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
I should also point out that my brother purchased the CD player in 2019 so even though it may have been an older model it was still being sold at Richer Sounds at that time...
@TLang-el6sk6 ай бұрын
I can only imagine that this has to do ith the way the data is processed. In the olden days that data was basically streamed into a very small buffer and just decoded on the fly. You may remember the early Philips players with their voice coil driven laser pickup on a rotary arm. You could simply move that manually to any spot on the CD and as soon as the control circuit locked onto the track again the player simply continued playing. So the metadata was also decoded on the fly as a side product. So the implementation was more like a record player. You would have to do quite same extra work for such a crappy non-seamless playback implementation.
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
A couple of people mentioned in the comments on the last video that the cd players affected by this issue haven't bothered with the buffer. I was going to mention some of these more technical things in this video based on the comments but not everyone described the issue in exactly the same way, so I kept it simple.
@Synthematix6 ай бұрын
Thats why i love minidisc, all the sony portables have gapless random playback depends how the cd is mastered, all cd players should be gapless even going back to 1985, but i know of none that are gapless on random playback, simply because they dont have a buffer like minidiscs does. But just playing a disc from start to finish like for example a ministry of sound mix cd has to be gapless on all players for obvious reasons. the sony cd players have autospace feature that you can turn off.
@MohsinWadee6 ай бұрын
The Arcam CD5 now plays gapless after a firmware update that's done via USB. An owner confirmed this on the What Hifi forum.
@JelloPotate6 ай бұрын
I find it very strange that there would be people denying or ignoring this as an issue. CDs are a great technology and while I love my records, I cannot deny the reliability and ease of use of CDs. Their biggest advantage at the time apart from sound quality was that you didn't need to flip the record/tape. There were no longer sides to an album, just a straight shot from beginning to end. Artists didn't need to worry about spacing their songs out in any way and could present them in the way they or the record label wanted while albums that already existed could be released in their exact form without any changes needed.
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
Couldn't agree more 👍
@tomleader70546 ай бұрын
The very odd thing is that the audio file on a CD is continuous. The table of contents with the track information is a seperate thing from the audio. When I master a CD a fair bit of time is spent deciding with the artist on the gaps between tracks. Between tracks you should see a count down, as you demonstrate, from the end marker of one track to the start marker of the next. During the count down the player should be outputting digital silence if that is what is recorded in the audio file. Also, many live albums run as a continuous piece if you stsrt from the beginning with the track i.d.s carefully placed to avoid any jarring when you start a track from within the running order that does not start from silence. I can only assume that manufaturers are cutting costs by using players without the firmware needed for full Red Book playback.
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
In fact you've reminded me that on at least one live album I've listened to (I forget which one), the bits where there was talking to the audience in between the songs existed within the countdown tracks. The song would be introduced by the singer or whatever and then at zero the song would begin.
@alansteadreviews6 ай бұрын
But you're right, most of the time it is digital silence.
@tomleader70546 ай бұрын
@@alansteadreviews Exactly. That is what your hidden track is; audio recorded into the area from the start of the disk until the beginning of track one. Red book standard says that the countdownto the first track must be at least two seconds long but, in fact, you can make it as long as you want.
@llewellynGS16 ай бұрын
As a Beatles fan, I really love Bowies version of Accross the universe… and I also love Dj. Not really sure about your “love for bowie”- some of your rankings a bit suspect to me
@Imontei6 ай бұрын
My favorite Bowie song is station to station, but after that song the album is just ok.
@robertwilson2147 ай бұрын
I would say my favourite music is where classical meets rock,hence my favourites..late beatles,bowie,ELO....life on mars may be the best song ever made.Ziggy is the only album with no fillers...even the masterful abbey road has one or two.
@prosperoeaton82017 ай бұрын
Great ranking and discussion. Here is how I rank them. 1. The Piper at the Gates of Dawn- I am a huge Syd fan and consider this album to be a masterpiece. 2. Dark Side of the Moon 3. Animals- This one got better as I got older. 4. A Saucerful of Secrets- This album is very underrated. 5. Wish You Were Here 6. The Wall- This was number one for me in high school. I really connected with it at a hard point in my life. It doesn't hit me quite the same at this age, but I still enjoy it. 7. Meddle 8. Obscured by Clouds 9. The Final Cut 10. More 11. Division Bell 12. Atom Heart Mother 13. Endless River 14. A Momentary Lapse of Reason 15. Ummagumma
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Cheers for sharing your list. The Piper of the Gates of Dawn used to be my favourite when I was young and I still love it, but when I first heard it over 20 years ago it blew me away.
@MIB_637 ай бұрын
Interesting list and ditto comments to each entry. I have been a big Bowie fan since the 70s. I guess each fan's list would be different, depending on ones individual taste and so would mine. E.g. some of your top 10 picks would be at the bottom of my personal list (I never quite liked Diamond Dogs) but I loved hearing your reasons for placing the albums in the particular order you have chosen. Cheers from a new subscriber from Denmark😎
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Glad you enjoyed it. Cheers for watching and subscribing
@chrisseed46437 ай бұрын
As a Bowie record collector I found this video very interesting. But I do disagree with a lot of what you said. That's not me being nasty just different opinions. I personally don't think any album is a ten out of ten. That would mean liking every single track to a point where they are all classics. Now for me Heroes ( album version) is the best song ever written but I can't seriously say I love everything on the album. Same with Ziggy. Songs like moonage daydream/ Five year's are ten out of ten but sings such as Soul love and It ain't easy are very poor. The closest to perfection is ( and these comments are only my opinion) Scary Monsters album. It's absolutely brilliant. The weakest track being Scream like a baby is average but tracks like Because your young /Teenage Wildlife are brilliant and I'd give Kingdom Come another chance. I think it's one of his best ever covers along with Cactus ( Heathen album). Like I said not having a go. It's a good video and would love to hear what you guys think about my comments.
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Interesting to hear your thoughts. I will go more deeply into individual tracks on my album reviews when I finally get round to them (soonish). As for songs being perfect, I think that can change with each listen and be based on many different factors so impossible to gauge definitely for most songs. Many people don't give perfect 10s for albums when reviewing, but if I were to go by that philosophy, I probably wouldn't give any album a 10. Ziggy for instance has tracks that are A tier and S (top) tier, however taken collectively as a whole it's S tier all the way for me on that album (for instance)... That's not mathematical I know - maybe I'll explain better in a future video... Cheers for watching!
@johnpownall77202 ай бұрын
I disagree. Scary Monsters does not really stand up as well as Low, Hunky Dory or Station to Station, in my view. Some of it just sounds a bit daft and overblown now.
@dumpwoodhereАй бұрын
Heroes gets faded out too soon. It should go to 10m.
@easterislandhead95797 ай бұрын
4 Station to station 3 Heroes 2 Low 1 1.Outside
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Interesting top 4...
@dumpwoodhereАй бұрын
Outside?????
@TheMattheth7 ай бұрын
'doesn't do anything for me' is over-used, mate!
@jakehudson71187 ай бұрын
Glad to see "Heroes" make your top 5, its my personal fav, side 1 is just perfection, 5 amazing krautrock style songs, I also love the ambient work on side 2, the whole album feels like a journey
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Glad you enjoyed the video! Yeah, "Heroes" is great.
@terrysutton84527 ай бұрын
Enjoyed this video, I would mostly agree with your rankings. I was lucky enough to be around for his seventies and eighties stuff, but only recently got round to catching up with his albums since then. Am enjoying them all on rotation.
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Glad you enjoyed it! 😊
@deanfletcher41897 ай бұрын
I recently had to replace a faulty Oakcastle majority cd100 portable player from Amazon and so decided to do some research and eventually went with a Desobry model and although it had a nice interface and better Bluetooth connection with device memory and resume feature which they don’t all have etc etc… it wasn’t seamless play and apparently it’s something that’s now common especially devices from China who don’t understand the seamless play system like with audiobooks, live music and classical which require this feature and so don’t program it into the devices software. Like many having had many cd devices over the years I’ve never had this before so it is a modern recent issue. So i decided in the end to get another Oakcastle cd100 which is seamless and states so in its advertising a British company from Cambridge who understands our listening habits
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Sounds like they did a firmware update... I will add this info to my pinned comment when I'm next updating it... Cheers.
@deanfletcher41897 ай бұрын
@@alansteadreviews that’s great 👍 of interest One Concept products are seamless and also Coby
@fourseasons41057 ай бұрын
1. Scary monsters 2. Aladdin Sane 3. Ziggy Stardust 4. Low 5. Hunky Dory 6. Station to station 7. Diamond dogs 8. Lodger 9. The man who sold the world 10. Young americans 11. Heroes 12. Black star 13. Let's dance 14. Heathen 15. Reality 16. Outside 17. Earthling 18. Hours 19. The next day 20. Pin ups 21. Space oddity 22. Tonight 23. David Bowie 24. Buddah of Suburbia 25. Black tie white noise 26. Never let me down
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Interesting ranking. Everyone's listing is so different
@BappyMan7 ай бұрын
great video.. i made a video about how i bought a 50 dollar cd player and there is a two second gap .. so frustrating!!
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Just watched your video. Sadly with the cheap portable cd players it's a bit of a minefield to avoid this issue. My pinned comment lists gapless cd players I've been told about, but none for that cheap unfortunately (to my knowledge).
@alansteadreviews7 ай бұрын
Oh and I will add the cd player in your video to the list of non gapless cd players in that pinned comment when I next update it too. Cheers.
@BappyMan7 ай бұрын
@@alansteadreviews Cool ...This is such a great resource! Also, the ONN Brand regular CD Players from Walmart are Gapless and pretty cheap!