Songs you use when auditioning gear


What are some of your favorite songs to play when auditioning gear?  I often listen to Dreams by Fleetwood Mac.  Just about anything off of Gaucho or Aja by Steely Dan or Joni Mitchell’s Hejira or Hissing of Summer Lawns usually gets spun up too.  Dreams, in particular, is such a great song and is recorded with the balance I really like as well as a full and wide soundstage.  Wondering what some of yours are to see what I’m missing.

128x128jastralfu

The Turn of a Friendly card by Alan Parsons Project since I am so familiar with the sound because I have been listening to it from the time I got my first descent stereo in the early 80's and have heard it in every system I ever owned.  It allows me to gauge what I am listening to in great detail. 

After that I listen to a good recording of a piano, which in my opinion is the most difficult instrument to fool you into sounding live on a recording.