These two sides offer bigger brass, more transparency and more presence than every other side we played save one!
This may become one of your favorite big band albums to demo or test with. Or you can just enjoy the hell out of it if you prefer. So transparent and tonally correct, this is a killer sounding copy. We put this one right up there with the best of the Verve jazz titles we’ve done to date.
This album sounds like a big room full of musicians playing live, which it surely was. The Tubey Magical richness of the 1962 recording is breathtaking – no modern record can touch it.
The best copies recreate a live studio space the size of which you will not believe. (more…)
UPDATE 2025
We can’t find any stereo pressings we like anymore. They sound thin, bright and somewhat phasey to us.
We are going to do the next shootout with the mono pressings unless we can find a killer stereo soon.
This vintage Black Label Contemporary Stereo LP from has DEMO DISC QUALITY SOUND. No other copy we played was in a class with this bad boy — it does it ALL.
How can you beat a Roy DuNann recording of five reeds, piano, guitar and a rhythm section that includes Shelly Manne and Red Mitchell? The timbre of the instruments is so spot-on it makes all the hard work and money you’ve put into your stereo more than pay off.
The Demo Disc sound on this copy is really something to hear – all tube, live-to-two-track direct from the Contemporary studio. It’s pretty much everything you want in a recording from this era. I’d love to keep it but when would I have time to play it? I can assure you I will sleep very well knowing that it’s going to a good home. (more…)
Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of J.S. Bach Available Now
Some audiophiles buy organ records to show off their subwoofers. Exceptional pressings of exceptional recordings such as this one will allow you to do that, but the best of them have musical qualities far beyond simple demonstrations of bass fundamentals. Carl Weinrich understands this music perfectly and makes it come alive in a way I’ve rarely heard by other performers.
For those of you who think technology marches on — which of course it does in some ways — this 1963 recording shows that the RCA engineers were capable of capturing the authentic sound of the instrument with the vintage tube equipment available to them. In my opinion they could do it better back in those days.
Musically speaking there aren’t many organists in Carl Weinrich’s class. The only other Bach organ records of this caliber that we know of are the two volumes that Karl Richter recorded for Decca in the mid-’50s. You can’t go wrong with any of them. At least one belongs in any serious audiophile’s collection.
One of the qualities that we don’t talk about on the site nearly enough is the SIZE of the record’s presentation. Some copies of the album just sound small — they don’t extend all the way to the outside edges of the speakers, and they don’t seem to take up all the space from the floor to the ceiling. In addition, the sound can often be recessed, with a lack of presence and immediacy in the center.
Other copies — my notes for these copies often read “BIG and BOLD” — create a huge soundfield. They’re not brighter, they’re not more aggressive, they’re not hyped-up in any way, they’re just bigger and clearer.
We often have to go back and downgrade the copies that we were initially impressed with in light of such a standout pressing. Who knew the recording could be that huge, spacious and three dimensional? We sure didn’t, not until we played the copy that had those qualities, and that copy might have been number 8 or 9 in the rotation.
Think about it: if you had only seven copies, you might not have stumbled upon the copy that sounded so exceptionally open and clear. And how many of even the most dedicated audiophiles would have more than one of two clean vintage pressings with which to do a shootout? These kinds of records are expensive and hard to come by in good shape. Believe us, we know whereof we speak when it comes to getting hold of vintage Living Stereo albums.
When you hear a copy do what this copy can, it’s an entirely different – and dare I say unforgettable — listening experience.
Some of Newman’s best songs can be found on Sail Away, including Political Science, You Can Leave Your Hat On, Last Night I Had a Dream and of course the wonderful title track. AMG goes nuts about Sail Away, giving it the full 5 stars and calling it “musically adventurous” and “one of Newman’s finest works.”
If you only have room for one Randy Newman record in your collection, this would be our pick. (more…)
Hot Stamper Pressings of TAS List Super Disc Albums
Reviews and Commentaries for TAS Super Disc Recordings
This is a very old commentary. Lately every copy of this record that we have auditioned has left us wondering: what is the appeal?
Take this review with a large grain of salt and don’t spend a lot of money on this title unless you can easily return it.
We don’t think it sounds very good, and rather than continue to buy more copies, we are going to give up and write it off as a lost cause, TAS List or no TAS List.
This RCA Pink Label TAS List LP plays Mint Minus. Side one of this record sounds AMAZING, especially the Dvorak piece.
Here are the comments for the copy we recently sold on the site:
Superb string tone. This is one record that deserves to be on the TAS list, and you have to give Harry credit for going against the audiophile tide and recognizing a cheap, thin pink VIC! Side one sounds incredible. I do not ever recall hearing sound like this on this Victrola. It’s demonstration quality sound.
Classic Records remastered this record not long ago and ruined it.
This is what it’s supposed to sound like. (more…)
*NOTE: On side one, Track 1, A Song For You, plays M– to EX++.
Forget the dubby domestic pressings and whatever dead-as-a-doornail Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – if you want to hear the Tubey Magic, size and energy of Leon’s wonderful debut album, a vintage UK pressing like this one is the only way to go.
The best copies of Russell’s debut album have excellent sound, as expected from a record engineered by Glyn Johns in 1970. Surprisingly, a number of UK copies suffered from somewhat dry sound, especially in the vocals. Our best copies are rich and Tubey Magical, which is what these songs need to have in order to sound their best. (more…)
The one real flaw in the recording is the amount of compression the engineer used — it’s a bit heavy-handed. This is after all a radio-friendly pop album, so no surprise there. (more…)