I think this should depend on what kind of music you like to listen to. I think the ability to play your favorite music and make you smile and get totally involved in the music is the key. For me getting to involved in analytical listening and trying to find faults in the system is a warning sign.
It also depends if you're testing head-fi gear or your big system.
For the Hifi-system in my livingroom there's two tracks that I always use to check that system is acceptable and have the right setup:
- The Ballad of Bill Hubbard (with Jeff Beck on guitar)
- Late Home Tonight, Part 1
Both from Roger Waters - Amused to Death
The recording used the Q-sound technology to make surround sound from two speakers. With the right system setup some sounds will come from other parts of the room, like a dog barking from 90 degrees right or a faucet dripping behind you. You will not get this without a good system, good speaker placement and relatively good room acoustics.
These tracks are also a test of the system's ability to give you a wide soundstage.
It doesn't work with headphones unfortunately...
To me the soundstage, or rather how the system or headphones manages to deliver the acoustical space is most important. It can be intimate or outer space, and a good headphone or stereo should be able to deliver both.
I have quite recently discovered an album (and label) with varied music, fantastic sound and most recordings are done in churches and places with great acoustic space:
The Nordic Sound - 2L audiophile reference recordings
You can get it in multiple formats:
- Hybrid SACD (both stereo and 5.1)
- Blueray audio (both stereo and 5.1)
- Download 320kbps Mp3
- Download Flac 24 bit 96KHz or 192 KHz
- And Spotify premium gives you 320kbps Ogg Vorbis (q9):
Various Artists – The Nordic Sound - 2l Audiophile Reference Recordings
To test deep bass:
- Get Off Your Ass and Jam by Funkadelic, with deep funky bass from Bootsy Collins. 
Check it out on Emusic or Spotify
To test both deep bass and general Omph:
- The opening from Also sprach Zarathustra, by Richard Strauss. Berliner Philharmoniker conducted by Herbert von Karajan
Check it out on Spotify
Edited by Aregu - 8/23/10 at 9:30am
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