Best Examples Of Cymbal Decays On A Recording

Since I’ve been a drummer for over 60 years, I have always brought in selected music when auditioning speakers that favored the drums, mainly the cymbals. I knew what a larger ride cymbal sounds like as well as a good hi hat pair and the music I would bring in had examples of that. Of course there is more to listen to when auditioning like the bass, guitar, organ, horns, etc.. but if the cymbals didn’t sound right, it would be hard to pick that speaker. In the 70’s when I got my 1st hifi system, my speakers had the heil air transformer mid/tweeter. For the last 6 years, I’ve been using a Diamond tweeter

Ah @rbstehno, but WHAT cymbals? I have A. Zildjians, K. Zildjians, Paiste 602's, and Bosphorus, each of which sounds different than the others. I have recordings made by myself with small capsule condenser mics and a Revox A77 of some of them, as well as recordings made in pro studios (I keep a log of which mics the engineers used). I employ both in my loudspeaker evaluations.

Fleetwood Mac - Dreams 

The first cymbal crash at the begining has a long decay.

I heard it on lesser quality systems than mine and it is not as long and sustained. The more transparent the system the more noticable it is. It's a great test for cymbal decay.

Nice ride cymbal taps on the intro to I.G.Y., from Donald Fagen’s The Nightfly and throughout Negative Girl from Steely Dan's Two Against Nature.

DMP does DSD, track 3, 4...