Rock and Pop LPs to Improve Your Playback

Teaser and the Firecat – Our First Hot Stamper Listings (2005-6)

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Cat Stevens Available Now

This Hot Stamper listing from 2006 is a Time Capsule of Commentaries of sorts; it contains write-ups from 2006, 2005 and 2002 all rolled into one. Out of sheer laziness we used to leave the old commentary in the listings, sort of like building the new city on the ruins of the old. For those who don’t mind excavating through the Hot Stamper thoughts of the past, please read on. 

We give out some stamper information down below for those of you who might have some Island reissues.

Notes from August 2006

DEMO DISC QUALITY SOUND of the HIGHEST ORDER!

(For pop music anyway.) Before I get into the sound of this record, let me preface my remarks by saying this is a work of GENIUS. Cat Stevens made two records which belong in the Pantheon of greatest popular recordings of all time. In the world of folky pop, Teaser and the Firecat and Tea for the Tillerman have few peers. There may be other recordings that are as good but there are no other recordings that are better.

For years I have been telling people that one day I would put up on the Web site some Hot Stamper copies of Cat Stevens’ greatest albums. Today is that day.

Last night I listened to at least fifteen of the best pressings of this album that I had available to me — we’re talking some heavy hitters here, all top quality British and American original pressings — and even though this pressing didn’t take top honors (that distinction belongs to the $500 copy we put up) — it was clearly at the top of the pack.

This is an Original Island Sunray pressing. As good as the best domestic originals are, none of them could compete with the amazing British copies that I played. I can’t explain it, but that’s the way it worked out. (more…)

Time Loves A Hero – Key Tracks on an Old Favorite

Little Feat Albums with Hot Stampers

Little Feat Albums We’ve Reviewed

On the better copies the title track has Demonstration Quality Sound – the soundstage is huge and the multi-tracked vocal parts are energetic, clear and free from congestion and distortion. If your copy doesn’t blow your mind on this song, try one of ours.

The next track, Rocket in My Pocket, kicks off with a big, fat drum sound that’s present and punchy on the better copies. The album finishes with the controversial jazz-rock fusion of Day at the Dog Races, a song the band used to open their live act with in order to get in the groove. If the band wants to stretch out a bit, we don’t have a problem with it.

On side two Old Folks’ Boogie rocks with the best of them; it’s a must for any Greatest Hits compilation. Red Streamliner has a strong Doobies vibe, which can be good or bad depending on how you feel about that band. (We’re big fans.)

The fourth track, Keepin’ up With the Joneses, is some good funky Feat music, and the album finishes with Barrere’s “Willin”-like Missin’ You, a mellow but still strong finish for the last good Little Feat album (save for the often amazing sounding compilation Hoy Hoy).

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Our First Shootout for Sgt. Pepper’s – 2005

Hot Stamper Pressings of Sgt. Peppers… Available Now

We started doing massive shootouts in 2004 — Teaser and the Firecat was our first — and it wasn’t long before we got around to doing one of the most important albums of popular music ever produced.

It was a milestone for us here at Better Records, and there have been quite a number of them since.

Here is our review from 2005. Please excuse all the unnecessary capitalization.

Drumroll please… FREAKISHLY GOOD SOUND ON BOTH QUIET SIDES. This White Hot Sgt. Pepper’s is absolutely stunning with huge amounts of LIFE, ENERGY, PRESENCE, and IMMEDIACY.

The huge soundfield will fill up your living room — and then some.

Side One is a TUBEY MAGICAL MONSTER! We rate the first two tracks an A++ because the bass is a bit more bloated than we would like. But in true champion form, the bass tightens up during “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds” to earn its THIRD PLUS and to show the world what correct tonal balance sounds like. 

The vocals here are virtually strain free, which is a miraculous feat for any Beatles album. Unless you happen to be Sir George Martin, we guarantee you have never heard Sgt. Pepper’s sound so good. After the bass tightens up, you’ll be treated to some serious MASTER TAPE SOUND!

Side Two is a heavyweight in its own respect. The voices sound excellent with lots of texture and ambience, really conveying the boys’ performances in the studio. The clarinet on When I’m 64 sounds OUT OF THIS WORLD! There’s lots of texture to the various instruments, particularly the strings, and the piano has nice weight to it. There’s lots of deep, well-defined bass, and the transparency is breathtaking. 

Sgt. Pepper’s checks off a number of important boxes for us:

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Leaner and Cleaner Just Won’t Cut It on the Last Record Album

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Little Feat Available Now

To our way of thinking, this is the kind of record one should bring to one’s favorite stereo store to properly judge their equipment.

They can play female vocals; they do it all day long.

But can they play The Last Record Album and have it sound musical and involving?

Can they get it to ROCK?

Will they even turn it up loud enough to find out? My jaded money is on no, for all three. 

Rockin’ The Last Record Album is a much, much tougher test than what they are used to, one that their systems will struggle to pass. (That’s what makes it a good test, right?)

Leaner and cleaner — the kind of audiophile sound I used to hear everywhere I go — is simply not going to work on this album, or Zuma, or Houses of the Holy, or the hundreds of other Classic Rock records we put up on the site every year. There has to be meat on those bones. To switch metaphors in the middle of a stream, this album is all about the cake, not the frosting.

Bear that in mind when they tell you at your local salon that the record you brought with you is at fault, not their expensive and supposedly “correct” equipment. I’ve been in enough of these places to know better. If you’ve put your audio time in, their excuses should fall on deaf ears. 

Whose Fault Is It?

Most copies of this album are ridiculously dull and compressed. The band itself sounds bored, as if they lack faith in their own songs. But it’s not their fault. Whose fault it is is never easy to fathom; bad mastering, bad tapes, bad vinyl, bad something else — whatever it is, that thick, lifeless sound turns this powerfully emotional music into a major snooze-fest. It’s positively criminal but it happens all the time. It’s the reason we have to go through a dozen copies to find one that sounds like this. (more…)

Maybe Not a Perfect Recording, a Good One for Testing Though

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Jellyfish

I spent quite a few hours tuning up the stereo with side two of the album, specifically the song Now She Knows She’s Wrong, with its glockenspiel, loudly clanging tubular bells and yelling chorus at the end. 

It’s exceedingly hard to get everything right at the same time: the energy, the deepest bass, the extension at the very top of the top end, the greatest transparency, just to mention a few of the main ones. There are always trade-offs, and being able to balance the trade-offs against the gains in these areas and others is a real test of your critical listening skills.

It’s not a perfect recording, and those are usually the ones that can teach you the most about your system’s strengths and weaknesses.

DMM

The problem with the typical copy of this record is gritty, grainy, grungy sound — not the kind that’s on the master tape, the kind that’s added during the mastering and pressing of the record. When that crap goes away, as it so clearly does on side one of the copy we played recently, it lets you see just how good sounding this record can be. And that means REALLY good sounding.

While during the shootout I had completely forgotten that all the domestic pressings of Bellybutton are direct metal mastered. (The import pressings are clearly made from copy tapes and are to be avoided.) It was only afterwards, when looking for stamper variations, that I noticed the DMM in the dead wax .

On most copies the CD-like opacity and grunge would naturally be attributed to the Direct Metal Mastering process; that’s the conventional wisdom, so those with a small data sample (in most cases the size of that data sample will be no more than one) could be forgiven for reaching such a conclusion. Based on our findings, it turns out to be completely erroneous.

The bad pressings do indeed sound more like CDs. The better pressings do not. All are DMM, so the conventional wisdom, a term of disparagement here at Better Records to start with, again shows how little probative value it actually brings to the discussion.

We would love to hear a version of the album that was not Direct Metal Mastered, just for comparisons sake. That unfortunately is an experiment that cannot be run. What we can do is play the CDs — I have several, the earliest ones being the best — and note that they are clearly grungier and grittier sounding than the better LP pressings. Some of that sound is on the Master Tape, how much we will probably never know.

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