More Roots Rock

• An original Slash pressing of The Blasters’ sophomore LP (and only the second copy to ever hit the site) with solid Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
• These two sides are bigger and richer than most of what we played, and they also have more vocal presence and hard-rockin’ energy, two qualities that we found to be key to the better sounding pressings
• 4 1/2 stars: “The Blasters wasn’t the only great album this group would make, but it was certainly their best, catching them when they were still fresh but with just enough seasoning to bring out their best performances; it’s practically impossible to imagine the roots rock scene of the 80s and onward existing without this album as a roadmap.”

This vintage Slash 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.

What The Best Sides Of The Blasters 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 1981
• 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.

Pop and Rock Shootouts

What are the sonic qualities by which a Pop or Rock record — any Pop or Rock record — should be judged?

Pretty much the ones we discuss in most of our Hot Stamper listings: energy, vocal presence, frequency extension (on both ends), transparency, spaciousness, harmonic textures (freedom from smear is key), rhythmic drive, tonal correctness, fullness, richness, three-dimensionality, and on and on down the list.

When we can get a number of these qualities to come together on the side we’re playing, we provisionally give it a ballpark Hot Stamper grade, a grade that is often revised during the shootout as we hear what the other copies are doing, both good and bad.

Once we’ve been through all the side ones, we play the best of the best against each other and arrive at a winner for that side. Other copies from earlier in the shootout will frequently have their grades raised or lowered based on how they sounded compared to the eventual shootout winner. If we’re not sure about any pressing, perhaps because we played it early on in the shootout before we had learned what to listen for, we take the time to play it again.

Repeat the process for side two and the shootout is officially over. All that’s left is to see how the sides of each pressing match up.

It may not be rocket science, but it’s a science of a kind, one with strict protocols that we’ve developed over the course of many years to insure that the results we arrive at are as accurate as we can make them.

The result of all our work speaks for itself, on this very record in fact. We guarantee you have never heard this music sound better than it does on our Hot Stamper pressing — or your money back.

What We’re Listening For On The Blasters

• 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.

Side One

Marie Marie
No Other Girl
I’m Shakin’
Border Radio
American Music
So Long Baby Goodbye

Side Two

Hollywood Bed
Never No More Blues
This Is It
Highway 61
I Love You So
Stop The Clock

AMG 4 1/2 Star Review

When punk rock began exploding in the late 1970s, more than a few fans of the new music declared the only hope for rock & roll was to throw away its past and start over, but thankfully, a few people knew better than that. Dave and Phil Alvin were a pair of brothers from Downey, CA who’d been raised on a steady diet of what they called “American Music” — blues, rockabilly, country, jazz, swing, R&B, and early rock & roll, nearly all of it dating back before 1955 — and they knew the last thing that music needed was to be treated as a museum piece, as so many others treated it in the 70s.

The Alvin brothers formed a band called the Blasters that approached the classic styles of the past with the energy and insouciance of punk rock, and their music taught a new generation that rock & roll was hard, wild, and manic fun even before it was called rock & roll. The Blasters cut a fine LP for Rollin’ Rock Records in 1980, but it was their self-titled 1981 album for Slash that made them stars in Los Angeles while earning them a loyal following nationwide, and with good reason. The Blasters were a stronger, tighter band when they went into the studio for their second album, and while the production (credited to the group, with Pat Burnette and Roger Harris engineering) was simple, it captured the fire in their performances with greater accuracy and detail.

The Blasters is divided roughly half-and-half between originals and covers, and the classic tunes cover a broad enough spectrum to show off the full range of what the musicians could do, while Dave Alvin’s songs were the work of a writer who knew how to tell a compelling story with strong characters in a few well-chosen words, married to melodies that rocked hard and sweet. Phil Alvin’s vocals hit an ideal grace note between reverence and gonzo passion, and with Dave’s guitar, John Bazz’s bass, and Bill Bateman’s drums turning up the heat behind him, the Blasters took the group’s tough, heartfelt music and put it on plastic for the ages in near flawless form. (It didn’t hurt that they also had some excellent guest musicians on board who later became full members of the band — Gene Taylor on piano, Steve Berlin or baritone sax, and New Orleans R&B legend Lee Allen on tenor sax.)

The Blasters wasn’t the only great album this group would make, but it was certainly their best, catching them when they were still fresh but with just enough seasoning to bring out their best performances; it’s practically impossible to imagine the roots rock scene of the 80s and onward existing without this album as a roadmap.