Month: July 2023

Letter of the Week – “I had no idea it was this well recorded.”

More of the Music of Rob Wasserman

Hot Stamper Pressings of Jazz Recordings Available Now

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

Hey Tom,  

By the way, this Duets has a focus and richness that belies the Digital norm. Your copy kills my Promo copy. I had no idea it was this well recorded. The bass here is not fatiguing like my other copy. Everything is balanced and integrated.

Best,
Phil

Phil,

Thanks for your letter. We’ve written quite a bit about digital recordings, CDs and the like. Here is some of what we had to say that we hope you find of interest:

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Letter of the Week – “Insulting people is petty and makes you sound as though you are jealous of their success.”

Welcome to the Skeptical Audiophile

Click here to see more letters from fans and detractors alike.

A fellow sent me this email a while back. Normally when people find fault with what we do, or how we do it, or the prices we charge, or the things we say, we figure live and let live and just go about our business (you know, the one where we find the best sounding records ever made).

This fellow took me to task for speaking ill of “people in the record industry,” which is a common complaint their number one apologist, Michael Fremer, likes to make, rather foolishly in my opinion, so I thought I would write a few words addressing the topic.

Ray’s letter:

Everytime I am tempted to make a purchase I always read something where Mr. Port is insulting people in the record industry. I get it. Your records may sound better than an audiophile pressing but for the price, they better! I respect the fact that you put a lot of time and effort into what you do, but insulting people is petty and makes you sound as though you are jealous of their success, you can sell records by simple stating that they sound great and with your money back guarantee (which few people actually take advantage of, from what I have read) You should be able to continue doing what you do with great success.

Just my unsolicited opinion.

Ray

I replied as follows:

Ray,

Thanks you for your letter.

Part of the problem with our approach to vinyl is that we not only sell a product that directly competes with those produced by others in the industry, but we also review the products that these other companies make.

We see it as fundamental to our job — something we owe to our customers — that we compare their Heavy Vinyl remastered pressings to our vintage Hot Stampers.

When we do that, insults are hard to avoid.

Their records are mostly a disgrace, but they don’t seem to notice how bad they sound. Nor do the audiophile types who review them.

This used to confound us. It still confounds us, but over the years we have decided it is better to accept reality and just live with it.

We are of the opinion that the people making records today should be held to account for their substandard work. Who better to do that than us?

We can provide the physical records that, when played properly, prove just how second-rate theirs actually are.

Bernie Grundman cut many of the best sounding pop and rock records ever made. I wanted to pay tribute to his fine work, so I wrote this commentary and tagged many of his best records within it: Thriller is proof that Bernie Grundman was cutting great records in 1982

But the bad records he made are very bad indeed. Most of what he mastered for Classic Records is awful, a more recently he has been doing equally spotty work. Here is a link to a select group of his worst remasterings.

Since no one seems to want to write about just how bad these records are, we felt it was our duty, as experts in the world of records, to point out their specific shortcomings. We do this for the benefit of audiophiles who might actually want good sound and not just quiet vinyl.

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Toto – IV

More of the Music of Toto

  • A vintage copy of Toto’s Must-Own Masterpiece that was doing just about everything right, earning excellent Double Plus (A++) grades from start to finish – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Huge and clear with the kind of smooth, rich, Tubey sound you sure don’t hear on too many ’80s pop albums
  • “Rosanna” and “Africa” are both knockouts here – we’ve rarely heard them with this kind of weight, scale and energy
  • 4 1/2 stars: “It was do or die for Toto on the group’s fourth album, and they rose to the challenge… Toto IV was both the group’s comeback and its peak …Toto’s best and most consistent record.”
  • This is clearly the band’s best sounding album. Roughly 100 other listings for the Best Sounding Album by an Artist or Group can be found here
  • In our opinion, IV is the only Toto record you’ll ever need. Click on this link to see more titles we call One and Done

If more records sounded like this we would be out of business (and the CD would never have been invented). Thankfully we were able to find this TOTO-ly Tubey Magical copy and make it available for our customers who love the album.

Africa Has The Whomp We Love

Side two ends with the huge hit “Africa.” Jeff Porcaro’s drums are alive and bouncy with the clarity and attack of the real live thing. When the bass kicks in, the whomp factor really gets your head bobbing. Dynamic contrasts were dramatic as well: with the best copies, the delicate sound of the ballads really took our breath away.

The brass section hired for this record, including some of the ‘Chicago’ horns, are showcased on side one. The best copies really have weight to the horn sound that the most pressings lacked, making the horns edgy and shrill. (Ugh.)

This was our first shootout for Toto in several years and it was quite a fun listen. It’s obvious why Toto IV was a Platinum Record. What’s not to like?

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Beethoven and Richter – Our Favorite Performance on Vinyl

More of the Music of Ludwig van Beethoven

  • A stunning copy of this wonderful concerto performance that boasts a Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) side two mated to a solid Double Plus (A++) side one, and reasonably quiet vinyl for a Shaded Dog from 1961
  • This pressing has the real Living Stereo magic in spades, but unlike most of the RCA concerto recordings, Richter, the brilliant soloist featured here, is not overly spotlighted, hence the much more natural “concert hall” sound
  • The piano is part of the orchestra, and properly sized, allowing the contributions of the other musicians to be heard more clearly, laid out as they are so elegantly across a huge and deep Boston Symphony Hall stage

In orchestral music, when it comes to clarity there is nothing close to the sound of the live performance, but some records, this one especially, give you the sense that you are hearing it all. Audio may be an illusion but it can be a very convincing one.

The spaciousness and three-dimensionality of the recording are also exceptional. Through the efforts and skill of the RCA engineers, that striking openness in the recording is somehow combined with an electrifying immediacy in the sound of the piano, no mean feat. One rarely hears both, except of course live (and not always even then).

There may be other performances of merit, but I know of no recording of this music with better sound. If you are demonstrating naturalistic sound, not bombastic Hi-Fi spectacularity, this pressing more than qualifies as a Demo Disc.

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Robert Brook and I Discuss His Revolver Shootout on Youtube

Robert Brook has a blog which he calls

A GUIDE FOR THE DEDICATED ANALOG AUDIOPHILE

He has now started a youtube channel and he invited me to talk about records for about an hour or so.

Please to enjoy.

Quick tip: set the playback speed at 1.25, 1.5 or 1.75, the conversation will still be intelligible and a lot shorter!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf7ja6gdqbk&t=54s

On This Recording of Concerto No. 1, Transparency and Piano Weight Are Key

More of the Music of Ludwig van Beethoven

Notes from a recent shootout.

This pressing has the real Living Stereo magic in spades, but unlike most of the RCA concerto recordings, Richter, the brilliant soloist featured here, is not overly spotlighted, hence the much more immersive “concert hall” sound.

The piano is part of the orchestra, and properly sized, allowing the contributions of the other musicians in the orchestra to be heard more clearly, laid out as they are elegantly across a huge and deep Boston Symphony Hall stage.

All of which adds up to a top quality piano concerto recording in every way.

When it comes to clarity in orchestral music, there is nothing that comes close to the sound of a live performance.

However, some records, this one especially, give you the sense that you are hearing it all.

Audio may be an illusion but it can be a very convincing one.

The spaciousness and three-dimensionality of the recording are also exceptional. Through the efforts and skill of the RCA engineers, that striking openness in the recording is somehow combined with an electrifying immediacy in the sound of the piano, no mean feat. One rarely hears both, except of course live (and not always even then).

There may be other performances of merit, but I know of no recording of this music with better sound. If you are demonstrating naturalistic sound, not bombastic Hi-Fi spectacularity, this pressing more than qualifies as a DEMO DISC.

What to Listen For

What typically separates the killer copies from the merely good ones are qualities that we often look for in the records we play: transparency. Transparency allows you to hear into the recording, reproducing the ambience and subtle musical cues and details that high-resolution analog is known for.

(Note that most Heavy Vinyl pressings being produced these days seem to be seriously Transparency Challenged. Lots of important musical information — the kind we hear on even second-rate standard-weight pressings — is simply not to be found.)

Solid weighty sound for a piano concerto recording is critically important as well. The piano has to be big, powerful, and solid, as massive as a boulder, just the way it can be in the concert hall. In this respect it helps to have Sviatoslav Richter pounding away on the instrument of course.

Side One

Amazing – big and rich without a touch of smear on the strings or the percussive piano. The piano is right sized and that is unusual indeed in our experience.

Dynamic as all get out, with lively horns and a piano that is clear and present. Tonally correct, in a big hall, the sound is Hard To Fault.

The piano is so clear, yet the orchestra is as rich and smooth as one could possibly ask for. No smear, no congestion, no bandwidth limitations – this is the sound of the master tape. No modern reissue — digital or analog — will ever be able to reproduce more than a fraction of the sound found on this pressing.

Side Two

Big, lively and less congested that most of the copies we played. Side one had no smear, this side has a touch, but the sound is wonderful nevertheless.

Listen to the woodwinds on this side; they are glorious. You will have a hard time finding better sound for that section of the orchestra on other recordings.

How Can I Possibly Replace Every Record in My Collection with a Hot Stamper Pressing?

What Exactly Are Hot Stamper Pressings?

A customer once wrote to tell us the following:

“I never thought I would spend $200 for a record, but I do hear the difference.”

Somewhat faint praise perhaps, but still, any praise is better than no praise, right?

We replied:

If that’s a favorite record of yours, you can now enjoy it for the rest of your life knowing you have a killer copy in your collection to play whenever you damn well please (assuming the kids and the wife are out of the house).

Based on what I am reading, the pressing we sent you is so good it’s practically priceless. But somebody had to put a price on it, and the price we landed on was two hundred bucks.

This is an outrageous amount of money for one record to some people. But not to someone who loves the album and will play it for the rest of his life. Once a month for 40 years comes to $4 a spin. To quote Pete Townshend, I call that a bargain.

Can You Afford It?

Can you afford to replace every record in your collection with a $200 Hot Stamper pressing? Of course not. Almost nobody can. But that’s not really what’s at the heart of our service.

We are offering exceptional copies of your favorite albums. (And of course some records that are soon to be your favorite albums.)

These are records that are guaranteed to be better than any other pressing you can find at any price.

Chasing a Dragon

Here’s an important benefit that often goes unmentioned. We eliminate the need to keep chasing after more and more copies.

If the album is remastered on Heavy Vinyl every two or three years by whatever company hasn’t licensed it yet, who cares? There is not a shred of evidence to back up the contention that any of these labels will ever be able to produce a record that sounds better than the pressing you already have.

How to Buy Hot Stampers

When it comes to Hot Stampers, buy as few or as many as you like. Pay only for records you think are reasonably priced based on how important the music is to you.

Whatever you pay for our record, know that its resale value is essentially nil. Nothing is special about the records we offer other than their superior fidelity.

When you receive a record from us, we ask only that you play it and, in this case, find two hundred dollars worth of sound and music or send it back. You have plenty of time to do that, 30 days.

If lots of customers returned our records, our business would struggle to survive. But we’re doing just fine, thank you very much.

Further Reading

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Straight, No Chaser – Now That’s a Piano (and a Saxophone)

monk_strai_1507_1435596984

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Thelonious Monk Available Now

An outstanding copy we played not long ago had us singing its praises, to wit:

If you want to hear just how good Monk’s big, rich piano can sound, look no further than Straight, No Chaser.

  • We like our pianos to sound natural (however one chooses to define the term)
  • We like them to be solidly weighted
  • We like them to be free of smear, a quality that is rarely mentioned in the audiophile reviews we read

Speaking of warm, rich and smooth, this is important to the horn sound too. Most copies could not make the sax as full-bodied and free of honk as we would have liked.

Listening in Depth to No Secrets

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Carly Simon Available Now

Presenting another entry in our extensive listening in depth series with advice on what to listen for as you critically evaluate your copy of No Secrets.

Here are some albums currently on our site with similar Track by Track breakdowns.

Balance is key to getting all the tracks to sound their best. Many copies we played were too dull or too bright.

One more note: having your VTA set just right is critical to getting the best out of this album.

The loudest vocal parts can easily strain otherwise.

Once you get your settings dialed in correctly, a copy like this will give you the kind of rich, sweet sound that brings out the best in this music.

Two Tracks Are Key

Listen to Embrace Me, You Child on side two — on the best copies you can really hear the rosiny texture of the strings as they are bowed.

The cymbals too can sound amazing — listen to how extended the crashes are on You’re So Vain.

Side One

The Right Thing to Do
The Carter Family
You’re So Vain

A wonderful song and a good test track to boot. On the best copies the bass will be deep and well-defined, and one can expect the vocals to have a lovely breathy quality.

His Friends Are More Than Fond of Robin
We Have No Secrets

The top end is key to finding great sound on this album. If it’s boosted you’ll have a bright copy that will be glaringly unpleasant. If it’s missing or attenuated, you’ll have a dull copy that’s boring and uninvolving.

Ah, but when it’s extended and correct, everything else seems to fall into place. That’s why this song is such a good test track. If the voices sound smooth but you still have extension up top, you know your copy has been mastered and pressed properly.

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Rob Wasserman / Solo

More Rob Wasserman

  • An original copy with excellent Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last on reasonably quiet Rounder vinyl
  • Remarkably spacious and three-dimensional, as well as relaxed and full-bodied – this pressing was a solid step up over most of what we played
  • “…a superior work in terms of showcasing Wasserman’s attributes, which include a huge tone, excellent compatibility and versatility, and tremendous overall skills. His talents were well displayed; he covers all the bases from bop to light fusion.”

This copy blew our minds with the quality of its sound. I don’t know when I’ve heard the bass reproduced with this kind of speed and authority. A Demo Disc par excellence.

As for the music, solo bass is surely not everyone’s cup of tea, but you can’t argue with the sonics. Wasserman is as gifted a player as I’ve ever heard (and I’ve heard Ray Brown live — that guy was pretty damn gifted too!).

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