Hot Stamper Pressings of Classic Rock Albums Available Now
This is how we described a recent Hot Stamper pressing that we put up on the site:
Surprisingly rich and full-bodied, particularly on side one, the best copies really ROCK with big bass and punchy drums – just the right Alice Cooper sound.
The beloved title track remains the most-performed song in his concert history, and the presence on this copy will put the band right there in your listening room.
Yet another impossible-to-find record — impossible to find in clean condition, with good sound — has made it to the site, and those of you who are fans should scoop it up. It takes us about four years to find enough copies to do this shootout.
We had poor luck with the second and third label copies on this AC title. It seems that, unlike so many records we play, the originals are the only way to go on School’s Out.
The stampers you see above belong to a Green Label early pressing. It earned good, not great Hot Stamper grades.
1.5+ is four grades down from the top copy. That’s a steep dropoff as far as we’re concerned. 1.5+ only hints at how good the best copies can sound.
To see more records that earned the 1.5+ grade, please click here. (Incidentally, some of them are even on Heavy Vinyl. The better modern pressings have sometimes, if rarely, been known to earn Hot Stamper grades, and one shocked the hell out of us by actually winning a shootout. Wouldn’t you like to know which one!)
For those who might be interested, there’s more on our grading scale here.
We’ve Played ‘Em
We’ve auditioned countless pressings in the 37 39 years we’ve been in business — buying, cleaning and playing them by the thousands.
This is how we find the best sounding vinyl pressings ever made, through trial and error. It may be expensive and time consuming, but there is simply no other method for finding better records that works. If you know of one, please write me!
We are not the least bit interested in records that are “known” to sound the best.
Known by whom? Which audiophiles — hobbyists or professionals, take your pick — can be trusted to know what they are talking about when it comes to the sound of records?
I have never met one, outside of those of us who work for Better Records. I remain skeptical of the existence of such a creature. The audiophile experts and reviewers I’ve encountered on the web seem woefully minsinformed to me.
We’re looking for records that actually do sound the best.
If you’re an audiophile with an ear for top quality sound on vintage vinyl, we’d be happy to send you the Hot Stamper pressing guaranteed to beat anything and everything you’ve heard, especially if you have any pressing marketed as suitable for an audiophile. Those, with few exceptions, are rarely better than mediocre.
And if we can’t beat whatever LP you own or have heard, you get your money back. It’s as simple as that.
Further Reading