Hot Stamper Pressings of Jazz Recordings Featuring the Saxophone Available Now
The copies of the 80s OJC we’ve played over the years have been thin, hard, tizzy up top and devoid of Tubey Magic.
I think I used to like it a long time ago, in the same way I used to like a lot of questionable pressings a long time ago, back when I had a darker and less revealing system whose limitations covered up for the weaknesses of this and plenty of other OJC pressings.
By the way, our Shootout Winning Gold Label Mono pressing went for big bucks, 1000 of them in fact. A clean original goes for many times that, which is one reason you have never seen such a record on our site. How much would we have to charge for a Hot Stamper pressing of an album we paid many thousands of dollars for? Far more than our customers would be willing to pay us, that’s for sure.
How About the DCC?
If you don’t want to pay the big bucks we charge for good pressings containing this music, try the DCC pressing from 1995.
The DCC Heavy Vinyl pressing is probably a nice record. I haven’t played one in many years, but I remember liking it back in the day. The 2011 OJC pressing is made from the same metalwork as the DCC vinyl. Maybe that one sounds good. I doubt we will ever find out as we have been done with these kinds of records for a very long time.
However, on a decidedly contrarian note, I would be surprised if the DCC Gold CD isn’t even better sounding than their vinyl pressing.
They usually are.
Steve Hoffmann brilliantly mastered many classic albums for DCC. I like DCC’s CDs much better than their records.
Their records did not have to fight their way through Kevin Gray’s opaque, airless, low-rez, transistory cutting system, a subject we discussed in some depth here.
We Do The Work
We’ve easily played more than a hundred OJC pressings in the 39 years we’ve been in the record business. The reviews for those we’ve auditioned to date are divided into three categories, good (potentially anyway), passable and bad (probably, but you never know).
We’ve even found some of the more recent pressings on OJC that have good — not great mind you, but good — sound. (Just to be clear, any OJC produced this century is to our way of thinking a recent release.)
We’ve cleaned and played thousands of pressings in the 39 years we’ve been in business.
This is how we find the best sounding vinyl LPs ever made, through trial and error. It may be expensive and time consuming, but there is simply no other method for finding better sounding pressings that works. If you know of one, please write me! (On second thought, don’t write me. I already know what you’re going to say.)
We are not the least bit interested in pressings 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 the wealth of pressings available for virtually every title we’ve ever played.
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.
UPDATE: 2026
Woops, I take that back. I have met one, a certain Robert Brook. He has been conducting his own shootouts for a few years now and has made his findings available on his blog, The Broken Record. This is information you can trust.
We’re looking for the pressings of albums that do sound the best. You know, when you pull them off your record shelves and play them.
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 you’ve ever heard, especially if you have any pressing that was marketed to audiophiles. Those, with few exceptions, are rarely better than mediocre, and a great many are just awful, especially these.
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
- Sonny Rollins helped us see the light many years ago
- Kevin Gray returns to the scene of the crime for One Flight Up
- Isn’t this supposed to be a good sounding Sonny Rollins record?