Month: March 2022

Roundabout Vs. South Side of the Sky

yes__fragiHot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Yes Available Now

Fragile is yet another record the deserves some of the credit for helping me become a better listener.

This shootout taught us that track one is not as well recorded as the rest of side one. On copy after copy, and there were well over a dozen, it was the other big track on side one, South Side of the Sky, that had consistently better sound.

You really hear it in the choruses, where the voices are especially full-bodied, powerful, rich and energetic on that fourth track.

A lesser amount of these qualities can be heard on the first.

We play both songs, but we play them in reverse order, knowing that the mind-boggling sound is really going to be on South Side, not so much Roundabout.

This record should give any record you own a run for its money. It’s as BIG and as BOLD a statement about raising the bar for rock recordings as any I know. Without a doubt one of the Best Rock Recordings of all time.

A well known audiophile record reviewer opined on his website that Fragile “was never a very good recording to begin with… cardboardy, compressed and somewhat cloudy and distant.”

Perhaps his old copy sounded like that, or maybe it sounded like that on his stereo, but our Hot Stampers sure don’t. The typical pressing of Fragile can be painful — smeary and dull with plenty of distortion. If you know the magic stamper numbers and you spend the time to clean and play enough copies, you’re bound to hear some serious magic.

Of course, that’s a lot of work, and some people are probably too busy typing out lists of their pricey equipment to be bothered with such things.

Evolution

My equipment was forced to evolve in order to be able to play the scores of challenging recordings issued by Yes and other groups in the ’70s. You could say that the albums of Yes informed not only my taste in music but the actual stereo I play that music on.

I’ve had large scale dynamic speakers for the last four decades, precisely in order to play records like this, the kind of music I fell in love with fifty years ago.

Hot Tuna – Self-Titled

More Folk Rock

• Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades on both sides make this the best sounding Hot Tuna we have ever played
• If you like the kind of music Brits such as John Renbourn, Stefan Grossman, Bert Jansch and the like were making back in the ’60s this should be right up your alley
• Live, all acoustic, mostly Blues and Rags, this is about as far from the Jefferson Airplane as you can get
• 4 Stars: “Kaukonen remained the accomplished fingerpicking stylist he had been before joining the Airplane, while Casady dispensed with the usual timekeeping duties of the bass in favor of extensive contrapuntal soloing, creating a musical conversation that was unique. The result was less an indulgence than a new direction.”

Top quality sound for both sides of Hot Tuna’s classic debut album. It’s the best Hot Tuna Hot Stamper to ever hit the site for a good reason — it’s hard to come by clean copies of this stuff, and even when you do most copies don’t sound all that good.

Schmitt and Zentz

A pair of big names behind the recording managed to achieve some of the better live sound of the day. I refer of course to none other than Al Schmitt, producer (and winner of 23 Grammy Awards to date), and Allen Zentz, engineer (who later went on to found Allen Zentz Mastering and Recording). (more…)

Cream / Fresh Cream – Yes, It Can Actually Sound Quite Good on Atco

More Cream

More British Blues Rock

  • Fresh Cream returns to the site with excellent Double Plus (A++) sound or very close to it on both sides of this Plum and Tan Atco stereo original
  • The band’s debut album has much better sound than most of those that followed – it’s surprisingly Tubey Magical, with tons of studio space and lovely vocal presence
  • If all you know is the DCC pressing, or any other Heavy Vinyl pressing, you are in for quite a treat with this domestic Hot Stamper (here is our review)
  • The Atco pressings never win our shootouts, but they can still have sound that is quite a bit better than 90% of the pressings audiophiles seem to like
  • 4 1/2 Stars: “Fresh Cream represents so many different firsts, it’s difficult to keep count. Cream, of course, was the first supergroup, but their first album not only gave birth to the power trio, it also was instrumental in the birth of heavy metal and the birth of jam rock…”
  • If you’re a fan of the band, this title from 1966 is clearly one of their best, and one of their best sounding
  • The complete list of titles from 1966 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

Vintage covers for this album are hard to find in exceptionally clean shape. Most of the will have at least some amount of ringwear, seam wear and edge wear. We guarantee that the cover we supply with this Hot Stamper is at least VG

We recently finished a shootout for this band’s hard-rockin’ debut album and were once again delighted to hear how good this music can sound when you get a pressing that sounds as good as this one does. Nothing the band did in the studio was as well-recorded as their first album.

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Listening in Depth to It’s Like You Never Left

More of the Music of Dave Mason

The first track on side one, Baby…Please, has huge bass and is very rich.

Check out the sweet vocals on the second song, Every Woman, and the Tubey Magical richness of track three, If You’ve Got Love.

On side two note how big the piano sounds, and how much space surrounds it.

Then in comes the solid snare, followed by rich, meaty horns; breathy, silky vocals, and big guitars.

This album is very well recorded and you don’t need a pair of golden ears or a state-of-the-art system to hear it — assuming you have a great copy like this one.

If you don’t have a good copy of the album, no amount of money spent on stereo equipment is going to get this album to sound the way it should.

I Was a Fan in 73

I was a big fan of this album when it came out in 1973. I used to play it all the time in fact. Now I hear why – it’s big and rich with a solid bottom end and a smooth, sweet top, perfect for the big but not especially sophisticated speakers (the Fulton J System) I had back in the day.

This album has the kind of sound that the typical CD wants nothing to do with. Not that the Compact Disc couldn’t pull it off — there are good sounding CDs in this world, I own hundreds of them — but it doesn’t seem to want to even try.

Graham Nash helps out on vocals on tracks one, two and five on the first side.

Stevie Wonder plays a lovely harmonica solo on The Lonely One on side two, and George Harrison guests on guitar on If You’ve Got Love, the third track on side one. (more…)

Letter of the Week – “The White Hot Stampers opened up a completely different listening experience.”

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Supertramp Available Now

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently:

Hey Tom,  

You don’t need any more adulation; you know I am a fan. I just had to send you a note to share an audio phenomena I am experiencing. I recently got Supertramp Breakfast In America 3+ / 3+ and now Zeppelin IV 2.5+ / 3+.

These were albums that were always average for me and I previously got copies just to have in the collection.

The White Hot Stampers, however, opened up a completely different listening experience. Holy smokes, these albums are really, really good; until I got the WHS’s I just could not hear them.

Probably, more accurately, lesser albums were harsh and not engaging. Once you hear copies like these anything less becomes unlistenable. These albums really rock, long live White Hot Stampers!

Mike H.

Paul Kantner/Jefferson Starship – Blows Against The Empire

More Jefferson Starship

Reviews and Commentaries for The Jefferson Airplane

  • Paul Kantner’s debut solo album finally arrives on the site with outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER throughout
  • Forget 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 this album from 1970, this is the way to go
  • “…the first use of the ‘Starship’ billing, predating the formation of the group with that name by four years.”
  • 4 stars: “Kantner employed often dense instrumentation and complex arrangements, but there were enough hooks and harmonies to keep things interesting. Blows eventually went gold, and it was even nominated for a science fiction award usually reserved for novels.”

(more…)

The Byrds – Ballad of Easy Rider

More of The Byrds

More Country and Country Rock

  • We’re always blown away at just how much further the best copies are able to take the music – what a difference the right pressing makes
  • Jesus Is Just Alright is the killer track here and it rocks like you will not believe
  • 4 stars: “The band sounds tight, self-assured, and fully in touch with the music’s emotional palette, and Clarence White’s guitar work is truly a pleasure to hear…”

Every now and then we manage to stumble on a copy with some serious magic, and this is the best of those to ever make it onto our site. You won’t believe how much better this great country-rock material sounds when you have a copy that sounds as good as this one does.

Jesus Is Just Alright is the killer track here and it rocks like you will not believe! It’s one of the All-Time Best Byrds tracks, especially for sonics, with Rock and Roll energy that shows just how good a band these four guys had become. (more…)

Neil Young – Freedom

More Neil Young

  • Freedom finally arrives on the site with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it from first note to last – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Balanced, musical, present and full-bodied throughout – this pressing was a big step up from every other copy we played
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Freedom, which was a major critical and commercial comeback after a decade that had confused reviewers and fans, seemed to be a selection of the best tracks from several different unissued Young projects. …[W]hat made it all work was that Young had once again written a great bunch of songs. The romantic numbers were carefully and sincerely written. The long imagistic songs were evocative without being obvious.”

(more…)

For Misty, Stick with the Real Japanese Pressings

More Audiophile Recordings with Audiophile Quality Sound

Hot Stamper Pressings of Jazz Recordings Featuring the Piano Available Now

This is a highly recommended Three Blind Mice LP. We don’t like most Three Blind Mice albums, or jazz played by practically anyone who is not American. (Ever played Jazz at the Pawnshop? If so, did you enjoy your nap?)

But we like the music of Yamamoto well enough to recommend some of it. Midnight Sugar might actually be his most enjoyable album of them all.

The Heavy Vinyl versions are not as good, although the 45 RPM pressing probably comes the closest to the real Japanese pressing we review here.

Anything pressed at RTI is rarely better than second rate and should be avoided if at all possible.

We almost never like records Made In Japan that were not recorded in Japan. There are of course a few exceptions.

My First Time

This was the first Three Blind Mice recording I ever heard, over 20 [now close to 40] years ago. A fellow audiophile who went on to become a true audio guru for me (George Louis) played me this recording to demonstrate his stereo.

It had to be the most dynamic piano recording I had ever heard in my life. 

Yamamoto likes to tinkle the keys very softly, and then really pound them. And the Three Blind Mice engineers were able to capture both the quiet tinkling because of the Japanese vinyl, and the full-on pounding because of the audiophile recording equipment they used. It was an ear-opening experience.

Over the course of the next year or two, I sold off my Fulton Premiers and my Audio Research Electronics, because no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get Misty to sound like it did at George’s house.

I realized that it takes better equipment than those companies were making back then to get the sound of that record right, and that put me on, to quote Cat Stevens, ”the road to find out.”

And it wasn’t just the equipment that had to get better, a subject we address in our commentary Revolutionary Changes in Audio. An excerpt:

When I got started in audio in the early- to mid-70s, the following important elements of the modern stereo system did not exist:

  • Stand-alone phono stages.
  • Modern cabling and power cords.
  • Vibration controlling platforms for turntables and equipment.
  • Synchronous Drive Systems for turntable motors.
  • Carbon fiber mats for massive turntable platters.
  • Highly adjustable tonearms (for VTA, etc.) with extremely delicate adjustments and precision bearings.
  • Modern record cleaning machines and fluids.
  • And there wasn’t much in the way of innovative room treatments like the Hallographs we use.

A lot of things had to change in order for us to reproduce records at the level required to do our record shootouts and be confident about our findings, and we pursued every one of them about as far as time and money allowed.

For a further discussion of these issues, please click here.

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Letter of the Week – “…you guys DID IT AGAIN – simply superlative sound quality.”

More of the Music of Paul McCartney

More of the Music of The Beatles

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently:

Hey Tom, 

Got my “Red Rose Speedway” today. OMG. OK, this was the FIRST album I EVER bought – new from the store, as a 12-year old kid just beginning to buy his own records with his own money. I haven’t heard this in 30 plus years. SUCH GREAT SOUND!!! The first is a series of fantastic songs, from start to finish, and you guys DID IT AGAIN – simply superlative sound quality.

You have NO idea how much joy you’re giving me!!!!

Steve M.

Steve,

Glad to hear it. Joy is the name of the game!

TP

FURTHER READING

More Hot Stamper Testimonial Letters

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