We do a vinyl night about once a week on average, mixed taste in our group, but mostly steer towards classic rock or 80's pop. Vinyl shopping on the boardwalk is still a summer pastime and after we find a good pressing, usually seek out other variants to do A/B listenings to pick out the difference. Year pressed, country pressed in, even the color of the vinyl (which probably has more to do with the which came off the press first).
Listening at home is on a highly modified SL1210M5G with Ortofon Quintet Blue, McIntosh C100 preamp, McIntosh MC252 amp, and Sonus Faber Grand Piano speakers. All Transparent Audio interconnects, speaker cables and power cables.
Our usual hangout/friends listening room is MUCH more high-end and is really where the subtle nuances in different pressing come out.
My go to favorites:
Cash, American IV. Red vinyl (have demo'd multiple colors of this album, our listening group unanimously agreed red was audibly better pressing). "Hurt" is by far my favorite cover ever recorded by any artist
Alkaline Trio, Damnesia. Acoustic recordings of a lot of their more popular songs.
Led Zeppelin, Mothership. Comparing this to the originals and other reissues, this album stands head and shoulders above the others.
Metallica Box sets (45 RPM, 180g sets). Some of the few re-releases that actually sound better than the originals. S&M is a 6 LP set and you truly feel like you're there live.
Pixies (all of them), I had most of the albums already but the Mineateur set release put out the best sounding pressings yet
Nirvana Unplugged NY, 180g Germany pressing
US Rattle & Hum is an interesting album. Some songs are stellar, others are absolute garbage...but cool to sit down and listen straight through and instantly tell a huge difference between where it was recorded and by whom.
Green Day, Demolicious (RSD exclusive)
Green Day, American Idiot
Dire Straights Brothers In Arms, 180g 2 LP set
Doors, Strange Days (RSD) reissue is great, the RSD version is the original Mono mix.
*Discogs.com is one of my favorite sites. My entire collection is up there with notes so I can pull it up and browse when shopping in the store to see if I have it and what condition mine is in (not to mention check pricing). I also like the extensive commentary on different versions so I can compare different pressings and find the right pressing anywhere in the world.
My all-time "favorite" album though isn't because of audio quality. This is Steve Caballero's band, The Faction. One of the coolest professional athletes/celebrities I've ever met. Went out of his way to personally mail me one of their original 45's, and signed it. Gotta get around to having this framed sometime soon!
