Help me with reference material...

[pedrohead]

Word.

So I need a little help here. I'm mostly recording a bunch of (for lack of better or more acceptable term) screamo, new school hardcore, mall punk, general indie rock kinda stuff nowadays... and am gaining a better appreciation for the importance and influence of reference material when recording/mixing.

For a long time, I used to use Jimmy Eat World's "Bleed American" as my reference disk because it didn't seem overly bright and Pro-Tooled to death with a bunch of drum samples and wasn't limited to the point of distortion, so it would make a good comparison track. What I've been finding is that compared to much of today's music, it is pretty boxy sounding, kinda dark, and my recordings that I've been trying to match up with it have ended up that way as well.

I've searched through my disks for stuff that I think I like the sound of when I listen to them, but stuff like newer Foo Fighters, Thrice, Sparta, they sound good in the car, but if you put them on your good detailed monitors in a quiet listening environment, you realize how smashed and distorted they are after the mastering, and are pretty much impossible to reference to when mixing.

For those of you out there that do some similar music, are there any good reference songs or discs that you use when you mix? Thanks a lot for the help.