Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of The Beatles Available Now
UPDATE 2020
We had forgotten how good these pressings were. Apparently we were way ahead of the curve in 2010. The German pressings with the right stampers win the shootouts we’ve been doing recently. A number of old listings from this era don’t hold up, but I’m glad to see that this one does.
This is a WONDERFUL SOUNDING early German Import 2 LP set — pressed on fairly quiet vinyl to boot! We are on record as finding the British pressings of 1967-1970 too bright; certainly most of them are anyway.
This German set has much more natural sound to my ear — it’s RICH, SMOOTH and SWEET, with plenty of tubey magic and little of the grain and grunge of the Brits.
The original domestic pressings, as anyone who has ever played one can attest, mastered at Sterling no less, are absolutely godawful.
Like most compilations, some songs sound better than others, but Don’t Let Me Down and Come Together are two that really stand out here. For some of you out there who have never tried one of our Hot Stamper Beatles records, this may be the best sound you’ve ever heard from them. The CDs — even the new ones — sure don’t sound like this!
This is an Older Review.
Most of the older reviews you see are for records that did not go through the shootout process, the revolutionary approach to finding better sounding pressings we developed in the early 2000s and have since turned into a fine art.
We found the records you see in these older listings by cleaning and playing a pressing or two of the album, which we then described and priced based on how good the sound and surfaces were. (For out Hot Stamper listings, the Sonic Grades and Vinyl Playgrades are listed separately.)
We were often wrong back in those days, something we have no reason to hide. Audio equipment and record cleaning technologies have come a long way since those darker days, a subject we discuss here.
Currently, 99% (or more!) of the records we sell are cleaned, then auditioned under rigorously controlled conditions, up against a number of other pressings. We award them sonic grades, and then condition check them for surface noise.
As you may imagine, this approach requires a great deal of time, effort and skill, which is why we currently have a highly trained staff of about ten. No individual or business without the aid of such a committed group could possibly dig as deep into the sound of records as we have, and it is unlikely that anyone besides us could ever come along to do the kind of work we do.
The term “Hot Stampers” gets thrown around a lot these days, but to us it means only one thing: a record that has been through the shootout process and found to be of exceptionally high quality.
The result of our labor is the hundreds of titles seen here, every one of which is unique and guaranteed to be the best sounding copy of the album you have ever heard or you get your money back.
Further Reading