Heavy Vinyl Reviewed

Heavy Vinyl Reviews and Commentaries

Look Around on Speakers Corner Heavy Vinyl

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Sergio Mendes Available Now

UPDATE 2026

This commentary, about how wrong I was about the Look Around album on Speakers Corner, was written shortly after that pressing came out in the early 2000s.

My foolishness is a textbook case of live and learn. One thing I can tell you for certain is that, although I didn’t know it, I sure had a lot to learn back in those days.

2007 was the year that the penny finally dropped and we finally gained a better understanding of what was going on with the sound of the modern Heavy Vinyl reissue.

Practically everything we would do in audio from that point onward would take us down a very different path than the one we had unknowingly been on. We saw the light, and there was simply never going to be a way to unsee it.

Our Old Review

We were fairly impressed with the Speakers Corner pressing of this album when it came out on Heavy Vinyl in 2001.

Since then we have learned a thing or two. Their version is decent, not bad, but by no stretch of the imagination can it compete with any Hot Stamper pressing found on our site.

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More Bright and Harsh Sound from Classic Records

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Led Zeppelin Available Now

Ridiculously bright and harsh, sounding nothing like the good pressings we sell.

We are proud to say this was one of the Classic Records Led Zeppelin releases that we refused to carry back when we were selling Heavy Vinyl (along with II and Houses, both of which stink to high heaven).

You will find very few critics of the Classic Zep LPs outside of those of us who work for Better Records, and even we used to recommend three of the Zep titles on Classic: Led Zeppelin I, IV and Presence.

Wrong on all counts. Live and learn, right?

Since then, we’ve made it a point to review many of the Classic Zeps, a public service from your friends at Better Records. We don’t actually like any of them now, although the first album is by far the best of the bunch.

Is this pressing of III the worst version of the album ever made?

There may be too much competition to make that claim – in our experience, most pressings of Zep records tend to be poorly mastered, barely hinting at how well recorded their albums really are — but it is certainly a record no audiophile should want anything to do with.

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Time Out Is a Classic Case of Live and Learn

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Dave Brubeck Available Now

When we did a shootout for this album way back in October of 2007, we took the opportunity to play the Classic Records 200 gram pressing. Maybe we got a bad one, who knows, but that record did not sound remotely as good as the real thing. (6 eye or 360, both can be quite good. Skip the Red Label ’70s reissues.)

The piano sounded thin and hard, which was quite unexpected given the fact that we used to consider the Classic LP one of their few winners and actually recommended it. Another example of we was wrong.

As we said in our shootout: “We dropped the needle on the Classic reissue to see how it stacked up against a serious pressing. Suffice it to say, the real Time Out magic isn’t going to be found on any heavy vinyl reissue!”

If I were in charge of the TAS Super Disc List, I would not have put this record on it.

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Let It Be on Heavy Vinyl – The Gong Rings Once More

Hot Stamper Pressings of Let It Be Available Now

At the end of a shootout for Let It Be back in June of 2014, we decided to see how the 2012 Digitally Remastered Heavy Vinyl pressing would hold up against the 12 (yes, twelve!) British copies we had just critically auditioned.

Having evaluated the two best copies on side two, we felt we knew exactly what separated the killer copies (White Hot) from the next tier down (Super Hot). Armed with just how good the recording could sound fresh in our minds, we threw on the new pressing. We worked on the VTA adjustment for the thicker record for a couple of minutes to get the sound balanced and as resolving as possible, and after a few waves of the Talisman we were soon hearing the grungy guitar intro of I’ve Got a Feeling.

My scribbled first notes: not bad!

Sure, there’s only a fraction of the space and three-dimensionality of the real British pressings, but the bass seemed to be there, the energy seemed decent enough, the tonality was good if a bit smooth and dark. All in all not a bad Beatles record.

Then we played One After 909 and the sound just fell off a cliff. It was so lifeless and compressed! The parts of the song that get loud on the regular pressings never get loud on the new one. The live-in-the-studio Beatles’ rock energy had somehow disappeared.

We couldn’t take more than a minute or two of the song. It was just too frustrating and irritating. What the hell did they do to make this record sound this way? We had no idea.

Didn’t matter. It was game over. The gong from The Gong Show had rung. The record had to go.

We had played twelve British copies, all with stampers that we knew to be good on side two. Two or three of those copies did not merit a Hot Stamper sonic grade. Nothing new there, happens all the time.

Yet even the worst copy we played of the twelve had more jump factor, more life and more dynamic energy than the new Heavy Vinyl pressing.

Which means that there’s a very good chance that any copy you pick up on British vinyl will be better sounding — maybe not a 100% chance but easily a 90+% chance. Which makes buying the new Heavy Vinyl LP, not to mention playing it, pointless unless…

Unless you are more of a record collector than an audiophile or music lover. And if you are one of those guys, you are definitely on the wrong blog, unless…

Unless you are here to repent and swear off the error of your ways.

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The Absolute Sound Thinks this Is Some Kind of Super Disc?

Hot Stamper Pressings of Top Quality Jazz Albums Available Now

Is there something “super” about it?

If there is we sure as hell missed it!

We described one of the better OJC copies from our second-ever shootout for Dolphy’s Out There album this way:

This copy (the first to hit the site in over four years) was doing just about everything right: it’s rich, full-bodied and Tubey Magical, yet still super open and spacious.

Admittedly somewhat generic, but good records tend to do pretty much all the same things well in our experience, so why complicate things unnecessarily?

Note that the best OJC pressings were dramatically better sounding than any of the earlier pressings we played, the ones mastered by Rudy Van Gelder.

At best the earlier stereo pressing was passable, and the mono original with the blue cover was just plain awful on side one (NFG) and passable on side two. Do you think the old school mono jazz collectors even noticed there was a world of difference between the two sides? I sure don’t.

But the 2016 remastered pressing (according to Discogs, we thought it was 2015 as you can see) puts them all to shame with ridiculously bad sound on side one, sound so bad we didn’t even bother to play side two. What would be the point? Whoever mastered this record was as clueless as they come, and then some.

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Gaite Parisienne Is Just More Smeary Dreck from Classic Records

More of the Music of Jacques Offenbach

Sonic Grade: F

The last time I played the Classic I thought it was nothing but a smeary mess, as awful as their awful Scheherazade. If I were to play it today, I’m guessing it would join the other Classic Records entries in our audiophile hall of shame.

Here are some other records we played and found had smeary strings. Orchestral recordings with smeary strings do not last long on our turntable.

I love Arthur Fiedler‘s performance with the Boston Pops and the 1954 two track RCA Living Stereo sound, but finding an original Shaded Dog pressing in clean condition under $500 with the right stampers is all but impossible nowadays.

If you want to go that way, more power to you. 

This 1954 2-track recording is RCA’s first stereo recording of the work. 1954. Can you believe it? A few mics and two channels and it blows away most of the classical recordings ever done! Some old record collectors and tube lovers say classical recording quality ain’t what it used to be. This record proves it.

Here are some other records that are good for testing string tone and texture.

Jimmy Page’s Houses of the Holy Needed Tubes and Didn’t Get Them

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Led Zeppelin Available Now

We did not care for the newly remastered version of Houses of the Holy. It badly lacks the kind of mastering that Robert Ludwig brought to the sound, and by that we mean lots of lovely tubes in the mastering chain.

What tube equipment he used and how he used it is something we have been researching for years now, but rather than go down that rabbit hole, let’s just say the Tubey Magic that is all over the original cuttings of the album is hard to find on the new one, and that means it’s missing a quality that makes Houses of the Holy one of the most luscious audiophile listening experiences one can have, even for those of us who long ago gave up on tube equipment for the home.

The notes for side one, track one (The Song Remains the Same) and track three (Over the Hills and Far Away), read:

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How Good Is the Sibelius Violin Concerto on Classic Records?

Hot Stamper Pressings Featuring the Violin

Classic remastered this title in the 90s — of course they did, it’s clearly one of the better Heifetz recordings.

As expected, Classic’s remastered pressing of the Sibelius Violin Concerto (LSC 2435) was awful, as bad as LSC 1903, 1992, 2129 and others too numerous to list. 

(There is one Classic violin concerto record that is actually better than every RCA Living Stereo we have ever played — which amounts to scores of them since we have done shootouts for them all — and one of these days you will be able to read about it right here on this very blog!)

The Classic is both aggressive and lacking in texture at the same time, the worst of both worlds.

Bernie’s cutting system is what I would call Low Resolution — the harmonics and subtleties you would expect to hear are simply not there. He brightens the tonal balance, causing screechy strings whenever they get loud.

The world is full of these kinds of third-rate records. They make up the bulk record collectors’ collections as well as the ones audiophiles have sitting on their shelves.

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More of the Same Heavy Vinyl Trash from Classic Records

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Jimi Hendrix Available Now

One of the worst things those dummies at Classic ever did. The mono mix is just plain awful.

Their reissue of the mono mix is flat and dry with practically no Tubey Magic whatsoever.

It positively screams “CHEAP REISSUE.” That two word description reminds me of this record, although to be fair the sound is quite a bit worse on the Hendrix.

Is it the worst version of the album ever pressed? It almost has to be, doesn’t it?

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John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman – Nothing Special on Speakers Corner

More of the Music of John Coltrane

UPDATE 2026

This review was probably written in 2004 when the record was released. I had heard good copies of it — not the originals as it turns out! —  and new that the recording was outstanding.

This Heavy Vinyl is not awful, but it is a long way from outstanding. My guess is that the CD would be better.

We were only slightly impressed with both the Speakers Corner pressing of this album and the earlier Impulse Heavy Vinyl edition from the ’90s. In our opinion neither one is worth pursuing.

This could very well be the greatest collaboration between a horn player and a singer in the history of music. I honestly cannot think of another to rank with it. Ella and Louis has the same feel — too giants who work together so sympathetically it’s close to magic, producing definitive performances of enduring standards that have not been equaled in the fifty plus years since they were recorded. And, on the better copies, or should we say the better sides of the better copies, RVG’s sound is stunning.

They Say It’s Wonderful: Hartman and Coltrane, an Appreciation (more…)