It is a Golden Rule of Life that reggae ALWAYS sounds better on vinyl.

Seeing as you have limited it to three, I'll ponder carefully.

I have found variable quality in remasters (not all of them are worth the £25 or whatever), but the recent Rolling Stones Exile on Main St was fantastic. So that would be my first pick.

If you are buying early 70s vinyl in decent condition, you may have some clicks - depends if you can live with that. In my experience, quality of pressings went downhill in the late 70s to the point where many LPs in 85 were practically flexidiscs.

Two quick picks that I think sound better on my old vinyl than on CD are The J Geils Band - Full House and Carole King - Tapestry.

Happy shopping!

I was looking at the Dark Side of the Moon reissue double album the other day. It is lovely!

Blonde on Blonde sounds brilliant on vinyl.
Forever Changes is also better - there are edits on my record that aren't on the CD.
The 3rd Velvets LP also superior on disc.

...and despite not having played any vinyl for years, I am taking it all with me. Can you recommend a mid price turntable?

http://t.co/tUKt8iU

Beatles - Sgt Pepper's
Bob Dylan - John Wesley Harding
Beach Boys - Pet Sounds (cheapest version as a double with Carl and the Passions)

I own only 4 vinyl albums and I love them.

Jean Michel Jarre - Equinoxe
Jean Michel Jarre - Concerts in China
Vangelis - Spiral
Underworld - Second Toughest in the Infants.

They're actually framed and on the wall of my home studio. God I love them.

i'll stick to post punk for starters.

1. PIL - Metal Box / Second Edition
These re-issues on 4 men with beards are mind blowing, knocking the original pressings into shitsville. The Metal Box (3 x 12") is best, as you would expect, and i know avalanche had one a couple of years back. However, since they've moved and it sells for £200 on ebay, they've probably sold it. Settle then for the 2 LP "Second Edition". 4 men have also released blinding re-issues of the first three Wire LPs (bitch-no EP with 154), the first four Scott Walker records and "Dusty in Memphis" (with US cover).

2. Gang of Four "Entertainment!"
Now, i can't remember who re-issued this, but i saw one on tuesday. Again, a shredder. Bass pounds, Guitar sounds like when Tom scraped down the side of that liner.

3. (cheat) Any mint Japanese pressings, and not necesarrily originals. Japan alwys use virgin vinyl and i have made it my small and pathetic aim to own Japanese copies of all my favourite records. You haven't heard "Dirty Mind" by prince until you hear from land of rising sun! Ebay makes this easy, especially if you get from dealers in the US. Buy in bulk if you can. I got six eighties Prince albums for under £40 delivered! First three Devo for £13! British dealers will skin you alive though.

The last recommendation should, in the long run, provide aural orgasm in perpetuity. Good luck!!

and our friend is absolutely spot on concerning reggae.
And if mono is your bag see Sundazed. Their mono Dylan LPs will cause deep religious stirrings.

this is a double post removed.
And HMV.com are very cheap and very good.
Example; Soft Boys re-issues, lovely pressings etc - £8.99!
Ditto Raincoats

then check around for reviews. Steve Hoffman's site has forums which are good in the nitty gritty of different pressings and A&B comparisons.

http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/

The recent Costello reissues of his first 4 albums have been brills stuff from Mobile Fidelity. Pricey but if you wants the best....

Aways ask what the sources of any reissue is. Original tapes, comparison to original vinyl pressings, whose done the mastering job. An alarming amount of so called audiophile reissues are just sourced from CDs - Simply Vinyl

Also try and go for the artists country of origin. The US stereo of Blonde On Blonde kicks the shit out of the UK stereo

Big Thumbs up for 4 Men With beards from here too. Their Dusty in Memphis is just sublimely great. Truelove's Gutter by Richard Hawley is stupendous cut but only 1000 copies so you're gonna have to pay up via ebay.

And if you want mono Fabs n Beach Boys - car boot sales. You can pick up pretty good copies and that 60's vinyl can put up with a bit of punishment.

Oh and you haven't heard Dylan's 'Modern Times' until you've heard the vinyl - the Cd is just shit. Even Zimmy said as much

I got rid of a lot of vinyl in my youth, now I'm trying to replace and rebuild
too.
Fopp sells some new stuff, some of it around the £20 mark, some of it MUCH cheaper. I got Midlake's Trials of Van Occupanther for a measly fiver. Well worth that!

Believe it or not, HMV have the odd vinyl bargain. I don't think that a tenner is too much to pay for the Fleet Foxes first elpee (some may disagree!!).

Transgressive records put out some rally high quality vinyl. Bought Johnny Flynn's two records in the last year after having them on MP3 from itunes. Beautiful packaging and heavyweight vinyl. Things of beauty!

If you venture to Stirling, there's a fab shop for trawling for gems Just off the High Street in the direction of the train station.. I spent £60 in there a couple of months ago and came out with about 15 records, one of which was DSOTM with poster and stickers.

I've found that there's a lot of fun to be had in rebuilding the collection.

I'd go via Amazon with new releases (PJ Harvey for one) being around the 11\12 quid mark. Diverse Vinyl are reasonable too.

Although for US releases you might as well go on US Ebay and get em sent over. Works out cheaper even with shipping and rarely gets nabbed by customs.

Oh and beware of pirated vinyl. Camden is awash with the stuff. Blur's Parklife for a tenner? Yes its been ripped off the CD. Nick Drake 'Pink Moon' on pink vuiyl? That too.

Astral Weeks a miss at £20 - buy a decent Van Morrison album instead.

Is that different pressings sound different to everyone.

I have a few recent audiophile reissues and none of them sounds as good as an original or early pressing to me. And that includes the Metal Box on 4 Men With Beards and the Sundazed mono Dylans... I would go with the advice already given to get as early a pressing as you can find from the country where the recording was made.

As for records that must be heard on vinyl, I would suggest Raw Power. Every CD I have heard sounds terrible.

Raw Power.
The Music on Vinyl double LP with the book and both mixes works for me. Every CD sounded like shit, but so does the original vinyl.The first pressing of the Iggy mix was good-ish.
I have a german edition from the eighties that sounds like mud and shit mixed together.

Obvious as usual but because of what they mean to me

Monkees "Headquarter"
Ian Dury etc. "New Boots and Panties"
Elton John "Captain Fantastic etc"

I know every crackle, hiss and jump. Lovely

the answer is As Usual and as usual, again, it's Station to Station.

The other one is Horses by Patti Smith

And agree, with comments further up-thread about Tapestry. Indeed, I'd say singer-songwriter albums of the 70s in general. Something to do with the mellow vibe and the ritual attached to playing a vinyl LP.

Agree too about the Reggae only sounds right on vinyl - a comment that applies to Soul too. And Laura Nyro

Mrs T gave me "Penguin Eggs" on lovely heavy vinyl for my birthday back in March. It is lovely.

... Aladdin Sane... my vinyl copy (from the early 80's) was the tinniest sounding record I've ever heard.

if you like that sort of jazz

or blue note
or cti

Three that sound better on vinyl:

The Yes Album
The Hissing of Summer Lawns
Electric Ladyland

I have original pressings of each and they have a presence the CD versions can't match.

Also Robbie, since I went through the same exercise a few months ago, here are some other recommendations from the Word Massive

http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/your-vinyl-recommendations-please

Half Speed Mastered Audiophile Pressing

No you can't have mine!

and would love one but having just spent a fortune (and I mean a fortune) on bespoke cd shelving and bookcases/computer desk it might be asking a bit too much to persuade the FPO that I really need a record player as well.
I remember however that Ry Cooders Into the Purple Valley and Chicken DSkin Music sound better on vinyl than my cd versions do - by some distance.

Three years ago I dug out my old Thorens turntable, put it on e-bay and got £35 for it. I put that towards a new Rega and hav'nt looked back. I've bought around a thousand vinyl albums since then, at auctions and from e-bay and record shops. Originaly to fill the gaps in my old collection from 40 years ago. It's not just the sound but the whole experience of putting a vinyl record onto the record player, looking at the artwork, reading the back-cover, even the smell of a forty year old record goes towards the whole ambience and experience. I love it!

but my wife would certainly be having a stern word with me if I had a thousand of the buggers cluttering up the house. You're a lucky person.

reissues is question of exactly what a "faithful" LP copy would actually be. In particular master tape of Kind of Blue is famously a tad slow, while there are serious phase issues on Art Pepper Meets ...

I have both on recent vinyl but if I want accuracy rather than texture I listen to the CDs. And try not to get too worried about it all ...

Depends on what you're into of course, but my copy of Serge Gainsbourg's *Histoire de Melody Nelson* sounds all the better for the fact that I don't own it digitally or on CD. It's also, at just 28 minutes long, a perfect record for a single sitting.

Apart from that, I second *Dark Side Of The Moon*. From the moment that heartbeat kicks in, it just sounds incredible.

If you want a third selection, I love Bob Dylan's *Highway 61 Revisited* on record. I think it's the mono sound but it just sounds so much warmer to my ears than the CD ever does.

All in all, yours sounds like a happy hunting ground. Enjoy the chase.