Singer / Songwriter

Joni Mitchell – Miles of Aisles

More of the Music of Joni Mitchell

  • This Joni Mitchell classic (the first copy to hit the site in close to five years) boasts INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Plus (A+++) sound or close to it on all FOUR sides of these vintage Asylum pressings – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Henry Lewy brings the analog richness, smoothness and clarity he achieved on Court and Spark to the recording – it’s some of the best live sound we’ve ever heard
  • Joni reworks some of her best-loved songs for this concert, with five tracks from Blue alone(!), and the new arrangements show us just how vital her early 70s work has turned out to be
  • There is only one pressings plant that produces shootout winning copies, and the lucky buyer of this copy will find out what it is when he opens his box of Hot Stampers
  • “It’s a strong album of her best songs performed mostly informally… Much of the material here is beautiful, replete with the patented Mitchell tension. And a word for engineer Henry Lewy—the sound is terrific, the best reproduced concert album I’ve heard.” – Rolling Stone
  • If like us you’re a big Joni Mitchell fan, then this killer live album from 1974 belongs in your collection.
  • The complete list of titles from 1974 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

We recently had a chance to do another shootout for this album, and when you find a great copy the sound is out of this world. Not many live albums have this kind of “you are there” immediacy. Turn down the lights, crank up the volume, and you’ll be right there in the crowd as Joni and the LA Express (Tom Scott, Robben Ford, and the crew) knock out jazzy versions of some of her best material.

The brass sounds great — you can really hear the breath moving through the horns, with the all-important bite that really brings their various characters to life.

I’d be remiss not to mention the amazing bottom end on this copy. The best sides have big, note-like bass that sets an unusually strong foundation for these great songs. You don’t usually get much bass on Joni’s studio albums, so WHOMP-aholics like myself will find a copy like this to be quite a treat.

Just check out the songs on here: “You Turn Me On I’m A Radio,” “Big Yellow Taxi,” “Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire,” “Circle Game,” “People’s Parties,” “All I Want,” “Woodstock,” “The Last Time I Saw Richard,” and on and on. Those are many of our very favorite Joni songs, and the versions on this album do not disappoint.

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James Taylor / Mud Slide Slim

More James Taylor

  • A wonderful copy of JT’s classic followup to Sweet Baby James with KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them on both sides
  • This early Green Label pressing demonstrates the Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records almost never reproduce
  • Some of old JT’s strongest material: “You’ve Got a Friend,” “You Can Close Your Eyes,” “Hey Mister, That’s Me up on the Jukebox” and more
  • The sound of most of the tracks on the better pressings is raw, real and exceptionally unprocessed
  • 4 stars on Allmusic – it destroys the recent reissue, which lacks the texture and warmth you get in abundance on these killer originals
  • If you’re a James Taylor fan — and what audiophile wouldn’t be? — this title is clearly one of the best releases of 1971 and a true Must Own for the audiophile

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Kris Kristofferson – The Silver Tongued Devil and I

More Kris Kristofferson

  • Seriously good sound for Kristofferson’s sophomore release, with Double Plus (A++) grades from top to bottom – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • It’s richer, fuller, more musical and more natural that a lot of what we played – Kristofferson’s breathy voice is reproduced with a solidity and immediacy that’s not easy to find
  • Both of these sides are wonderfully full-bodied and warm, exactly the way you want your vintage analog to sound
  • 5 stars: “On its way to becoming a gold record, The Silver Tongued Devil and I reached the pop Top 20, Kristofferson’s career high on that chart, and the country Top Five; thus, Kristofferson made the transition from being a successful songwriter to a successful recording artist.”

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Phoebe Snow – Self-Titled

More Singer-Songwriter Albums

  • Snow’s self-titled debut appears on the site for the first time ever, here with INSANELY GOOD Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound throughout this vintage Shelter pressing
  • It’s richer, smoother yet still very clear and highly resolving in precisely the way so few copies are
  • The sonics are rich, warm and natural, with wonderful transparency, ambience and an abundance of Tubey Magic
  • This is a title I have been pursuing since the 90s, with nothing to show for it until now
  • Pressing after pressing let us down for decades, but we finally made the breakthrough we needed, and now we have copies of the album that sound the way you’ve been waiting to hear them
  • 4 1/2 stars: “If anyone has bridged the gap between Joni Mitchell and Aretha Franklin, it’s Snow, who is as confident on the soul-influenced “Good Times” as she is on the introspective jazz offering “Harpo’s Blues.”

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Townes Van Zandt – Flyin’ Shoes

More Folk Rock

  • This original Tomato pressing boasts superb Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER from start to finish – remarkably quiet vinyl too
  • Amazingly present, real and resolving, this copy is guaranteed to murder any remastering undertaken by anyone – past, present and future
  • The LIFE of the man’s music is captured on this pressing, and you can be pretty sure that that is simply not going to be the case with whatever Heavy Vinyl mediocrity they’re peddling to record buyers these days
  • 4 stars: “The melodies here are strong, the lyrics full of Van Zandt’s razor sharp insight, and the production is sparse and to the point, bringing to mind the inconspicuous polish of High, Low and in Between. The feel here is a balance between folk and country, with Van Zandt’s voice and guitar up front, letting the songs speak for themselves. “
  • If you’re a Van Zandt fan, this title from 1978 is surely a Must Own

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Tom Waits / Heartattack and Vine

More Tom Waits

  • Both sides of this vintage Asylum pressing (the first copy to hit the site in years) have superb sound for Waits’s 1980 release, earning STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them
  • The overall sound is exceptionally rich and full with wonderful immediacy to the vocals
  • Waits’s music is an acquired taste and certainly not for everyone, but those of you who appreciate Randy Newman, just to take one example, are likely to get a lot out of this one
  • “…Heartattack and Vine reveals just how much Waits had grown during his tenure with Asylum. …almost every song stands on its own as a dusty gem.”

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Joni Mitchell – For The Roses

More Joni Mitchell

  • With STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them on both sides, this early White Label Asylum pressing could not be beat
  • Here are just a few of the things we had to say about this incredible copy in our notes: “tubey, present vox”…”lots of body and detail”…”best bass + the richest + sweetest” (side one)…”silky and upfront,”….big, lively and rich”…”top detail” (side two)
  • The sound is rich, warm and natural, with wonderful immediacy to Joni’s vocals and Tubey Magic for days – this is the amazing sound of Asylum in the Seventies, a subject nobody seems to talk about but us
  • One of the best sounding Joni records, on a par with Court and Spark and Blue – fine company indeed
  • 4 1/2 stars: “The lyrics here are among Mitchell’s best, continuing in the vein of gripping honesty and heartfelt depth exhibited on Blue…. More than a bridge between great albums, this excellent disc is a top-notch listen in its own right.”

This copy has real energy and dynamics that just could not be heard on most of the pressings we played. With dynamics and the warmth and richness found here, this copy will be hard to beat.

Listen to how huge the piano is. No two copies will show you the same piano, which makes it a great test for sound. Both sides have clear, present, breathy vocals, about as good as Joni can sound on vinyl, which is saying a lot.

What to Listen For

The second track on side one, “Cold Blue Steel and Sweet Fire,” is a great test. Here the guitars are full-bodied, harmonically rich, with more reverb and space than practically any side one we have ever played. The Tubey Magical liquidity of the sound is what vintage analog is all about. No reissue and no CD will ever get that sound the way this copy does.

That’s the sound we love here at Better Records. Even if your system is all transistor, that guitar will sound like you own the most Tubey Magical equipment in the world. The magic is on the tape and it was transferred beautifully to this piece of vinyl.

Live and Learn

About ten years ago we thought For The Roses was the best sounding of all Joni’s albums, as you can see from the commentary below.

This is probably the most underrated Joni Mitchell album, both in terms of sonics and music. It seems that everyone wants a great copy of Blue or Court And Spark, but this album ranks right up there with them and does not deserve to be overlooked.

Let’s face it, we love Blue (1971), but most pressings suffer from a raft of sonic problems, as does Ladies of the Canyon (1970).

By the time Joni had fully indulged her jazzier inclinations with Court and Spark, some of the recording quality had been lost in the quest for slicker production values. The complexity of the instrumentation required more multi-tracking and overdubbing, and as good as that record can sound on the best copies, in a head to head matchup with For the Roses, the latter would probably win, although probably by no more than a nose.

We take it all back. As we have made more and more improvements to the stereo, room, record cleaning and such, Court and Spark has pulled ahead in the race for the Best Sounding Joni Mitchell Album, and Blue is up there too.

I would still rank them Court and Spark, For the Roses and then Blue.

But three better sounding records by one artist — assuming you have good copies to work with — would be hard to find.

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Leonard Cohen Sure Sounds Better than He Used to

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Leonard Cohen Available Now

Insanely good Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound on both sides AND fairly quiet vinyl – the best copy to ever hit the site bar none.

Unbeatable richness and freedom from artificiality in the midrange allowed this one to tower over the rest of the field.

As you can see from the notes, both sides of our most recent White Hot stamper shootout winning copy were doing everything right. We marvelled at these specific qualities in the sound:

Side One

Track one

    • Rich vocals
    • Jumps out
    • Much bigger and fuller and more natural

Track two

    • Big and rich and breathy
    • Very open chorus

Side Two

Track three

    • Big, breathy and transparent and rich
    • Vocals are right up front and dynamic

Track one

    • Sweet and tubey
    • Big bass

Midrange presence is one of the most important qualities of any rock or pop recording we might be evaluating, and for a Leonard Cohen album it is absolutely essential.

You want Cohen to be front and center, neither recessed in space nor behind a veil.

The notes for track three on side two say it all:

Vocals are right up front and dynamic

That is what gets this music to sound the way it is supposed to. You can be very sure that no Heavy Vinyl remastered pressing is going to put Leonard Cohen front and center. They practically never do. (Here is an especially offensive remaster with a bad case of recessed vocals. Funny how none of the audiophile reviewers noticed. What does that say about the quality of their playback, or the standards to which they hold their records?)

DIY Advice

To aid you in doing your own evaluations, here is a list of records that we’ve found to be good for testing midrange presence.

This is exactly why we do shootouts. If you really want to be able to recognize subtle (and not so subtle!) differences between pressings, you must learn to do them too.

And make sure to take notes about what you are hearing, good and bad.

We love Cohen’s albums here at Better Records. No, they’re not audiophile spectaculars, but much like the best Dylan recordings, when they work the sound fits the music perfectly.

UPDATE 2025

In previous listings we had noted:

The vocals are right up front and fairly dry, throwing the words and phrasing into high relief.

But we would no longer agree with the vocals being dry. On the best copies they are rich, full-bodied and tubey.

What does that say about the quality of our playback? How about: It’s better now than it used to be!

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Leonard Cohen – Recent Songs

More Leonard Cohen

  • Outstanding sound throughout this vintage copy (one of only a handful to hit the site in three and a half years), with both sides earning solid Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them
  • Richness and freedom from artificiality in the midrange placed this copy ahead of most others we played in our recent shootout (particularly on side one)
  • “… a return to Cohen’s acoustic folk music after the Phil Spector experimentation of Death of a Ladies’ Man, but now with many jazz and Oriental influences.”
  • 4 stars: “The first thing Leonard Cohen’s music fans noticed about his sixth new studio album, given the typically open-ended title Recent Songs, was that, musically, it marked a return to the gypsy folk sound of his early records…”

This 1979 album marks Cohen’s return to the simple folk arrangements of his early albums. As you might expect, the key elements here are going to be the man’s vocals, the acoustic guitars and Cohen’s trademark female backup singers, Jennifer Warnes among them.

We love Cohen’s albums here at Better Records. No, they’re not audiophile spectaculars, but much like the best Dylan recordings, when they work the sound fits the music perfectly. The vocals are right up front and fairly dry, throwing the words and phrasing into high relief.

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Gordon Lightfoot – If You Could Read My Mind (aka Sit Down Stranger)

More Gordon Lightfoot

More Folk Rock

  • With INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound from start to finish, this original pressing of Sit Down Young Stranger could not be beat
  • Here are just a few of the things we had to say about this amazing copy in our notes: “tubey and spacious and 3D”…”huge bass”…”very big and rich and open”…”present and spacious”…”tons of space and detail”…”so wide and roomy”
  • Forget whatever dead-as-a-doornail Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – if you want to hear the Tubey Magic, intimacy, and freedom from audio coloration of this wonderful album from 1970, these early pressings are the only way to do it
  • An outstanding recording – Lightfoot’s best in our experience – with “Me and Bobby McGee” sounding as good as we have ever heard it on this superb pressing
  • Originally released in the summer of 1970 as Sit Down Young Stranger, it was reissued under its new title to capitalize on the success of the hit single “If You Could Read My Mind”
  • 4 1/2 stars: “The entire album is rich in the simple beauty of its folky melodies and personal lyrics… the music here is timeless, still feeling and sounding great many years after its release.”
  • This is an excellent title from 1970, which also happens to be a great year for rock and pop music, maybe the greatest of them all

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