More George Michael

Records We Only Sell on Import Vinyl

• This original import pressing was doing practically everything right, with both sides earning incredible Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) grades, just shy of our Shootout Winner – fairly quiet vinyl too
• Dramatically more “natural” than almost all other copies (the scare quotes are there for a reason; it’s clear that George has never been interested in that kind of sound) – feel free to donate your dubby domestic pressings to the Goodwill, they’re a joke next to this
• Michael’s second studio release, a far superior album to Faith in our opinion, shows the maturation of his skills in songwriting and production – it’s a Personal Favorite of mine to this day
• The sound may be too heavily processed and glossy for some, but we find that on the best copies that sound really works for this music
• 4 stars: “… the highlights — the light, Beatlesque harmonies of “Heal the Pain,” the plodding number one “Praying for Time,” and also “Waiting for That Day” as well as the Top Ten “Freedom” — make a case for his talents as a pop craftsman.”
• This recording ranks high on our Difficulty of Reproduction Scale. Do not attempt to play it using any but the best equipment.

This original Epic import pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records can barely BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing signs of coming back. If you love hearing INTO a recording, actually being able to “see” the performers, and feeling as if you are sitting in the studio with the band, this is the record for you. It’s what vintage all analog recordings are known for — this sound.

If you exclusively play modern repressings of vintage recordings, I can say without fear of contradiction that you have never heard this kind of sound on vinyl. Old records have it — not often, and certainly not always — but maybe one out of a hundred new records do, and those are some pretty long odds.

And of course the CD is a joke compared to the good British vinyl we are offering here.

What The Best Sides Of Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. 1 Have To Offer Is Not Hard To Hear

• The biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space
• The most Tubey Magic, without which you have almost nothing. CDs give you clean and clear. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes even as late as 1990
• Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low
• Natural tonality in the midrange — with all the instruments having the correct timbre
• Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional studio space

No doubt there’s more but we hope that should do for now. Playing the record is the only way to hear all of the qualities we discuss above, and playing the best pressings against a pile of other copies under rigorously controlled conditions is the only way to find a pressing that sounds as good as this one does.

Rock in the Eighties and Nineties

For Big Production Rock Albums such as this, there are some obvious problem areas that are heard on one or both sides of practically any copy of Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. 1.

With so many heavily-produced instruments crammed into the soundfield, if the overall sound is at all veiled, recessed or smeared — problems common to 90+% of the records we play in our shootouts — the mix quickly becomes congested, forcing the listener to work too hard to separate out the elements of musical interest.

Transparency, clarity and presence are key. Note that none of the British copies we played was excessively thin. (Unlike the domestic copies — they are clearly made from dubs and lack the richness only found on the imports.) Most had a fair amount of Tubey Magic and bass, so thankfully that was almost never a problem.

However, many did lack top end extension and transparency to some degree, and many were overly compressed. The sides that had sound that jumped out of the speakers, with driving rhythmic energy, worked the best for us. They really brought this complex music to life and allowed us to make sense of it.

This is yet another definition of a Hot Stamper — it’s the copy that lets the music work as music.

What We’re Listening For On Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. 1

• Energy for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?
• Then: presence and immediacy. The vocals aren’t “back there” somewhere, lost in the mix. They’re front and center where any recording engineer worth his salt would put them.
• The Big Sound comes next — wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.
• Then transient information — fast, clear, sharp attacks, not the smear and thickness so common to these LPs.
• Tight punchy bass — which ties in with good transient information, also the issue of frequency extension further down.
• Next: transparency — the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the instruments.
• Extend the top and bottom and voila, you have The Real Thing — an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.

Vinyl Condition

Mint Minus Minus and maybe a bit better is about as quiet as any vintage pressing will play, and since only the right vintage pressings have any hope of sounding good on this album, that will most often be the playing condition of the copies we sell. (The copies that are even a bit noisier get listed on the site are seriously reduced prices or traded back in to the local record stores we shop at.)

Those of you looking for quiet vinyl will have to settle for the sound of other pressings and Heavy Vinyl reissues, purchased elsewhere of course as we have no interest in selling records that don’t have the vintage analog magic of these wonderful recordings.

If you want to make the trade-off between bad sound and quiet surfaces with whatever Heavy Vinyl pressing might be available, well, that’s certainly your prerogative, but we can’t imagine losing what’s good about this music — the size, the energy, the presence, the clarity, the weight — just to hear it with less background noise.

A Tough Record to Play

Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. 1 is a Difficult Record to Reproduce. Do not attempt to play it using anything other than the highest quality equipment.

Unless your system is firing on all cylinders, even our hottest Hot Stamper copies — the Super Hot and White Hot pressings with the biggest, most dynamic, clearest, and least distorted sound — can have problems. Your system should be thoroughly warmed up, your electricity should be clean and cooking, you’ve got to be using the right room treatments, and we also highly recommend using a demagnetizer such as the Walker Talisman on the record, your cables (power, interconnect and speaker) as well as the individual drivers of your speakers.

This is a record that’s going to demand a lot from the listener, and we want to make sure that you feel you’re up to the challenge. If you don’t mind putting in a little hard work, here’s a record that will reward your time and effort many times over, and probably teach you a thing or two about tweaking your gear in the process (especially your VTA adjustment, just to pick an obvious area many audiophiles neglect).

TRACK LISTING

Side One

Praying For Time
Freedom
They Won’t Go When I Go
Something To Save
Cowboys And Angels

Side Two

Waiting For That Day
Mothers Pride
Heal The Pain
Soul Free
Waiting (Reprise)

AMG 5 Star User Review

This is a spectacular album! I was in high school when Faith came out and my indie / punk / college-radio ethos made me almost violently opposed to that album and all it represented. Fast forward a few years, house and techno are creeping into my collection and Freedom ’90 drops. Not Earth-shattering, but over 3-4 weeks it drilled itself into my head and wouldn’t leave.

I gave in and picked up LWP, Vol. 1 on a whim and that is when the Earth shook for me. These songs are great because they showcase GM’s voice in so many different lights. The production is stellar and the variety of music is impressive. Perhaps the best compliment I can give this album is that it allowed me to hear Faith again “without prejudice” and eventually love that album too.