Hey Fred,
Here is the organization that is helping to educate about the loudness wars. I'm sure there are lists out there. I'll post them if I find them myself. I'd like to have some sense of which remasters were turned up, for instance. I bought a non-remastered copy of George Harrison's All Things Must Pass on CD in hopes of not having the loudness turned up. But after listening to it I wondered who mastered it for CD in the first place. It wasn't as dynamic as the original vinyl (which I also own). I feel like it's a catch 22 on that level. I guess if you love music that was made pre-CD, you should buy it on vinyl or cassette even. But I want to be able to listen to Elton John's Madman Across the Water in my iPod and know that it wasn't remastered to death.
Of newer CDs, I'm also with you about wanting to know. I guess there are ways of importing the music into computer music programs which will show the dynamics. That Rolling Stone article I posted has some amazing examples of 'loud' recordings. The U2 examples are incredible. Original song has texture, peaks and valleys, but the remaster is loud, loud, loud! Crappy since they are a band I love and have most of their CDs. I don't only listen to jazz and classical, or Steely Dan/Donald Fagen, which means I want to know about the loudness factor too. You can hear it too, on the really awful ones, like Red Hot Chili Peppers' Californication.
Hope this helps. I'll post more links if I find them.
Zoë