And the winner is: 1996 Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab release. In 1991, I discovered Nirvana. Nirvana's Nevermind was one of the very first tapes I ever bought, and the night I acquired my first copy, I practically wore the cassette out with play after play after play after play. It was the first album that really made me want to play music, one of the very first soundtracks to my teenage years, the one that really kick-started my interest in music and performance. There are few if any other albums that I know as intimately, sonically speaking, as this one. And that being the case, I can say with 100% certainty that the remastered version is absolute garbage. The dynamics have been suffocated, the sonic balance completely upended. Drums in particular plop where they used to sound with a sharp, distinct crack, and now practically disappear in the mix due to the peak limiting that has been employed. The jumps in dynamics from soft to very loud to soft again are terrifically muted, stripping out the punch of the original recordings and turning Nirvana's signature sound into a dulled, flattened out disaster. The Mobile Fidelity disc, on the other hand, is a notable improvement over the original DGC release. Stereo separation and bass response are noticeably better, and the sound is much cleaner and clearer by comparison with the original 1991 disc, which actually sounds rather muddy by comparison. Whether this is due to improved analog to digital transfer technology, the use of the original master tape by the folks at the Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab, or a likely combination of both, the audiophile disc is clearly the way to go for this seminal early 90s release.