Month: August 2018

Shelly Manne – Another Analogue Productions Disaster

More of the Music of Shelly Manne

A Hall of Shame pressing and another Analogue Productions LP debunked.

Remember the ’90s Acoustic Sounds Analog Revival series mastered by Stan Ricker? This was one of the titles they did, and completely ruined of course. Ricker boosted the hell out of the top end, as is his wont, so all the percussion had the phony MoFi exaggerated sizzle and tizziness that we dislike so much around here at Better Records. Yes, it’s the very same phony top that many audiophiles do not seem bothered by to this day. 

The whole series was an audio disaster, but funnily enough, I cannot remember reading a single word of criticism in the audiophile press discussing the shortcomings of that series of (badly) half-speed mastered LPs — outside of my own reviews of course. Has anything in audio really changed?  (more…)

Lee Ritenour / Rit – Nautilus Half-Speed

More of the Music of Lee Ritenour

Hot Stamper Pressings of Jazz Fusion Albums in Stock

This review was written in 2010 or so, before we had done much work with the album. Even though the best Elektra pressings are sure to be much better than this half-speed, we haven’t been impressed enough with any of the copies we’ve played to get a shootout going.

This very nice Nautilus Half-Speed Mastered LP has SURPRISINGLY GOOD SOUND.

We played this pressing against the 180g Discovery reissue that Doug Sax remastered and it SMOKED it.

What a piece of muddy trash that Discovery pressing is. 

Members of both Toto and Chicago play on this album, so fans of either might get a kick out of this music. 

AMG Review

Lee Ritenour has long been the perfect studio musician, one who can melt into the background without making any impact. While he possesses impressive technique, Ritenour has mostly played instrumental pop throughout his career, sometimes with a Brazilian flavor. His few jazz efforts have found him essentially imitating Wes Montgomery, but despite that he has been consistently popular since the mid-’70s. After touring with Sergio Mendes’ Brasil ’77 in 1973, Ritenour became a very busy studio guitarist in Los Angeles, taking time off for occasional tours with his groups and in the mid-’90s with Bob James in Fourplay. He also recorded many albums as a leader.

Muddy Waters / Folk Singer – Classic Records Reviewed

More of the Music of Muddy Waters

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Muddy Waters

Sonic Grade: C+

The Classic kills that muddy MOFI, which I must confess I used to like.

Things have changed, that’s for sure.

The Mobile Fidelity is thick and fat sounding, like most of their awful Anadisq releases, with much less transparency than this Classic Records pressing.

 

Muddy Waters / Folk Singer – Another Muddy MoFi

More of the Music of Muddy Waters

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Muddy Waters

Sonic Grade: F

An Audiophile Hall of Shame pressing and another MoFi LP reviewed and found wanting.

The MoFi is thick, fat and murky, with much less transparency than the Classic release (which is no award winner either).

The typical album MoFi remastered on Anadisq suffered from many or most of the long list of shortcomings you see below. If you want to avoid records with these faults, you would be well advised to avoid any of the records we’ve linked to.

Is this the worst sounding pressing of Folk Singer ever made?

That’s hard to say. But it is the worst sounding version of the album we’ve ever played, and that should be fair warning for any audiophile contemplating spending money on this kind of trash.

Muddy Waters – Folk Singer

  • An outstanding copy with solid Double Plus (A++) sound, or close to it, on both sides – quiet vinyl too 
  • Folk Singer is an exceptional live-in-the-studio recording, with some of the best sound Muddy Waters ever managed
  • This ’80s reissue is guaranteed to trounce any heavy vinyl pressing you’ve heard of it or we’ll give you your money back!
  • 4 1/2 Stars: “Muddy’s “unplugged” album was cut in September of 1963 and still sounds fresh and vital today. It was Muddy simply returning to his original style on a plain acoustic guitar in a well-tuned room…”

This 1963 recording pressed on ’80s vinyl has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern pressings cannot BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing any sign of coming back.

Having done this for so long, we understand and appreciate that rich, full, solid, Tubey Magical sound is key to the presentation of this primarily vocal music. We rate these qualities higher than others we might be listening for (e.g., bass definition, soundstage, depth, etc.). The music is not so much about the details in the recording, but rather in trying to recreate a solid, palpable, real person singing live in your listening room. The best copies have an uncanny way of doing just that. (more…)

A True Audiophile Pressing at 45 RPM to Shame Them All

More of the music of Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953)

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Sergei Prokofiev

This Japanese 45 RPM remastering of our favorite recording of Prokofiev’s wonderful Lt. Kije Suite has DEMONSTRATION QUALITY SOUND. For starters, there are very few records with dynamics comparable to these. Since this is my favorite performance of all time, I can’t recommend the record any more highly. 

Most of what’s “bad” about a DG recording from 1978 is ameliorated with this pressing. The bass drum (drums?) here must be heard to be believed. We know of no Golden Age recording with as believable a presentation of the instrument as this.

The drum is clearly and precisely located at the back of the stage; even better, it’s as huge and powerful and room-filling as it would have been had you attended the session yourself. That’s our idea of hi-fidelity here at Better Records.

Real Dynamics

Over the course of this and many other shootouts, we’ve discovered that it’s practically impossible to find the right volume setting for this album. It’s so dynamic that no matter what volume you set it at the loud portions get too loud. There is a huge amount of deep bass on this recording and that, coupled with the practically unparalleled dynamics, means that you must have a great deal of amplifier power to reproduce this one properly. Either that or a very efficient speaker such as a horn. I confess I would need a great deal more power than I have at my disposal to get the climaxes of this recording to play cleanly.

The Best DG Recording

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Nat “King” Cole’s Love Is The Thing – The Breakthrough We Were Waiting For

Hot Stamper Pressings of Our Favorite Vocal Albums Available Now

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Nat “King” Cole

Love Is The Thing has long been one of the best sounding Nat “King” Cole recordings we had auditioned over the years. With a large variety of copies to play, including some interesting “finds” among them, we now know it actually is The Best. We have never heard the man sound better than he does on the hottest copies of this very album.

Of course we’re always on the lookout for Nat King Cole albums with good sound. In our experience that is not nearly as easy as one might expect. Far too many of his recordings are drenched in bad reverb and can’t be taken seriously. At least one we know of has his voice out of phase with the orchestra on most of the copies we played, putting a quick end to that shootout. 

If anything the sound on his albums gets even worse in the ’60s. Many of Nat’s albums from that decade are over-produced, bright, thin and shrill.

We assume most audiophiles got turned on to his music from the records that Steve Hoffman remixed and remastered for DCC back in the mid-’90s, For those of you who were customers of ours back then, you know that I count myself among that group. I even went so far as to nominate the DCC of Nat’s Greatest Hits as the best album DCC ever made. (I know now, as I expect you do, that that’s really not saying much, but at the time I thought it was a pretty bold statement.)

Devoting the Resources

Naturally, having long ago given up on Heavy Vinyl LPs by DCC and others of their persuasion, these days we are in a much better position to devote our resources to playing every Nat King Cole album on every pressing we can get our hands on, trying to figure out what are the copies — from what era, on what label, with what stampers, cut by whom, stereo or mono, import or domestic — that potentially have the Hot Stamper sound, the very Raison d’être of our business.

What we discovered with the more than dozen copies we’d pulled together for our shootout was that different pressings from different eras on different labels can all have the right sound. In fact, while listening to one copy after another, all without the benefit of knowing anything about the specific record on the table, it was simply impossible to predict from the sound alone which label the record was printed on.

Some of the earliest pressings were rich and tubey, but so were some of the later ones. Same with copies that were lean, hard or transistory — they could be on a label from any era with that sound.

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Stockhausen / Noda – Zyklus & Eclogue on Direct to Disc (Reviewed in 2011)

More Direct-to-Disc Recordings

Reviews and Commentaries for Direct to Disc Recordings


This RCA 45 RPM Direct-to-Disc fulfills the promise of both the direct to disc recording medium AND the 45 RPM cutting speed so much in vogue these days. As with the Virtuoso Guitar record we listed today, the sound is simply SUPERB — open, dynamic and distortion free.

This is a real DEMO DISC, no doubt about it.

I’ve known this record had top quality sound for decades; we started way back in 1987 selling these kinds of audiophile pressings and this one was clearly a Top Title even back then. I’m happy to say that, unlike most of the audiophile pressings we used to sell, this title has actually gotten BETTER with time.  (more…)

Led Zeppelin / Houses of the Holy – Classic Records Reviewed

More of the Music of Led Zeppelin

Sonic Grade: F

We can describe the sound in two words: ridiculously bright. Honestly, what more need be said? 

Over the years we have done many Led Zeppelin shootouts, often including the Classic Heavy Vinyl Pressings for comparison purposes. After all, these Classic LPs are what many — perhaps most — audiophiles consider superior to other pressings.

We sure don’t, but everybody else seems to. You will find very few critics of the Classic Zep LPs outside of those who write for this very website, and even we used to recommend three of the Zep titles on Classic: Led Zeppelin I, IV and Presence.

Wrong on all counts.

Since then we’ve made it a point to create debunking commentaries for some of the Classic Zeps, a public service of Better Records. We don’t actually like any of them now, although the first album is still by far the best of the bunch.

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The Who / Quadrophenia – Universal Heavy Vinyl Reviewed

More of the Music of The Who

Sonic Grade: B

[These are old notes from many years ago. Take them with a grain of salt.]

Wow! This Universal Heavy Vinyl pressing from circa 2000 (the turn of the century!) is superb, not all that far from a good Track original, and quieter for sure. 

Side One rocks incredibly hard from start to finish. What a great album. It has to rank right up there with the best rock of the ’70s, right behind Who’s Next and probably on a par with Tommy, good company indeed, since we LOVE all three of those albums here at Better Records. (Both Tommy and Who’s Next are Top 100 titles, but Quadrophenia is not far behind either of them for sound or music.

Here’s what we wrote about this pressing when it was still in print ten years ago (!).

Thank you Universal! We have almost forgiven you for the Cat Stevens records you ruined. With more great releases like this one, that debacle will fade one day from memory. (Although you can still buy those crappy pressings from my competitors. Have they no shame?)

As with any Who album, this is obviously not your average Audiophile Demo Disc. We don’t imagine you’ll be enjoying this one with wine, cigars, and polite conversation. This one is for turning up loud and rockin’ out — in other words, it’s our kind of record!

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