Must Own Rock & Pop Titles

These titles should make up the core of any serious collection of rock and pop music. Drawing on our shootout expertise, the emphasis here is on the highest quality recordings.

The Who – Quadrophenia

More of The Who

  • Quadrophenia is back! These early British pressings boast stunning Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) sound or close to it on all FOUR sides, just shy of our Shootout Winner – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • It’s been over a year since we last had a copy play this quietly, and it didn’t sound as good as this one
  • If you want to hear this music explode out of the speakers and come to life the way The Who wanted you to hear it, these records will do the trick
  • The sound here is so big, rich, and powerful it will surely make you rethink the recording itself
  • The sound here is so big, rich, and powerful it will surely make you rethink the recording itself
  • We know about quite a few records that rock this hard
  • We seek them out, and we know how to get them to sound their best
  • 5 stars: “Some of Townshend’s most direct, heartfelt writing is contained here, and production-wise it’s a tour de force, with some of the most imaginative use of synthesizers on a rock record.”
  • If you’re a fan of The Who, or Classic Rock in general, this title is clearly a Must Own from 1973

We removed this title from our Top 100 list a while back because it has become too difficult to get hold of clean UK copies. Who’s Next is even more difficult, but for some reason we left that one on the list, go figure. (It is the better album, their Masterpiece, in fact.)

The other Who album that still makes the cut and always will is Tommy. That is one amazing sounding record, when you find a good one on the UK Track label. (Nothing else can touch it, of course, but if you don’t want to pay the big bucks we charge, find one of these for cheap.)

On the best copies, the energy factor is OFF THE CHARTS. The highs are silky sweet, the bottom end is meaty, the drums are punchy and the vocals are present and tonally correct. The piano has real weight, the synths float breathily in the air, and there’s wonderful three-dimensional depth to the soundfield.

There’s a POWER to the sound that the average copy only hints at. The crashing guitar chords that are the hallmark of The Who often lack the weight of the real thing; they don’t punch you in the gut the way Townsend no doubt wanted them to.

Moon’s drums need to blast away like cannons. This is the quintessential Who sound. Everybody who’s ever seen them live knows it. I saw them back in the day when Moon was still behind his kit and it’s a sound I’ll never forget.

Most copies don’t have nearly this much Tubey Magic — you aren’t going to believe all the richness, sweetness, and warmth here. The clarity and transparency are superb in their own right, and the impressive dynamic range really allows this copy to communicate the explosive energy of The Who at their peak.

As with any Who album, this is obviously not your typical Audiophile Demo Disc. We don’t imagine you’ll be enjoying this one with wine, cigars, and polite conversation. This one is for turning up loud and rockin’ out — in other words, it’s our kind of record!

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Spirit’s Psych Rock Masterpiece (The First of Two)

More Psychedelic Rock

  • Wall to wall, with layered studio depth like you will not believe, the kind of space you hear on an engineering classic like Dark Side of the Moon
  • 4 1/2 stars on Allmusic, but in our estimation it deserves five – it’s simply one of the All Time Greats from the era
  • We’ve recently compiled a list of records we think every audiophile should get to know better, along the lines of “the 1001 records you need to hear before you die,” with an accent on the joy these amazing audiophile-quality recordings can bring to your life. Spirit’s First Album is a good example of a record many audiophiles may not know well but would be well advised to get to know better.
  • If I were to make a list of my favorite Rock and Pop albums from 1968, this album would definitely be on it, close to the top I should think.

Need a refresher course in Tubey Magic after playing too many modern recordings or remasterings? These Ode pressings are overflowing with it. Rich, smooth, sweet, full of ambience, dead-on correct tonality — everything that we listen for in a great record is here.

No recordings will ever be made that sound like this again, and no CD will ever capture what is in the grooves of this record. There is of course a CD of this album, quite a few I would guess, but those of us with a good turntable could care less. (more…)

Led Zeppelin / Self-Titled

More Led Zeppelin

  • A truly excellent import of Zep’s amazing debut with outstanding sound from first note to last
  • Arguably the biggest, clearest and most Tubey Magical Zeppelin album ever recorded, thanks to the engineering genius of Glyn Johns (and production genius of Jimmy Page, who paid for the whole thing out of his own pocket)
  • Just look at the track list – the lucky owner of this LP will be hearing those songs come to life like never before
  • The band’s first album is a permanent member of our Top 100 and a Big Speaker Demo Disc like you will not believe
  • 5 stars: “Taking the heavy, distorted electric blues of Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, and Cream to an extreme… But the key to the group’s attack was subtlety: it wasn’t just an onslaught of guitar noise, it was shaded and textured, filled with alternating dynamics and tempos.”

For the real Led Zep magic, you just can’t do much better than their debut — and here’s a copy that really shows you why. From the opening chords of “Good Times Bad Times” to the wild ending of “How Many More Times” (“times” start the album and end it, too, it seems) this copy will have you rockin’ out!

Both sides have the BIG ZEP SOUND. Right from the start we noticed how clean the cymbals sounded and how well-defined the bass was, after hearing way too many copies with smeared cymbals and blubbery bass.

When you have a tight, punchy copy like this one, “Good Times Bad Times” does what it is supposed to do — it really rock! With this much life, it’s lightyears ahead of the typically dull, dead, boring copy. The drum sound is perfection.

Drop the needle on “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You” to hear how amazing Robert Plant’s voice sounds. It’s breathy and full-bodied with in-the-room presence. The overall sound is warm, rich, sweet, and very analog, with tons of energy. “Dazed and Confused” sounds just right — you’re gonna flip out over all the ambience!

“Communication Breakdown” sounds superb — the sound of Jimmy Page’s guitar during the solo is shockingly good.

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Roxy Music / Siren

More Roxy Music

  • Roxy’s Art Rock classic from 1975, here with INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them from top to bottom
  • These are just a few of the things we had to say about this killer copy in our notes: “huge and rich and open”…”tight bass”…”big, open chorus”…”tubey and 3D”…”great size and energy”…”lots of weight”…”jumping out of the speakers”
  • If you know the quality of Atlantic/Atco vinyl in the mid-70s, you know this is about as quiet as we can ever hope to find to them
  • The sound here is richer, with much less transistory grain, and more of the all important Tubey Magic than practically all other copies we played
  • Some of Bryan Ferry‘s strongest and most consistent songwriting – “Love Is The Drug,” “End of the Line,” “Sentimental Fool” and more
  • 5 stars: “Abandoning the intoxicating blend of art rock and glam-pop that distinguished Stranded and Country Life, Roxy Music concentrates on Bryan Ferry’s suave, charming crooner persona for the elegantly modern Siren.”

Siren is one of our favorite Roxy albums, right up there with the first album and well ahead of the commercially appealing Avalon. After reading a rave review in Rolling Stone of the album back in 1975 I took the plunge, bought a copy at my local Tower Records and instantly fell in love with it.

As is my wont, I then proceeded to work my way through their earlier catalog, which was quite an adventure. It takes scores of plays to understand where the band is coming from on the early albums and what it is they’re trying to do.

Now I listen to each of the first five releases on a regular basis. Even after more than forty years, the band’s music never seems to get old.

That seems to be true of a lot of the records from the era that we offer on our site. Otherwise, how on earth could we possibly charge so much money for them?

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The Beatles – Abbey Road

More of the Music of The Beatles

  • This vintage UK copy of The Beatles’ last and arguably greatest album boasts two seriously good sides – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Quiet vinyl is rarely in the cards for Abbey Road, but here it is, and on a great sounding copy too
  • The stereo to play The Beatles magnum opus didn’t exist when the record was made, but it does now
  • If you’ve heard the disastrous new Half-Speed mastered remix LP, or the remastered Heavy Vinyl from a few years back, then you surely know that nothing comes close to a real, vintage, analog Abbey Road
  • This pressing might just give you a new appreciation for one of the Greatest Rock Albums of All Time
  • 5 stars, a permanent member of the Top 100, and a true rock and pop Demo Disc
  • If you’re a fan of big drums in a big room, with jump out of the speakers sound, this is the album for you.

Abbey Road Magic

Those of you who follow the site (or do your own shootouts) know that it’s much tougher to find great copies of Abbey Road than it is for MMT or Please Please Me. Most of the copies we’ve played just aren’t good enough to put on the site. For whatever reasons — probably because this recording is so complicated and required so many tracks — Abbey Road is one of the tougher nuts to crack in the Beatles’ catalog.

We’re wild about this album, and here’s a copy that will show you exactly why. Both sides are big, rich, sweet and present with lots of energy, wonderfully breathy vocals, and huge dynamic guitars. You don’t hear too many copies with a massive bottom end like this bad boy. A copy with this kind of transparency really allows you to hear INTO the soundfield and appreciate every last detail — quite a privilege for the lucky person who takes this one home.

This is the final statement from The Beatles. To take away the power of their magnum opus by playing it through inadequate equipment makes a mockery of the monumental effort that went into it. Remember, the original title for the album was Everest. That should tell you something about the size and scope of the music and sound that the Beatles had in mind.

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Little Feat – Waiting For Columbus

More Little Feat

  • A vintage copy of Waiting For Columbus with seriously good Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them on all FOUR sides – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Some of the best sounding live rock and roll sound you will ever hear outside of a concert venue (particularly on sides one, two, and four)
  • If you want to understand the unique appeal of the band, there’s no better place to start than right here
  • One of our all-time favorite live recordings and their single best release – a true Masterpiece
  • 4 1/2 stars: “There’s much to savor on Waiting For Columbus, one of the great live albums of its era, thanks to rich performances that prove Little Feat were one of the great live bands of their time.”
  • We’ve recently compiled a list of records we think every audiophile should get to know better, along the lines of “the 1001 records you need to hear before you die,” but with less of an accent on morbidity and more on the joy these amazing audiophile-quality recordings can bring to your life. Waiting for Columbus is a good example of a record many audiophiles may not know well but should.

This is an amazingly well-recorded concert, and what’s more, the versions the band does of their earlier material are much better than the studio album versions of those same songs in every case.

Fat Man In A Bathtub on this album is out of this world, but you could easily say that about a dozen or more of the tracks on this double album. Which simply means that you will have a very hard time listening to any of the studio versions of these songs once you’ve heard them performed with the kind of energy, enthusiasm and technical virtuosity Little Feat brought to this live show. (I saw them twice with Lowell and they were amazing both times.)

This is some of the best sounding live rock and roll sound you will ever hear outside of a concert venue. In fact, on a great copy, it’s just about as good as live rock’n’roll sound gets.

Here is a link to take you to more letters, commentaries and reviews for Waiting for Columbus.

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ZZ Top – Deguello

More ZZ Top

  • Both sides of this copy were giving us the big and bold sound we were looking for, earning KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them
  • Forget whatever dead-as-a-doornail Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – if you want to hear “Cheap Sunglasses” sound big, bold and lively, this is the copy for you
  • A surprisingly good recording – here is exactly the kind of hard-rockin’ energy you want from these three guys
  • Excellent songs including “Hi Fi Mama,” “Cheap Sunglasses” (an all-time classic), “She Loves My Automobile,” and more
  • 4 1/2 stars: “ZZ Top returned after an extended layoff in late 1979 with Degüello, their best album since 1973’s Tres Hombres… The trio is in fine shape here, knocking out a great set of rockers and sounding stylish all the time.”

The sound is big and full-bodied with excellent separation and real punch down low. You get real clarity and impressive immediacy. Turn this one up and let ‘er loose!

It’s not easy to find great sounding pressings for this band, which is why so few have ever made it to the site with Hot Stamper sound.

We aren’t going to claim to be the world’s foremost ZZ Top experts, but we know a great sounding rock record when we hear one, and this one impressed the heck outta us. (more…)

The Clash – London Calling

More of The Clash

  • A vintage UK import with incredible Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) sound on all FOUR sides – just shy of our Shootout Winner (side four actually won the shootout) – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Guaranteed to be a huge improvement over anything you’ve heard, this Brit is big, punchy, and full-bodied with excellent presence
  • A shockingly well-recorded album that comes to life with the combo of a great copy and a hi-res, full-range system
  • 5 stars: “A stunning statement of purpose and one of the greatest rock & roll albums ever recorded.”

Audiophile sound for this punk rock classic?! You better believe it, baby! The sound here is superb for all four sides.

What really sets this album apart sonically is The Clash’s use of reggae and dub influences. You can really hear it when you tune in to the bottom end; your average late 70s punk record won’t have this kind of rich and meaty bass, that’s for sure. Drop the needle on “The Guns Of Brixton” (last track on side two) to hear exactly what I’m talking about. On a Hot Stamper copy played at the correct levels (read: quite loud!) the effect is positively HYPNOTIC.

Bill Price engineered and as we like to say, he knocked this one out of the park. The best sounding record from 1979? I have the feeling it just might be.

Nobody would have accused The Clash of being an audiophile-friendly band, but a copy like this might make you think twice about that! We had a blast doing this shootout and we hope whoever takes this home has just as much fun with it.

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Squeeze / Argybargy Rocks on UK Vinyl

More Squeeze

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  • Both sides of this vintage British import were giving us the big and bold sound we were looking for, earning solid Double Plus (A++) grades – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • The overall sonics are rich, full-bodied, lively, and warm, with solid bass and breathy, clear vocals
  • Forget the dubby domestic pressings and whatever crappy Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – if you want to hear this music right, the UK LPs are the only way to fly on Argybargy
  • 5 stars: “If any one album were responsible for sowing the seeds of Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook’s reputation as the new Lennon and McCartney, it’s Argybargy, Squeeze’s third album and undisputed breakthrough.”

If you think you might enjoy the mashup of Pub Rock and New Wave that this group unleashed on the pop music scene of the 70s and 80s I could not recommend any album of theirs more highly than Argybargy.

Squeeze’s prime period with Jools Holland on keyboards encompasses four albums, any of which is worth owning. The band really gets going with their second album, Cool for Cats (1979), pulls it all together and takes it to another level for their breakthrough third, Argybargy (1980), and produces two more of high quality, East Side Story (1981, produced mostly by Elvis Costello) and the darker but equally brilliant Sweets from a Stranger (1982).

I’m a huge fan of all four, as well as two from their later days, the amazing-to-this-day Cosi Fan Tutti Frutti (1985) and the weaker but enjoyable Babylon and On (1987). I play all of them on a regular basis.

If you’re a fan of Elvis Costello, Graham Parker, Nick Lowe, Joe Jackson and probably quite a few other lesser-knowns from this era, Squeeze is the band for you. I put them right up there with Elvis Costello and Peter Gabriel in the pantheon of British Pop Music of the era.

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Cat Stevens – Mona Bone Jakon

More of the Music of Cat Stevens

  • Incredible sound throughout this UK Island pressing of Cat Stevens’s brilliant third album, with both sides earning Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them
  • So transparent, open, and spacious, nuances and subtleties that escaped you before are now front and center
  • When you play “I Wish, I Wish” and “I Think I See The Light” on this vintage pressing, we think you will agree with us that this is one of the greatest Folk Rock albums of them all
  • One of the most underrated titles on the site – you owe it to yourself to see just how good the album that came out right before Tillerman can be when it sounds this good
  • 4 stars: “A delight, and because it never achieved the Top 40 radio ubiquity of later albums, it sounds fresh and distinct.”

So many copies excel in some areas but fall flat in others. This side one has it ALL going on — all the Tubey Magic, all the energy, all the presence and so on. The sound is high-rez yet so natural, free from the phony hi-fi-ish quality that you hear on many pressings, especially the reissues on the second label.

Right off the bat, I want to say this is a work of GENIUS. Cat Stevens made three records that belong in the Pantheon of greatest popular recordings of all time. In the world of Folk Pop, Mona Bone Jakon, Teaser and the Firecat and Tea for the Tillerman have few peers. There may be other Folk Pop recordings that are as good but we know of none that are better.

Mike Bobak was the engineer for these sessions from 1970. He is the man responsible for some of the best sounding records from the early ’70s: The Faces’ Long Player, Rod Stewart’s Never a Dull Moment, The Kinks’ Lola Versus Powerman And The Moneygoround, Part One, (and lots of other Kinks albums), Carly Simon’s Anticipation and more than his share of obscure English bands (of which there seems to be a practically endless supply).

Tubey Magical acoustic guitar reproduction is superb on the better copies of this album. Simply phenomenal amounts of Tubey Magic can be heard on every strum, along with the richness, body and harmonic coherency that have all but disappeared from modern recordings (and remasterings). (more…)