Below you will find some of the more popular commentaries we’ve written about Crosby, Stills and Nash’s debut. It’s an album I have been obsessed with since the age of 15, which I enjoyed mostly on 8-track tape back then.

For those of you too young to know about these things, that speaks volumes about the quality of turntable at the time, which was mounted to an all-in-one auto-changing record player, attached to an AM/FM receiver complete with 8-track tape playback. The thing probably retailed for less than a hundred bucks and sounded like it.

This is also one of the records that we’ve often used to test with in order to improve the quality of our playback over the years, along with scores of others you can read about here on the blog.

Don’t expect to find any Hot Stamper pressings on the site though. They are very hard to find, due to the fact that the right reissues are the only ones that sound good to us and they apparently just did not make very many of them.

Listening in Depth to Crosby Stills and Nash

Although millions of copies of this album were sold, so few were mastered and pressed well, and so many mastered and pressed poorly, that few copies actually make it to the site as Hot Stampers.

We wish that were not the case — we love the album — but the copies we know to have the potential for Hot Stamper sound are just not sitting around in the record bins these days.

Whatever you do, don’t waste your money on the Joe Gastwirt-mastered CD. It couldn’t be any more awful. (His Deja Vu is just as bad.)

Suite Judy Blue Eyes – Critical Listening Exercise

What’s magical about Crosby, Stills, Nash (& Young)? 

Their voices of course. It’s not a trick question. They revolutionized rock music with their genius for harmony. Any good pressing must sound correct on their voices or it has no value whatsoever. A CSN record with bad midrange — like most of them — is a worthless record.

For more posts on how to go about improving your critical listening skills, please click here.

Detail on Crosby, Stills and Nash – Holy Grail or Audio Trap?

Detail may be the Holy Grail to some audiophiles, but listening for the details in a recording can be a trap we too easily fall into unless we are on our guard.

Tonal balance is the key. Without correct tonal balance, no judgments about the details of the recording have any value. 

A case in point: As good as the Classic Heavy Vinyl pressing is, the guitar at the opening of Helplessly Hoping tells you everything you need to know about what’s missing. The guitar on the better Hot Stamper copies has a transparency and harmonic integrity that cannot be found on Classic’s version.

This Nautilus LP Has the Most Bloated, Ill-Defined, Overblown Bass in the Sad, Sordid History of Half-Speed Mastering

An audiophile record dealer (of course; who else?) once raved to me about Crosby Stills and Nash on Nautilus. I said “What are you talking about? That version sucks!” He replied “No, it’s great. Helplessly Hoping sounds amazing.”

Now one thing I know about the Nautilus is this: although it is wonderfully transparent in the midrange, it may very well take the cake for the most bloated, out-of-control bass in the history of Half-Speed mastering.

Accurate VTA Using Helplessly Hoping on the Classic LP

VTA is all about balance.

The reason this song is so good for adjusting VTA is that the guitar at the opening is a little smooth and the harmony vocals that come in after the intro can be a little bright.

Finding the balance between these two elements is key to getting the VTA adjusted properly.

For more advice on setting your VTA properly, please click here.

Crosby Stills & Nash – Classic Records Reviewed

The Classic 180g version was a revelation when it came out years ago. Bernie actually cut it pretty darn right. However, his mastering chain cannot compete with the one used on the best vintage pressings.

The evidence for this is overwhelming. There simply is no Bernie-Grundman-cut record that is the equal of the best pressings not cut on his current chain that I have heard over the years.

It lacks the Tubey Magic that can be found in abundance on the best vintage pressings and sounds too modern for a recording from 1969.