Month: September 2019

Liszt / Sonata in B Minor & Other Pieces / Curzon

More of the music of Franz Liszt (1811-1880)

Hot Stamper Classical LPs on Decca & London

This Super Hot Stamper solo piano record is 1963 Decca recording technology at its finest (or would be if we had ten copies to shoot out and could find the White Hot Stamper pressing hidden among them).

As it is, we are happy to have found this one, Super Hot on both sides, an amazingly realistic representation of a piano. You will have a hard time finding better. 

And the music, especially on side two, is compelling and wonderful. This is classical music that will engage you at the deepest and most serious level. Widely considered Liszt’s masterpiece, in Curzon’s forceful hands it is not hard to understand why.

Side One

A++ Super Hot Stamper sound, with a clear piano surrounded in space. Present and dynamic, there is little to fault here, save a touch of smear and a slight lack of weight.

Real pianos in live recitals have weight that I have never heard reproduced by any stereo system, so “real weight” is a relative term, one that applies more to recordings than to the live instrument itself. (more…)

Fleetwood Mac / Mystery To Me

More Fleetwood Mac

Reviews and Commentaries for Fleetwood Mac

Here it is, folks — the best sounding copy of Mystery To Me to ever hit our site. This copy positively DOES IT ALL — it’s super open and spacious with tons of energy and incredible presence. The bottom end is just KILLER and there’s dramatically more richness and fullness than you get on most copies out there. 

It’s beyond difficult to find great sounding copies of this album, which is why it’s been about four years since we last had these on the site.

Mystery To Me is my All Time Favorite Fleetwood Mac album, and this White Hot Stamper copy has the sound that I always DREAMED this album could have, but didn’t — until now. This is just the second Hot Stamper shootout that we’ve been able to do, since clean copies with the right stampers are ridiculously hard to come by. I’m not kidding. I have spent the last ten years and more trying to find the right stampers for this record. I can tell you I was dead wrong so many times in the past that I had almost given up. Time and time again, just when I thought I had it figured out, I would go back and play my so-called “hot” copy, to find myself miserably disappointed all over again. (more…)

Sibelius / Finlandia in Phase IV!

More of the music of Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)

More of the music of Edvard Grieg (1843-1907)

In 2013 we stumbled upon the London pressing of this relatively rare record — never heard of it before, and who on earth is Kazimierz Kord? — and were shocked to hear how good the random copy of this unknown-to-us recording sounded. The brass was incredibly solid and powerful; I don’t think I had ever heard Finlandia with the kind of heavy brass that this record was able to reproduce. We had to know more! 

We started by pulling out every performance on every label we had in our backroom and playing them one after another. Most never made it to the half-minute mark. Sour or thin brass on the opening salvo of Finlandia? Forget it; on to the trade-in pile you go.

If you have too many classical records taking up too much space and need to winnow them down to a manageable size, pick a composer and play half a dozen of his works. Most classical records display an irredeemable mediocrity right from the start; it doesn’t take a pair of golden ears to hear it. If you’re after the best sound, it’s the rare record that will have it, which makes clearing shelf space a lot easier than you might imagine. If you keep more than one out of ten you’re probably setting the bar too low, if our experience is any guide. (more…)

Sticky Fingers Is a MoFi Disaster to Beat Them All – Now With Video

More of the Music of The Rolling Stones

If you click on the video you can read some of the silly comments people are making about this awful pressing, which happens to be one of the worst sounding versions of Sticky Fingers ever committed to vinyl.

When you stop to consider how awful most pressings are compared to the only version that has ever sounded good to us, the right original domestic LP,  that’s really saying something.

The MoFi pressing of this album is a joke. It’s so compressed, lifeless, and lacking in low end weight and power that it would hardly interfere with even the most polite conversation at a wine tasting. I consider it one of the worst sounding versions ot the album ever made.

Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Harold Arlen Song Book #2 – Brash Sound? Not this Copy!

Hot Stamper Pressings of Ella Fitzgerald’s Albums Available Now

The first Harold Arlen Song Book to hit the site, and with sound like this it’s going to be very hard to beat. White Hot on side two, Super Hot on side one, Ella is especially rich, Tubey Magical and breathy throughout.

The space is HUGE and the sound so rich. The vocals have dramatically less hardness and the orchestra — especially on side two — is not brash for once.

Huge amounts of Tubey Magic as well, which is key to the best sounding copies. The sound needs weight, warmth and tubes or you might as well be playing a CD.

Hardness and Brashness

Want to know what we are on about with all this talk of hardness and brashness? Easy, just play the average copy. Unless you have been exceptionally fortunate to have chanced upon a properly mastered and pressed and cared for copy, you will hear plenty of both.

It’s one of the main reasons we have such a hard time doing shootouts for Ella’s Songbook albums. The other of course is the poor condition most copies are in. Few pressings do not have marks that play or damaged grooves. The players of the ’50s and ’60s, not to mention their owners, were ruinous on the records of the day.

Which is simply another reason not to expect another top copy of this album to come to the site any time soon. Give us three to five years or so and we might be able to find another batch with which to do a shootout. In that time we might look at fifty copies, buy ten, and end up with five that are worth playing. We obviously wouldn’t bother if the music and sound were so good. (Click on The Legendary Songbooks tab above to read more about the historical value of the music. The sound we can judge for ourselves.)

Stereo Vs. Mono

It is our opinion that the mono takes all the fun out of the Billy May’s deliberately wide, spacious orchestral presentation surrounding Ella. Which is too bad: the mono pressings are five times as common as the stereo ones.

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Deep Purple – The Book of Taliesyn

More Deep Purple

More British Blues Rock

  • An insanely good sounding copy with Triple Plus (A+++) sound from start to finish and the first copy to ever hit the site!
  • Forget the dubby domestic pressings and whatever crappy Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – the UK LPs are the only way to fly on this album
  • Exceptionally quiet vinyl throughout — Mint Minus to Mint Minus Minus
  • “Several months after the innovative remake of “You Keep Me Hanging On,” England’s answer to Vanilla Fudge was this early version of Deep Purple, which featured vocalist Rod Evans, and bassist Nick Simper, along with mainstays Ritchie Blackmore, Jon Lord, and Ian Paice.”

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Sting – Bring on the Night

More Sting and The Police

  • This outstanding copy of Sting’s epic double album boasts solid Double Plus (A++) sound or close to it on all four sides AND exceptionally quiet vinyl
  • Sting and his jazzy pals work through a good portion of his extensive catalog, including both Police songs and solo tracks
  • “Sting really got carried away with the idea that his supporting crew for Dream of the Blue Turtles was a real jazz band, and technically, he was kind of right … the loose, rather infectious performances show what Sting was trying to achieve with his debut.”

Sting said to Bring On The Night and who were we to argue? We finally collected enough of these import pressings to get a proper shootout going, and the best copies really impressed us.

The best copies like this one give you more transparency and separation between the various bandmembers. Many copies had a sterile/dry quality, but this one remains rich throughout with more analog warmth. (more…)

Ruggiero Ricci / Solo Recital – Reviewed in 2011

More Performances by Ruggiero Ricci

EXCELLENT SOUND and quiet vinyl on both sides of this London LP (CS 6193) featuring the great Ruggiero Ricci performing solo violin pieces.

Side two in particular has a sweet, clear top end that really shows you the detail in the violin.

Side one is transparent and tonally correct but a bit dark, without all the clarity and sweetness of side two.

Violin sonatas by Stravinsky, Bartok, Prokofiev and Hindemith.

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Bob Dylan – Knocked Out Loaded

  • You’ll find outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound on both sides of this superb pressing of Dylan’s 1986 release – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Both sides here are super rich and full with excellent bass and tons of energy
  • “… the 11-minute epic “Brownsville Girl”, co-written by Sam Shepard, has been cited as one of his best songs by some critics.”
  • “… [Dylan’s] scattershot approach has its charms, especially when it results in winding epics like the Shepard collaboration ‘Brownsville Girl.'”

This is one of the better sounding Dylan records from the ’80s. It’s not exactly Blood on the Tracks, the only Dylan album we think is qualified to be on our Top 100 Rock and Pop List, but it sounds good for a record from this era. (more…)

Dave Brubeck Quartet / 25th Anniversary Reunion

More Dave Brubeck

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Piano

This album has SURPRISINGLY GOOD SOUND and even more SURPRISINGLY GOOD MUSIC! Who would have thought that these old goats still could still play jazz at this level? Especially Joe Morello on the drums — this guy drums up a storm, especially during his solos on the first track. He’s always been one of the strongest members of the foursome. But everybody here is good, and they do both their famous songs and some that they’re less well known for.   (more…)