what CDs are most in need of remastering?

U2's earliest albums (up to Unforgettable Fire, which I also own on MFSL gold CD). In particular, the War album - The first time I listened to the vinyl issue (which came after hearing the CD) I was floored.

The Boss! Bruce's CDs are in desperate need of an upgrade, it's long overdue. Hopefully the wait is not much longer and the format will be SACD.

All of the Beatles stuff!
There is a Japanese series out with all their material - very hard to get but once your transport is spinning these CDs a whole new world opens up!
God only knows (no, that was the Beach Boys..) how they get these fabulous results from the same old master tapes?

A lot of the compression on pop recordings is built into the original mastertapes (whether digital or analog), and so is not just a CD-mastering issue. As Marakanetz (I think) alludes to, every vintage analog recording is actually 'remastered' when transferred to CD format, but of course at this point, many originally digitally-recorded and -issued recordings could also stand to be better-(re)mastered. But back to compression for a moment: Many, many analog-recorded and originally-issued recordings contain liberal amounts of compression both within the mastertapes and in the original LP mastering - this is not a fault exclusive to or caused by the CD format in particular. Radio has always been radio, even before CD (and large dynamic range is even more difficult for the average analog playback system to cope with than it is for an inexpensive CD player, both in tracking the record and in maintaining a favorble signal-to-noise ratio). The irony is that pop radio (and TV video) broadcasters then *further* compress the signal before it hits your tuner.

I think one insidious result of all this (and it's not just compression, but all kinds of digitally-synthesized harmonic 'enhancements', 'ambience'-creating phase-manipulations, response-tailoring, etc.) is that the public at large has been conditioned to accept and expect this type of sound, and consequently to consume their music only via tabletop mini-stacks, boomboxes, computers, TV's, and one-carton HT setups, not to mention the types of car systems young males like to install these days (is egregiously distorted LF thumping considered to be a mating call or territorial proclamation among these hormone-addled cruisers?). I think high fidelity actually sounds odd (and maybe even repulses) listeners raised on this numbingly processed sound, which lends itself so easily to background relegation at any volume. It helps explain why so few younger people today are interested in hobbyist hi-fi: it's not a sound they recognize or want. But when music itself becomes more of a commercialized product than an art form, what else can we reasonably anticipate happening?

Toshiko Akioshi/Lew Tabackin Big Band, even the Japanese cds are quite harsh sounding. Would be great to have XRCD versions.

The Beatles to SACD.

Everything except already remastered.

Every classical music recording on CD by Deutche Grammophon needs remastering. It is weird that their classical LP's were some of the best, and now their CD's are some of the worst.

Just about every 70's fusion disc. Seems like every transfer was an abomination.