Soul / RnB / Reggae, etc.

War – Deliver The Word

  • Insanely good Triple Plus (A+++) sound on both sides of this Shootout Winning copy – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Thanks to the brilliant engineering of Chris Huston, the sound is War at its best: big, rich, smooth and clear, with the kind of low end whomp that few rock records from the era can claim
  • 4 Stars: “A smooth blend of the band’s more progressive jazz-rock fusion, the LP shot to the top of the R&B charts, their second of four number one records in a row. It was a perfect tonic to the mediocre MOR music rampaging its way through the early part of the decade…A magical ride with plenty of surprises to keep the listener on his or her toes, this set is a perfect example of the band at their genre-fusing best.”

Engineered by the brilliant Chris Huston, this recording displays all his trademark gifts. His mixes feature lots of bass; huge, room-filling choruses that get loud without straining or becoming congested; and rhythmic energy that few pop recordings could lay claim to in 1972.

As for the choruses, allow me to paraphrase our listing from Commoner’s Crown.

This is one of the rare pop/rock albums that actually has actual, measurable, serious dynamic contrasts in its levels as it moves from the verses to the choruses of many songs. The first track on side two, Four Cornered Room, is a perfect example. Not only are the choruses noticeably louder than the verses, but later on in the song the choruses get REALLY LOUD, louder than the choruses of 99 out of 100 rock/pop records we audition. It sometimes takes a record like this to open your ears to how compressed practically everything else you own is.

What to Listen For (WTLF)

Richness and weight are key to the sound, but oddly enough an extended top end was almost as crucial to the success of the best copies. When the top end extends, the sound is open and relaxed. When the various songs build to their climaxes, the copies with lots of clean top end had a sense of “ease” that simply was not to be found on the smoother (read: duller) brethren. (more…)

Otis Redding – The Immortal Otis Redding

More Otis Redding

  • Redding’s posthumous release finally returns to the site with outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER from start to finish
  • This ’60s LP has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern pressings cannot BEGIN to reproduce
  • This vintage Plum and Tan label LP plays pretty darn quietly for an original Atco pressing – we’ve never heard one quieter
  • “…any Otis Redding recordings should be considered welcome (if not mandatory) additions to all manner of listeners.”

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Little Milton / Blues’N Soul – Reviewed in 2012

More Soul, R&B and Blues

Well Recorded Soul. RnB, Blues, Etc. Albums – The Core Collection

Not sure if I would still agree with what I wrote many years ago about this album, sonically anyway:

A pristine looking Stax LP with excellent sound and some really heartfelt Blues music.

This is a Stax reissue from 1982. My experience with the stuff that Fantasy remastered has been very good over the years. This is another winner.

“Milton’s early-’70s output indeed began to walk the fine line between the blues and soul and includes the song Behind Closed Doors.” — AMG

The Chi-Lites – A Lonely Man

More Chi-Lites

More Soul, Blues and R&B

  • The Chi-Lites make their site debut here with this outstanding pressing of A Lonely Man – solid Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER throughout – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Bigger and bolder, with more bass, more energy, and more of that “you-are-there-immediacy” of ANALOG that set the best vintage pressings apart from the current crop of (mostly awful) reissues, CDs, and whatever else you care to name
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Behind the talents of Eugene Record, the Chi-Lites presented an impeccable album featuring one gem after another.”

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Four Tops – Reach Out

Another Record We’ve Discovered with (Potentially) Excellent Sound

  • A stunning copy with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound from the first note to the last
  • Both sides here are incredibly clean, clear and lively with a punchy bottom and and plenty of space
  • “… it’s one of the best Four Tops records of the ’60s… Reach Out still did better than any other original LP by the group, almost breaking the Top Ten.” – All Music

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Chuck Berry – The London Chuck Berry Sessions

More Live Recordings of Interest

  • Stunning sound throughout for this original pressing with each side earning Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades and playing about as quietly as any copy ever will, Chess vinyl being what it is
  • These vintage sides are rich, full-bodied and Tubey Magical with a lovely musical quality that we found was missing from many of the copies we played
  • “This 1972 release is Chuck Berry’s bestselling album in nearly 50 years of hot-wax work. Buoyed by the playfully lewd No. 1 hit single “My Ding-A-Ling,” one of three live recordings here, the success of these sessions marked a comeback for the mercurial Rock and Roll Hall of Fame immortal…” – Alan Greenberg

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Al Green – The Belle Album – Our Shootout Winner from 2011

More Al Green

SUPER HOT STAMPERS and QUIET VINYL on BOTH sides of this fun ’70s Al Green album! This AMG 4 Star-rated album is the last secular music Green put out for a long time, and it sure is funky! We played a ton of these and found that the best copies such as this one are incredibly lively, clear and fun! 

The typical copy is dull up top and small in size. We played copy after copy and wondered “Where’s the energy?” until a Hot Stamper pressing finally hit the table and showed us how great this music can sound. While the typical copies put us to sleep, the Hot copies such as this one are so lively, present and balanced that it’s hard not to move your body to the beat.

It’s tough to find great sounding copies of Al Green’s great music, but it’s always a thrill to hear one of the best voices in soul when the sound is right. These shootouts are a labor of love — the records never come very cheaply and almost always disappoint, but it’s all worth it when you get to hear a pressing that presents the music with the kind of sound you know the musicians and engineers were going for. (more…)

What to Listen for on Back To Oakland

More Soul, Blues and R&B

The biggest problems we found in our shootout were:

Some edge to the horn sound (the kind of “detail” that some audiophiles might prefer but that to our ears would be a source of listener fatigue in the long run).

Stuck in the speakers low-resolution sound, by far the most typical, wherein the ambience and spaciousness of the studio are noticeably compromised.

And lack of bass, which either takes the rhythmic quality out of the music, the drive so to speak, or makes the horns sound thin, which is a not a sound we tend to like, on this album or any other, although most of the audiophiles that I’ve met seem not to mind it all that much.

The Wrong Kind of Clarity

Much of what passes for clarity in some systems is just a lack of lower mids and thin bass response — woofers too small, not enough of them, the same old story. There are many commentaries on the site concerning this very issue and I recommend you check a few out when you have the time.

Music like this needs full-bodied sound to do what it’s trying to do; you need to be able to move lots of air in your listening room to bring this music to life. You can be sure this band full of horn players was moving huge amounts of air in the studio. Would have loved to be there!

We love this funky music and have long been delighted with how wonderful the best pressings can sound. This may be Tower of Power’s best; certainly it’s one of their most consistent and well-recorded.

When you hear it on a Hot Stamper like this, there is little in the recording to criticize. The brass is textured with just the right amount of bite (but not to the point of sounding gritty). In addition, the soundstage is wide and three-dimensional, with the kind of transparency that allows you to hear into the music all the way to the back wall of the studio (assuming your system resolves that kind of information).

The most obvious effect is that all the horns are separated out from one another, not all smeared together, with plenty of space around the drums, guitars and vocals as well. The sound is freely flowing from the speakers, not stuck inside them.

The Sheffield Record — So Dry

Some of you no doubt know that there is a Direct to Disc on Sheffield by this band. I can tell you without question that this particular LP is clearly better sounding than that one, which tends to be annoyingly dry. This band’s recordings as a rule tend to be on the dry side, with little in the way of studio echo or ambience. The Sheffield is even more dryly recorded than their other albums, at least on the copies that I have played.

Bill Withers – Live at Carnegie Hall

More Bill Withers

  • KILLER Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it on sides two and three and solid Double Plus (A++) sound on the other two sides
  • These sides are incredibly spacious, clear, rich and chock full of analog Tubey Magic – exactly the right sound for this surprisingly well recorded live album
  • 4 stars: “A wonderful live album that capitalizes on Withers’ trademark melancholy soul sound while expanding the music to fit the room granted by a live show… One of the best live releases from the ’70s.”

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Aretha Franklin – Soft and Beautiful

More Aretha Franklin

  • Aretha’s wonderful 1969 release finally makes its Hot Stamper debut with outstanding soundfrom start to finish
  • This 360 Stereo pressing offers lively and tonally correct sound, with Franklin’s soulful vocals well reproduced and especially Tubey Magical, as would be expected from a Columbia recording from 1964 
  • Clean pressings of this title are hard to come by – this one is about as quiet as any we played in our shootout
  • Mark Bego, in Aretha Franklin: The Queen of Soul, called it “the most consistently paced album of her later Columbia years.”

This vintage 360 Stereo LP has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern pressings barely BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing any sign of coming back.

Having done this for so long, we understand and appreciate that rich, full, solid, Tubey Magical sound is key to the presentation of this primarily vocal music. We rate these qualities higher than others we might be listening for (e.g., bass definition, soundstage, depth, etc.). The music is not so much about the details in the recording, but rather in trying to recreate a solid, palpable, real Aretha Franklin singing live in your listening room. The best copies have an uncanny way of doing just that.

If you exclusively play modern repressings of older recordings (this one is now 50 years old), I can say without fear of contradiction that you have never heard this kind of sound on vinyl. Old records have it — not often, and certainly not always — but less than one out of 100 new records do, if our experience with the hundreds we’ve played can serve as a guide.

What the Best Sides of Soft and Beautiful Have to Offer Is Not Hard to Hear

  • The biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space
  • The most Tubey Magic, without which you have almost nothing. CDs give you clean and clear. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes in 1969
  • Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low
  • Natural tonality in the midrange — with all the instruments having the correct timbre
  • Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional space of the studio

No doubt there’s more but we hope that should do for now. Playing the record is the only way to hear all of the above.

Copies with rich lower mids and nice extension up top did the best in our shootout, assuming they weren’t veiled or smeary of course. So many things can go wrong on a record! We know, we’ve heard them all.

Top end extension is critical to the sound of the best copies. Lots of old records (and new ones) have no real top end; consequently, the studio or stage will be missing much of its natural air and space, and instruments will lack their full complement of harmonic information.

Tube smear is common to most vintage pressings and this is no exception. The copies that tend to do the best in a shootout will have the least (or none), yet are full-bodied, tubey and rich.

What We’re Listening For on Soft and Beautiful

  • Energy for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?
  • The Big Sound comes next — wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.
  • Then transient information — fast, clear, sharp attacks for the guitars and drums, not the smear and thickness common to most LPs.
  • Tight, note-like bass with clear fingering — which ties in with good transient information, as well as the issue of frequency extension further down.
  • Next: transparency — the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the players.
  • Then: presence and immediacy. The vocals aren’t “back there” somewhere, way behind the speakers. They’re front and center where any recording engineer worth his salt would have put them.
  • Extend the top and bottom and voila, you have The Real Thing — an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.

Vinyl Condition

Mint Minus Minus is about as quiet as any vintage pressing will play, and since only the right vintage pressings have any hope of sounding good on this album, that will most often be the playing condition of the copies we sell. (The copies that are even a bit noisier get listed on the site are seriously reduced prices or traded back in to the local record stores we shop at.)

Those of you looking for quiet vinyl will have to settle for the sound of later pressings and Heavy Vinyl reissues, purchased elsewhere of course as we have no interest in selling records that don’t have the vintage analog magic that is a key part of the appeal of these wonderful recordings.

If you want to make the trade-off between bad sound and quiet surfaces with whatever Heavy Vinyl pressing might be available, well, that’s certainly your prerogative, but we can’t imagine losing what’s good about this music — the size, the energy, the presence, the clarity, the weight — just to hear it with less background noise.

TRACK LISTING

Side One

Only The Lonely
I Wish I Didn’t Love You So
When The World Was Young (Ah, The Apple Trees)
Shangri-La
A Mother’s Love

Side Two

My Coloring Book
Jim
Friendly Persuasion (Thee I Love)
But Beautiful
People (From “Funny Girl”)