Month: November 2019

Electric Light Orchestra – Eldorado

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More of our favorite Art Rock Records

  • An outstanding vintage pressing of Eldorado with solid Double Plus (A++) sound and vinyl that’s about as quiet as can be found
  • This pressing showed us a big, lively, musically involving Eldorado, one of the toughest nuts to crack in the entire ELO canon
  • There are some really awful UK pressings out there (and lots of bad domestics to be sure), so if you like the thrill of the hunt, make sure you have plenty of time and money to spend
  • 5 stars: “Eldorado was strongly reminiscent in some ways of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Not that it could ever have the same impact or be as distinctive, but it had its feet planted in so many richly melodic and varied musical traditions, yet made it all work in a rock context, that it did recall the Beatles classic.”

As a result of Jeff Lynne’s everything-but-the-kitchen-sink production approach, it’s the rare copy that provides enough transparency and resolution to bring out all the elements in the incredibly dense mixes — with strings! – that Lynne favors. But when you find a copy that does, what a THRILL it is. (more…)

Fiedler / Boston Tea Party – Reviewed in 2010

This original Shaded Dog pressing of LSC 2213 from 1959 has EXCELLENT SOUND AND QUIET VINYL ON SIDE TWO, where you’ll find a wonderful rendition of Hernando’s Hideaway.

The sound is excellent — lively, full-bodied and super three-dimensional. Check out how great the castanets sound.

Side one is nothing special and a bit noisy in the right channel, so we’re really only charging you for the strong side two. Hernando’s Hideaway is really worth the price of admission alone, you’ll see.

As I’m sure you know by now, Fiedler on this sort of material is very hard to beat. (more…)

Stripped – Bad on CD, Way Better on Vinyl

The best record The Rolling Stones made in the last 20 years! Superb sound. Highly recommended.  The CD sucks and the vinyl is rare and pricey but worth every penny.

By 1995 records like this were only released on import vinyl and typically went out of print soon after they began their descent down the pop charts. I used to review them and sell the better sounding ones back in the day. Supplies were extremely limited and unpredictable – these small pressing run ’90s albums went out of print without warning and almost never came back. Once they were gone they were rarely ever reissued, although Simply Vinyl took a crack at filling that gap, with mixed results as I’m sure you know.

All of those factors conspire to make the cost of acquiring the mintiest pressings from overseas fairly high, and of course this is the main reason you have never seen the album on our site before. Be that as it may, we have this copy available and it is not only wonderful sounding but the music is every bit as good as I remember it.

You may remember that a controversy raged in the audiophile press at the time about how awful the CD sounded compared to the vinyl.  Turns out they had mastered the CD using some bad equipment, or a bad transfer of the tape, or some other such foolishness, and the result was that only us dinosaurs who had kept our turntables into the ’90s could actually stand to listen to the album. (more…)

Big Brother & The Holding Company Featuring Janis Joplin

More Women Who Rock

  • With two seriously good Double Plus (A++) sides, this was one of the better copies we played in our recent shootout
  • Most copies we played were too compressed or veiled to involve you in the music, but this one has the kind of rich, big, clear sound this Bay Area band needs to work its bluesy magic
  • Turn this one up good and loud (which you can do when the sound is right) and you’ll have a living, breathing Janis Joplin standing right between your speakers
  • A tough record to find with audiophile quality sound and clean vinyl, two reasons you rarely see it on the site

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Deep Purple – Mark I & II – Reviewed in 2009

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More British Blues Rock

This is a Minty looking EMI Import Double LP. It’s a compilation with a single LP dedicated to each era of the band’s early history. As with any compilation some tracks sound better than others here but don’t let the German sourced tapes scare you. These sound like really high quality tapes, close to, if not the actual, master tapes.

The second LP features the most recognizable and probably best lineup (Mark II) the band ever had, with songs such as Black Knight, Speed King, Smoke on the Water and Highway star, to name but a few. 

Bill Evans – I Will Say Goodbye

More Bill Evans

  • Bill Evans’ 1980 release makes its Hot Stamper debut with outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last
  • Rich, smooth, sweet, and wonderfully natural, this is the sound we love here at Better Records
  • 4 stars: ” For his final Fantasy album, Evans, bassist Eddie Gómez, and drummer Eliot Zigmund perform memorable renditions of such songs as Herbie Hancock’s “Dolphin Dance”… Fine post-bop music from an influential piano giant.

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Tchaikovsky / Violin Concerto / Grumiaux – Our Shootout Winner from 2012

More of the music of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893)

This White Hot Two-Pack of the most well-known and beloved violin concerto in the classical repertoire gives you a TOP performance with TOP quality sound from first note to last. No single copy had two sides as good as these, so we’ve combined two LPs to bring you the best Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto ever to hit the site.

In choosing these two sides we put special emphasis on the sound of the violin. Many copies suffered from a slight screechiness to the sound of the instrument, but we present here a violin that is rich and sweet, yet retains the full pallette of its complex harmonics.

Side One – Record One

A++, with Tubey Magic to die for. The sound is rich, with a bit of tube smear that does little damage to the overall sound. Big space, a solid bottom, and plenty of dynamic energy are in evidence throughout the side. There’s so much energy that, in comparison to some copies, this side almost sounded like it was running fast!

Side two of this LP earned a grade of A+ — it’s too smeary and dark for our taste. (more…)

Led Zeppelin – Our Four Plus Shootout Winner from 2014

More of the Music of Led Zeppelin

Reviews and Commentaries for Led Zeppelin I

It’s hard to imagine any copy beating this one! The vinyl is Mint Minus throughout, and the sound is INSANELY GOOD!

The chances of finding these surfaces with this sound — we’ll let you do the math. If you’re a fan of this album, and who isn’t – this is the copy you want.

Side one blew our minds and earned a grade of A++++!

Our lengthy commentary entitled outliers and out-of-this-world sound talks about how rare these kinds of pressings are and how to go about finding them.

We no longer give Four Pluses out as a matter of policy, but that doesn’t mean we don’t come across records that deserve them from time to time.

Originals Vs Reissues

The reason this copy has such amazing transparency and such an extended top end compared to other copies is clearly due, at least to some degree, to the better cutting equipment used to master it.

No original pressing — on domestic or import vinyl — we’ve ever played could boast this kind of resolution, leading edge transients, articulate bass definition, and big, bold but shockingly REAL sound.

Collectors routinely pay hundreds of dollars for original copies that don’t sound remotely as good as this one.

Which is fine by us. We’re not in that business. We’re not selling the right labels; we’re selling the right sound. There is a difference.

Collecting single pressings of original albums is doable, albeit expensive. Collecting good sounding pressings is hard; in fact, nothing in the record collecting world is harder.

But if you actually like playing your records as opposed to just collecting them, then the best possible sound should be right at the top of your list and the rarity of the label right at the very bottom.

Keep in mind that we’re the guys who are all about sound, not originality.

We discussed it in our FAQ as a matter of fact:

This listing gets to the point:

These are all records that can sound better on the right reissue pressing, not the original:

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Breakfast in America – Nimbus Reviewed

More on Breakfast in America

Sonic Grade: D

UPDATE 

We were a bit generous with our sonic grades for this record in the past. It’s not hard to do quite a bit better with an original domestic pressing.

For 33 38 years we’ve been helping music loving audiophiles the world over avoid bad sounding records.

To see the audiophile records with bad sound or bad music we’ve reviewed, click here.

It’s yet another public service from Better Records, the home of the best sounding records ever pressed. Our records sound better than any others you’ve ever heard or you get your money back.

Astrud Gilberto – Beach Samba

  • An outstanding copy of Beach Samba, with solid Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER from top to bottom 
  • The soundstage is huge, and the overall quality of the recording is big and bold like you will not believe
  • Creed Taylor (the CTI man) produced, Don Sebesky and Deodato did the arrangements, and Val Valentin engineered – what’s not to like?
  • “This 1967 Verve LP has the breezy bossa novas and sambas Astrud was famed for, but also a Lovin’ Spoonful duet with her young son and some seriously impressive scatting, too.” – Amazon

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