Hot Stamper Pressings of Digital Recordings with Audiophile Sound
The RCA domestic pressings cut at Sterling are not worth the vinyl they’re pressed on.
Don’t be one of those die-hard analog types who point fingers at the fact that there was digital in the recording chain when their pressing doesn’t sound good.
It’s got nothing to do with digital. It has everything to do with Sterling doing a bad job mastering the domestic vinyl.
(Keep in mind that a very large group of audiophiles, including some well-known reviewers, had no idea there was a digital step used in the process of making some of the records they had raved about. Apparently the only way to hear it is when you already know it’s there.)
Our notes for the domestic pressing below read:
- Flat and dry vox.
- Shifted up [tonally]
- A bit scooped [or “sucked out” in the midrange, meaning the middle of the midrange is missing to some degree]
The midrange suckout effect is easily reproducible in your very own listening room. Pull your speakers farther out into the room and farther apart from each other and you can get that sound on every record you own. I’ve been hearing it in the various audiophile systems I’ve been exposed to for more than 40 years.
Why Defend the Indefensible?
When good mastering houses like Kendun and Sterling and Artisan make bad sounding records, we offer no excuses for their shoddy work. The same would be true for the better-known cutting engineers who’ve done work for them, as well as other cutting operations.
Individuals working for generally good companies sometimes produce substandard work product.
How is this news to anyone outside of the sycophantic thread posters, youtubers, and self-identified record experts who write for the audiophile community?
Records are to be judged on their merits, not on the reputations of the companies or individuals making them.
We discussed the apparent distaste some audiophiles have for criticizing the demonstrably bad records made by formerly talented engineers here.
If someone can explain to me why we should like it when cutting engineers do bad work, please contact me at tom@better-records.com so that you can help me understand your reasoning. I am at a loss.
Want to find your own top quality copy?
Consider taking our moderately helpful advice concerning the pressings that have been winning our Hot Stamper shootouts for years. The better copies sound their best:
Further Reading
But if it passed through digital at any point, why not just leave it in the digital domain? What’s gained by pressing a record from a digital file?
ab_ba,
Pure digital does not exist as playback medium. We have CDs, we have digital streaming and digital downloads and who knows what else, but none of that is a pure digital signal that your stereo can play back without processing of some kind.
Therein lies the problem. Doug Sax spoke about this at length. His interviews can be found on the web. One of these days I hope to comment on them.
But all of this avoids the most important question of all!
Why do anything one way instead of another?
Now the answer becomes obvious: because it sounds better that way.
Logic is of very little value when it comes to thinking about audio. We should all try to avoid using it whenever possible.
I could never get my CD of Famous Blue Raincoat to sound remotely as good as my best early pressings.
It’s a digital recording, but what difference does that make to me as someone who wants to listen to the album?
Why would I play the CD if the record sounds better?
TP