Month: December 2021

Jerry Jeff Walker / Mr. Bojangles

More Jerry Jeff Walker

  • Clean and clear, rich and natural, with good vocal presence and wonderful energy throughout
  • The title track sounds amazing, but that’s just one of the great songs with excellent sound on the album
  • The engineering team of Tom Dowd and Phil Iehle really worked their magic on this one
  • 4 1/2 stars: “…Walker favored the country and folk side of folk-rock much more than the rock side.”

This is only the second title by Jerry Jeff that we’ve been able to do shootouts for. Most of the records we’ve played of his from the ’70s left a lot to be desired sonically and more often than not musically, so we gave up on them.

His Vanguard release from 1969 has superb sound, as does this Atco from 1968. There may be one or two more coming down the pike but that could be many years from now. His records never sold all that well, and not many of them can be found in Southern California.

And they are hard to find in audiophile playing condition. (more…)

Smokey Robinson & the Miracles – Greatest Hits, Vol. 2

More Smokey Robinson

More Soul, Blues and R&B

  • These sides are tonally correct and highly resolving, as well as relaxed and smooth – Motown’s trademark phony upper midrange boost is gone
  • Here is the sound we wish we could find on more Motown records – believe me, we’ve tried
  • We don’t offer Greatest Hits albums often but this one sounds too good to ignore
  • 4 stars: “Scrumptious! All hits, except for two excellent B-sides: the exquisite ‘Choosey Beggar,’ a marvelous ballad with an Asiatic feel, and the poignant ‘Save Me’…”

Both sides are outstanding from start to finish. Motown’s trademark phony top end boost is gone. Most copies we played had some of that sound, including a boosted upper midrange, but our Hot Stampers will keep the problems under control while at the same time giving you presence, energy and space, layered on a good solid base of low end. (more…)

Willie Dixon – Hidden Charms

More Willie Dixon

More Classic Blues

  • We guarantee there is dramatically more space, richness, vocal presence, and performance energy on this copy than others you’ve heard, and that’s especially true if you made the mistake of buying whatever Heavy Vinyl pressing is currently on the market
  • Hidden Charms was produced by T Bone Burnett, a man who understands this music as well as any living soul, and also a man who knows how to get the most out of the artists he works with

It was pretty easy to separate the men from the boys in this shootout. A quick drop of the needle on each side would immediately answer our number one question: “How BIG is the sound?”. The copies that lacked top end extension or bottom end were just too boring. This is the BLUES, baby — you think it’s supposed to sound small?

Another problem we ran into on many copies was excessive smoothness. When a copies was overly rich or smeary, it usually lacked the “gritty” feel that music like this should have. I don’t know about you, but if I’m listening to the blues I am not looking for glossy sound. Give me the texture and the detail and the other qualities that Willie Dixon put on the tape. I don’t want his sound to be “fixed” after the fact.

This is some of the best modern blues sound money can buy! We picked up a bunch of these and shot ’em out, and most of the copies left us cold. The average pressing is still a decent sounding record, but the music works so much better on a Hot Stamper. A copy like this one gives you more detail and texture, more extension up top and real weight to the bottom end — absolutely crucial for this music.

Hidden Charms was produced by T Bone Burnett, a man who understands this music as well as any living soul, and also a man who knows how to get the most out of the artists he works with. The sound and the arrangements are perfectly suited to Willie’s material. Since most vintage blues recordings leave a lot to be desired sonically, and most modern “hi-fi” blues recordings are less than engaging musically, this album is the cure for the blues-lovin’ audiophile’s blues! (more…)

With a Little Help From My Friends – A Masterpiece of Blue Eyed Soul

More of the Music of Joe Cocker

We just finished our first shootout in over FIVE [2012 or so] years for the album and were SHOCKED by how amazing the best copies can sound, even better than we remember them from last time around. Turn this one up good and loud and you’ll have Joe Cocker in all his raspy glory belting out With A Little Help From My Friends right in your very own listening room!

Blue-Eyed Soul doesn’t get much better than this. Cocker and his band chose SUPERB material for this album, including Dave Mason’s Feelin’ Alright; two of Dylan’s best, Just Like A Woman and I Shall Be Released; and of course the wonderful title track by no less than Joe’s fellow Brits Lennon and McCartney. The backing band features many great musicians including giants such as Jimmy Page and Stevie Winwood. No one’s making records like this anymore, not with this kind of musical and songwriting talent anyway.

What’s surprising is how good all the not-so-famous musicians are here. Chris Stainton is killer on bass, piano and organ. (He later toured extensively with Eric Clapton.) Henry McCullough (who joined Wings in 1971) handles the electric guitar duties so well (along with Jimmy Page and Albert Lee) that we would be hard pressed to say who turns in the better axe work on the album. (Some of these guys went on to become The Grease Band, but all of them had no trouble finding professional work with the best in the business.)

Whoever put this band together deserves our gratitude; they are playing with the Best of the Best and holding their own every step of the way. It was a thrill to hear the quality of the musicianship on this album; they sound like one of those great British bands that’s been together for years and finally got the chance to show off their chops.

The Recording

This album sounds just like one of the better Aretha Franklin outings from the late ’60s, early ’70s, with Aretha ducking out and Joe taking her place at the mic. If you’ve heard one of our Hot Stamper Aretha records you know exactly what you’ll be getting here. The background vocalists, piano and organ are eerily similar. It’s pretty clear that her recordings were being used as a template for this album, and it seems to have worked out very well for everyone involved. There is really nothing to fault here; the arrangements, the performances and the sound are GLORIOUS.

Overview

We played a large number of copies in our shootout and found that the average copy just didn’t cut it. They tend to be overly smooth with no real extension up top. Some are grainy and spitty, with edgy background vocals. It’s the Hot copies that split the difference — smooth and sweet in the upper mids, with an extended top end, but without sacrificing the all-important texture and presence in the vocals. If Cocker’s voice isn’t front and center and raspy as all get out, what’s the point?

Reissues

We used to recommend and sell the Speakers Corner German pressing of the album, one of the few Heavy Vinyl pressings we carried up until a few years ago. It’s a good value at $35 but obviously would not hold a candle to one of our Hot Stamper original pressings. (The domestic reissues on the later A&M label are not to our liking and should probably be avoided.)

Robert Christgau’s Insightful Review

With a Little Help From My Friends is the major triumph of rock interpretation thus far. Cocker’s material leans to the conventional … but his conception and performance, as well as Denny Cordell’s production, are always audacious.

His transformation of “Bye Bye Blackbird” and “A Little Help From My Friends” from light-hearted ditties into wails of human need succeeds perfectly, and his version of ‘Feelin’ Alright’ is not only better than Three Dog Night’s but better than the original, by Dave Mason and Traffic.

If that means Cocker is the best singer in England, well—overlook Mick Jagger and it’s possible, even likely. His voice is very strong, influenced by Ray Charles, and he has no inhibitions about using it. All of his inhibitions came before the fact, in the immense care that went into each track …

Cocker’s affection for rock is uniquely personalized. He is gruff and vulgar, perhaps a touch too self-involved, but his steady strength rectifies his excesses. He is the best of the male rock interpreters, as good in his way as Janis Joplin is in hers.

Ella Fitzgerald – Hello Love

Hot Stamper Pressings of Ella Fitzgerald’s Albums Available Now

More Titles that Sound Best to Us in Mono

  • Ella’s 1959 release finally arrives on the site with STUNNING Mono sound from first note to last
  • The sound is relaxed, full-bodied and lively, with Tubey Magical richness befitting the 1957 and 1959 recording dates of these sessions
  • Skip the stereo pressing on this title – none of the copies we played could hold a candle to this killer mono LP
  • “The album focuses on well-known songs not included in Fitzgerald’s epic Songbooks project, and several of the songs are tunes that she had recently recorded in duet with Louis Armstrong.”
  • 4 stars: “A fine gem among the diamonds of Ella Fitzgerald’s late-’50s period with Verve… Wrapped in the strings of Frank DeVol’s orchestra, Fitzgerald is a bewitching presence singing these dreamy standards…”

(more…)

Spirit – The Family That Plays Together

More Spirit

More Psychedelic Rock

  • The band’s sophomore release finally makes its Hot Stamper debut here with KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound on both sides
  • A very difficult album to find with good sound and audiophile quality surfaces
  • Both sides have presence, size and space we guarantee you have never heard on this album in all your born days
  • I Got A Line On You was the big hit and it really rocks on this copy
  • 4 1/2 stars: “On this, the second Spirit album, the group put all of the elements together that made them the legendary (and underrated) band that they were. Jazz, rock & roll, and even classical elements combined to create one of the cleanest, most tasteful syntheses of its day.”

This is a record I grew up with and like to think I know well. I’m a huge fan of the band. For audiophiles the first album and Clear are better recordings. This one has its problems, but so does Twelve Dreams and that album belongs in any rock collection worthy of the name.

The sound on the better copies isn’t unlike a good Jefferson Airplane record. It’s crazy psychedelic ’60s music with a LOT going on, and I’m guessing it was pretty hard to get the raw power of this band onto tape. (more…)

Soultrane – Supposedly Reprocessed into Stereo, But Was It Really?

More of the Music of John Coltrane

It may say stereo on the cover, but this album is pure, glorious MONO, with sound that is full-bodied, relaxed, Tubey Magical and tonally correct.

This is a mono recording that has supposedly been reprocessed into stereo. Rudy Van Gelder did the mastering, and my guess is he decided to leave the sound mono and simply not tell anyone. Who can blame him? He engineered it in mono, so why fix what ain’t broke just because the label decided to print the cover and the label with the word “stereo” in order to generate more sales?

We’re lucky he did. The early OJC reissues of this title are awful, and whatever Heavy Vinyl they’re churning out these days is probably every bit as bad.

Without these excellent ’60s and ’70s reissues, all that we would have available to do our shootouts would be the originals.

At one to three thousand dollars each for clean copies, few of which could ever be found anyway, that makes for a shootout whose costs could never be justified.

So our thanks go to Rudy for doing a good job!

(more…)

Bill Evans Trio with Symphony Orchestra – Not Recommended

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Bill Evans Available Now

We played a short stack of these, the second of two albums Evans made with a symphony orchestra, but we found the strings just too shrill for our taste, so we gave up, at least for now.

For 34 38 years we’ve been helping music-loving audiophiles the world over avoid bad sounding records.

We play mediocre-to-bad sounding pressings so that you don’t have to, a public service from your record loving friends at Better Records.

You can find this one in our hall of shame, along with more than 350 others that — in our opinion — qualify as some of the worst sounding records ever made. (On some records in the Hall of Shame the sound is passable but the music is bad.  These are also records you can safely avoid.)

Note that most of the entries are audiophile remasterings of one kind or another. The reason for this is simple: we’ve gone through the all-too-often unpleasant experience of comparing them head to head with our best Hot Stamper pressings.

When you can hear them that way, up against an exceptionally good record, their flaws become that much more obvious and, frankly, that much more inexcusable.

The Hollies – Hollies

More of The Hollies

  • A superb pressing of The Hollies’ 1974 release, with outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last
  • The sound of this early UK pressing is big, full-bodied and dynamic with Tubey Magic to die for – forget the dry, edgy sound of the domestic LPs, this is the real master tape, baby!
  • The Air That I Breathe is the monster track here, and on these killer British Polydor pressings it’s out of this world thanks to the engineering prowess of none other than Alan Parsons

(more…)

Frank Sinatra – Some Nice Things I’ve Missed

  • The album features Sinatra singing some of the biggest hits of the day by artists such as Stevie Wonder, Neil Diamond, Jim Croce, and Bread
  • Released in 1974, this is probably the last good album the man made outside of She Shot Me Down from 1981

(more…)