Demo Discs with Specific Qualities

Barney Kessel – Vol. 3: To Swing Or Not To Swing

More Barney Kessel

More Contemporary Label Jazz Recordings

  • Boasting seriously good Double Plus (A++) grades from start to finish, this early Contemporary MONO pressing is guaranteed to blow the doors off any other Vol. 3, To Swing Or Not To Swing you’ve heard – reasonably quiet vinyl too
  • Tubey Magic, richness, sweetness, dead-on timbres from top to bottom – this is a textbook example of Contemporary sound at its best
  • For some reason, the guitar sound from this era of all tube chain recording seems to have died out with the times – it can only be found on the best of these vintage pressings
  • 5 stars: “The unusual repertoire on this set … would by itself make this bop/cool set noteworthy. Add to that a very interesting lineup of players (trumpeter Harry “Sweets” Edison, Georgie Auld or Bill Perkins on tenor, pianist Jimmy Rowles, the rhythm guitar of Al Hendrickson, bassist Red Mitchell, and Shelly Manne or Irv Cottler on drums) … and the overall result is a recording highly recommended to fans of straight-ahead jazz.”
  • If you’re a fan of jazz guitar, this all tube MONO recording from 1955 surely belongs in your collection

Man, this music is a blast when it sounds this good. I don’t think there’s a whole lot you could do to make this music sound any better! It’s one of the best early mono Contemporary LPs we’ve ever played. It’s so Tubey Magical. Kessel’s guitar sound is out of this world.

The music here matches the sound for excellence. The whole band just swings. There’s a real old rag-timey feel to the songs. Look at this list of all-star players: Harry Edison, Jimmy Rowles, Red Mitchell and Shelly Manne — this is some serious jazz talent.

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America – Homecoming

More America

More Hippie Folk Rock

  • America’s sophomore album is back on the site for only the second time in seventeen months, here with STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it throughout this vintage Green Label pressing
  • Here are just a few of the things we had to say about this killer copy in our notes: “rich and breathy”…”jumping out [of the speakers]”…”deepest bass yet” (side two)…”so sweet and breathy and present”…”top detail and tubey” (side two)
  • Some of the most Tubey, warm acoustic guitar reproduction you could ever ask for – this is the sound of real analog!
  • There are some bad marks (as is sometimes the nature of the beast with these vintage LPs) on “Moon Song,” but once you hear just how incredible sounding this copy is, you might be inclined, as we were, to stop counting ticks and pops and just be swept away by the music
  • 4 stars: “The songs here are tighter and more forthright… The sound quality is clear and bright; the colorful arrangements, while still acoustic guitar-based, feature more electric guitar and keyboards. The performance quality is more assured, among the most urgently committed the group would ever put on vinyl. This top-flight album is a very rewarding listen.”

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

The guitars on this record are a true test of stereo reproduction quality. Most of the pressings of this record do not get the guitars to sound right. And when the guitars are perfection, the voices and all the other instruments tend to be right as well.

Let’s face it: they just don’t know how to make acoustic guitars sound like this anymore. You have to go back to 49 year old records like this one to find that sound. (more…)

Debussy & Ravel / Julliard String Quartet

More of the Music of Claude Debussy

More of the Music of Maurice Ravel

  • An original Shaded Dog pressing of the famous Juilliard String Quartet’s performance of these wonderful classical works (one of only a handful of copies to ever hit the site), here with INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them from first note to last
  • Having just played some killer copies of Death and the Maiden, we’re tempted to say that this Debussy record has the potential for even better sound – it’s richer and sweeter, but every bit as real and immediate as any chamber recording we know of
  • The Living Stereo sound here is Tubey Magical, lively and clear, with the kind of transparency that puts living, breathing musicians right in your listening room in the way that only the best vintage vinyl pressings can
  • Lewis Layton engineered this recording (along with Ed Begley) and he nailed it, perfectly capturing the rich, textured sheen on the strings, the hallmark of Living Stereo sound in the 50s and 60s
  • He recorded both the Schubert (LSC 2378) mentioned above and this wonderful Debussy/Ravel record (LSC 2413) for RCA in 1960 — it would be quite the understatement to say he had quite a gift for recordings of this kind

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Dire Straits – Self-Titled

More of the Music of Dire Straits

  • The band’s debut album is back on the site for only the second time in ten months, here with a STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) side one mated to a solid Double Plus (A++) side two
  • One of the best sounding rock records ever made, with rich, sweet, smooth mids; prodigious amounts of bass; superb transparency and clarity; and a freedom from hi-fi-ishness and a lack of distortion like very few rock records we have ever heard
  • Rhett Davies knocked this one out of the park – it’s a Top 100 title, a member of the Tubey Magical Top Ten (see below), and our favorite by the band for both sound and music
  • If you made the mistake of buying the unbelievably bad sounding MoFi 45 RPM Half-Speed, this vintage UK pressing will be a REVELATION
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Knopfler also shows an inclination toward Dylanesque imagery, which enhances the smoky, low-key atmosphere of the album… the album is remarkably accomplished for a debut, and Dire Straits had difficulty surpassing it throughout their career.”
  • It’s our pick for the band’s best sounding album. Roughly 150 other listings for the Best Recording by an Artist or Group can be found here.

Rhett Davies is one of our favorite recording engineers, the man behind Taking Tiger Mountain, 801 Live and Avalon to name just a few of his most famous recordings, all favorites of ours of course.

The man may be famous for some fairly artificial sounding recordings — Eno’s, Roxy Music’s and The Talking Heads’ albums come to mind — but it’s obvious to us now, if it wasn’t before, that those are entirely artistic choices, not engineering shortcomings.

Rhett Davies, by virtue of the existence of this album alone, has proven that he belongs in the company of the greatest engineers of all time, right up there with the likes of Bill Porter, Ken Scott, Stephen Barncard, Geoff Emerick, Glyn Johns and others we could mention.

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Tchaikovsky / Nutcracker Suites 1 & 2 / Ansermet

More of the music of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840 – 1893)

Hot Stamper Pressings of The Nutcracker Available Now

  • A superb copy of Tchaikovsky’s classical masterpiece with top quality sound from first note to last
  • If you have never experienced a vintage pressing of a Roy-Wallace-engineered Decca Tree recording from Victoria Hall, this is your chance to hear sound that puts practically everything else to shame
  • The notes for the last shootout winner read “I think this is my favorite [compared to the complete ballet (2203). It has more room, more glow and more sweetness, and it’s the most dynamic.”
  • A record like this lets you get lost in the world of its music, and what could be more important in a recording than that?
  • This is an AMAZINGLY well recorded performance of one of the most famous ballets – probably THE most famous – ever committed to analog tape
  • Enchanting music and sound combine on this copy to make one seriously good Demo Disc, if what you are trying to demonstrate is how relaxed and involved vintage analog can make you feel

There is certainly no shortage of Audio Spectaculars available on the site. A record such as this, so rich, natural and effortless, has distinctly different qualities that we feel are every bit as vital to the serious audiophile’s enjoyment of Tchaikovsky’s music.

Ansermet breathes life into this ballet as only he can and the Decca engineering team led by Roy Wallace do him proud.

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Emerson, Lake and Palmer – Tarkus

More Emerson, Lake and Palmer

  • This original UK Island pressing was doing practically everything right, earning killer Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) grades from top to bottom – just shy of our Shootout Winner
  • Our recent monster shootout produced this incredible sounding Brit (the only ones we offer), and it is stone guaranteed to rock your world
  • Eddie Offord‘s trademark Tubey Magic, energy, resolution, whomp factor and dynamics are all over this phenomenal recording
  • “Tarkus is a thoroughly written, focused piece of music. It remains among the Top Ten classic tracks in progressive rock history… [The album] is…a must-have.”

This killer copy features some of the more intense prog rock sound to hit our table in quite some time. This is a true Demo Disc LP, one of the most dynamic and powerful rock recordings ever made.

The organ captured here by Eddie Offord (of Yes engineering fame, we’re his biggest fans) and then transferred so well onto our Hot Stamper pressings will rattle the foundation of your house if you’re not careful. This music really needs that kind of megawatt reproduction to make sense. It’s big Bombastic Prog that wants desperately to rock your world. At moderate levels it just sounds overblown and silly. At loud levels it actually does rock your world.

Unlike most British pressings of the first album, the Brits here really ROCK, with greater dynamic contrasts and seriously prodigious bass, some of the best ever committed to vinyl. This music needs real whomp down below and lots of jump factor to work its magic. These Brits are super-low distortion, with an open, sweet sound, especially up top, but they still manage to convey the awesome power of the music, no mean feat.

Folks, This Is Why We Love Analog

This is ANALOG at its Tubey Magical finest. You ain’t never gonna play a CD that sounds like this as long as you live. I don’t mean to rain on anyone’s parade, but digital media are evidently incapable of reproducing this kind of sound. There are nice sounding CDs in the world but there aren’t any that sound like this, not in my experience anyway. If you are thinking that someday a better digital system is going to come along in order to save you the trouble and expense of having to find and acquire these expensive original pressings, think again.

This is the kind of record that shows you what’s wrong with your BEST sounding CDs. (Let’s not even talk about the average one in your collection, or mine; the less said the better.) This is the kind of record that somebody might hear in a stereo store and realize that the digital road he’s been going down for so many years is nothing but a sonic dead end.

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Rimsky-Korsakoff, Saint-Saens, Prokofieff – Destination Stereo

More Classical and Orchestral Recordings

  • Boasting two STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) Living Stereo sides, this original Shaded Dog pressing is the BEST we have ever heard
  • It’s also fairly quiet at Mint Minus Minus, a grade that even our most well-cared-for vintage classical titles have trouble playing at
  • Explosive dynamics, huge space and size, unerringly correct tonality, this is a Demo Disc like no other
  • Shockingly real – proof positive that the cutting systems of the day are capable of much better sound than some audiophiles might think – if more evidence of that fact is what you’re after, see here and here
  • It has all the Living Stereo magic one could ask for, as well as the bass and dynamics that are missing from other Golden Age records
  • If you’re a fan of orchestral showpieces such as these, this Living Stereo from 1959 belongs in your collection.

This record is designed to show off the Living Stereo sound at its best and it succeeds magnificently. The full range of colors of the orchestra are presented here with remarkable clarity, dynamic contrast, spaciousness, sweetness, and timbral accuracy.

If you want to demonstrate to a novice listener why modern recordings are unsatisfactory, all you have to do is play this record for them. No CD ever sounded like this.

Just play “Gnomus” to hear The Power of the Orchestra, Living Stereo style.

The fourth and fifth movements of “Capriccio Espagnol,” the second track on side one, sound superb, clearly better here than on the Shaded Dog pressings we played a few years ago (which were terrible and never made it to the site. Great performance but bad mastering of what obviously was a very good master tape).

You can also hear the Living Stereo sound especially well on the excerpt from “The Fourth of July” performed by Morton Gould. It’s one of the best sounding tracks here.

When “in-the-know” audiophiles discuss three-dimensionality, soundstaging and depth, they should be talking about a record that sounds like this.

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James Taylor – JT

More of the Music of James Taylor

  • This outstanding copy of Taylor’s breakthrough album from 1977 boasts excellent sound on both sides
  • It’s a superb recording – a member of our Top 100, in fact – but it takes a pressing like this to show you just how BIG and LIVELY it can sound
  • The big hits “Your Smiling Face” and “Handy Man” both sound great here – thanks Val Garay!
  • This and Sweet Baby James are the man’s best recordings, and his best albums too, but he has so many great albums that it almost seems unfair to him to point that out
  • 4 stars: “JT was James Taylor’s best album since Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon because it acknowledged the darkness of his earlier work while explaining the deliberate lightness of his current viewpoint, and because it was his most consistent collection in years.”
  • If I were to compile a list of my favorite rock and pop albums from 1977, this album would definitely be on it

The good copies really rock on songs like Honey Don’t Leave L.A. or I Was Only Telling A Lie, yet have lovely, delicate vocals on ballads such as Another Grey Morning or There We Are (two of our favorite songs on the album).

Just turn up the volume and play the opening to Honey Don’t Leave L.A. — this is James Taylor and his super-tight studio band at the peak of their powers. Russ Kunkel hits the drum twice, then clicks his sticks together so quickly you can hardly notice it, then goes back to the drums for the rest of the intro.

On the best copies, the subtleties of his performance are clearly on display. Until the right copies came along, we had never even noticed that stick trick. Now it’s the high point of the whole intro.

Here are more of our favorite records with exceptionally punchy bass.

And here are more of our favorite records with exceptionally punchy drums.

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Yes – Close To The Edge

More of the Music of Yes

  • Close To The Edge returns to the site for only the second time in fourteen months, here with KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close it throughout his vintage copy
  • An incredibly complex recording, with huge organs, light-speed changes and an abundance of multi-tracked parts – these early pressings are the only ones that can make sense of this challenging music
  • On such a dynamic recording, with so many quiet passages, finding reasonably quiet surfaces is a dubious proposition for even the most committed audiophile, as is the case here, sad to say
  • But on the bright side, once you hear just how amazing sounding side one of this copy is, you might be inclined, as we were, to stop counting ticks and pops and just be swept away by the music
  • If any pressing will let you do that, it’s this one!
  • 5 stars: “Close to the Edge comprised just three tracks, the epic ‘And You and I’ and ‘Siberian Khatru,’ plus a side-long title track that represented the musical, lyrical, and sonic culmination of all that Yes had worked toward over the past five years.”
  • This album is a Must Own from 1972, one that deserves a place in any audiophile’s collection
  • Close to the Edge is an album with one set of very special stampers that have consistently been winning shootout after shootout for years now

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Santana’s Debut Is a Masterpiece

More Santana

More Debut Albums of Interest

  • A superb Columbia 360 Label pressing of Santana’s debut album with Double Plus (A++) sound on both sides
  • The drums have real snap to them – fast, clean percussion is critical to the energy and drive of Santana’s music and this copy has the top end and the speed to bring it all together
  • A Must Own album, clearly their masterpiece, and one of the truly groundbreaking debuts in rock history
  • It’s also a personal favorite that knocked me out when I first heard it back in high school – over the decades it has become even more impressive, especially these days with the revolutions in cleaning and playback quality letting it sound as big and bold as it does
  • “Santana combined Latin rhythms with jazz-inspired improvisation, hard-rock guitar and lyrical, B.B. King-style blues – and even had a hit single, “Evil Ways. The combination of rock guitar and funk percussion was undeniable.” – Rolling Stone
  • 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. Santana’s first album is a good example of a record many audiophiles may not know well but should.

Santana’s first album came out of nowhere and rocked in a way that few music lovers (especially those who knew nothing about Tito Puente) had heard before.

In one sense it had something in common with Led Zeppelin’s debut from early in 1969. Zep’s first album took the blues and added heavy metal guitars. Santana took African and Latin rhythms and added his own style of heavy guitar.

Each is a landmark recording in its own right. It’s hard to imagine any collection of popular music that would be without both.

Folks, you owe it to yourself to hear what a great band Santana were back in the day. Hot Stampers of any of the first three records will do the trick. If you’ve got the stereo that can play loud rock and roll, we’ve got the records that sound like Santana playing live in your listening room. Take it from someone who likes to listen to his music at fairly loud levels, Santana’s first album is truly a thrill. (more…)