Well mastered Compact Disks

Regarding Carmen Gomes, George Foreman once observed:

"Boxing is like jazz. The better it is, the less people appreciate it."

Perhaps applied to Blues also.  I'm not saying to like her, but perhaps appreciate how effortless her delivery is.

I think most of the MFSL SACDs I have bought are really pretty good.

A few monthes ago I bought (I think it is Analogue Productions) Cowboy Junkies/Trinity Sessions SACD and it just about blows me away.

I also have 4 digital pressings (two of them are SACDs) of Patricia Barber/Cafe Blue, and the three I have listened to (including the red book) sound fantastic.

MFSL’s old red-books of Elton John/Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and Moody Blues/On The Thresh Hold Of A Dream sound pretty good to me on my stuff.

And I am not picking these because they are Musty Old Oldies But Goodies/Blasts From My Misguided Past that used to live on my turntable; I have plenty of digital reissues of other albums that meet that criteria that hurt my ears. Nails on chalkboards.

I have a Japanese digital pressing of Holly Cole/It Happened One Night that has a sense of presence and immediacy that does it pretty good.

On those MFSL SACDs I alluded to: I note that your OP was referring to red-book, but that’s what my CD player was when I first tried them. The red-book layer sounded so good I bought a SA10 to see what I might be missing that was on SACD.