Blue Note – Reviews and Commentaries

Our Previous Shootout for My Point of View Was in 2019

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Herbie Hancock Available Now

TWO KILLER SIDES, dramatically better sounding than the other copies we played it against. Both sides here are incredible — rich and warm with a huge bottom end and lots of space around the instruments. 

We’ve been saving up copies of this album for years in hopes we could find a top copy to put on the site; we were pleasantly surprised to find one this good on an early label with decent vinyl.

This is a great album, with a killer lineup that includes Grant Green, Donald Byrd, Tony Williams, Hank Mobley and more. If you’re a fan of Herbie’s debut album Takin’ Off, you’ll find much to like here. The typical pressing leaves much to be desired though — many copies we’ve played sounded a bit hollow and flat. Hot Stamper copies give you richer, fuller sound and more energy, qualities that really help this music shine.

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Connecting the Players on Maiden Voyage

More of the Music of Herbie Hancock

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Piano

Freddie Hubbard on this album is nothing short of astonishing. I remember playing around with the stereo one day, listening for different effects as I made minor changes to the tracking weight, the VTA, adjustments to the Hallographs and the like, and at one point I noticed that the ensemble seemed to be more coherently connected, with each of the players more properly balanced with the others. 

It was a striking effect and it made me realize that musical values can often be overlooked while chasing after audiophile effects of one kind or another.

Hearing the ensemble come together made me appreciate this album even more.

Tony Williams on the drums here deserves a special nod. His cymbal work on the first track is original and spontaneous in the best tradition of jazz improvisation. (more…)

Our Previous Shootout for Midnight Blue Took Place Back in 2019

Hot Stamper Pressings of Jazz Guitar Recordings Available Now

Midnight Blue is back on the site for the first time in years, six of them to be exact, and here you will find Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) grades on both sides of this vintage 60s pressing.

One of our All Time Favorite Blue Note albums for music and sound – is there a better bluesy jazz guitar album?

5 stars on AMG – if there were a Top 100 Jazz List on our site, Midnight Blue would be right up at the top of it.

It’s taken us at least five years to get this shootout going, and none of the top copies we managed to get hold of did not have condition issues of some kind — good luck finding one of these on your own, you are going to need it.

Jazz Improv Magazine puts the album among its Top Five recommended recordings for Burrell, indicating that “[i]f you need to know ‘the Blue Note sound,’ here it is.”

Midnight Blue is our favorite Kenny Burrell album of all time, at least in part because it’s one of the All Time Best Sounding Blue Notes. 

If you already own a copy of Midnight Blue and you don’t consider it one of the best sounding jazz guitar records in your collection, then you surely don’t have a copy that sounds the way this one does! In other words, you don’t know what you’re missing. (And if you own the Classic Records release, or any other Heavy Vinyl pressing from the modern era, then you really don’t know what you are missing.) (more…)

Letter of the Week – “The Kenny Burrell album arrived, and I’m STUNNED at how good it sounds.”

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Kenny Burrell

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently:

Hey Tom, 

Holy crap. The Kenny Burrell album arrived, and I’m STUNNED at how good it sounds. I’m really pleased to have it… you have new customer!

Best, Russ

Our First Shootout Winner for Our Man in Paris (2010)

Hot Stamper Pressings of Blue Note Albums Available Now

AMAZING SOUND ON SIDE ONE, great sound on side two and quiet vinyl throughout. Most importantly, the music here is EXCELLENT. We shot out all the copies in the house, and nothing could hold a candle to this Blue Label pressing on side one.

The sound is lively and energetic with lots of DEEP, well-defined bass. This side one has the kind of bottom-end WHOMP that you don’t hear on too many Blue Note LPs. The overall sound is rich and full-bodied with lots of air in the brass. The sound really JUMPS out of the speakers!

Side one of this copy is OUT OF THIS WORLD — open, spacious, high-resolution sound with tons of life. We had a few copies to compare and this side one beat the pants off the rest of them. The sax here is just right with lots of breath and clearly audible leading-edge transients. The presence and immediacy here went far beyond our expectations. We don’t know if we’ll ever see enough clean copies to do a large-scale shootout, but we have a hard time believing that you could find a better sounding side one than this one. I don’t think there’s anything you could do to this music to make it sound any better than this.

The bluesy version of Willow Weep For Me on side one is WONDERFUL. The rich, full-bodied sax sound is Right On The Money. The overall sound is totally transparent with superb clarity. Scrapple From The Apple (also on side one) has a silky top end anchored with deep, well-defined bass.

Side two is lively and transparent with nice bite to the brass. It didn’t knock us out the way side one did, but it was still musical and enjoyable enough to earn an A+ grade.

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Dexter Gordon Knocked Us Out All the Way Back in 2007

Hot Stamper Pressings of Blue Note Albums Available Now

[Some text has been altered, mostly the overuse of capitalization.]

This Blue Note LP is without a doubt one of the best sounding jazz records we’ve ever heard. We were auditioning a bunch of jazz records today (4/25/07), and when the needle hit the grooves on this one we were absolutely blown away.

I can’t think of one jazz record we’ve ever played here at Better Records with this kind of whomp. Everything here is so rich and full — nothing like a typical Blue Note album.

Both the sax and the trumpet sound unbelievably good — airy and breathy with lots of body and clearly audible leading edge transients. It’s hard to find a Blue Note where the horns aren’t either too smooth or too edgy, but here they have just the right amount of bite. The overall sound is open, spacious, tonally correct from top to bottom and totally free from distortion. We’ve heard good copies of this album before, but this one is magical.

The presence and immediacy on this copy are stunning. Just listen to the snare drum at the beginning of Coppin’ The Haven — it sounds like someone is bangin’ that thing right in your living room.

We’ve never heard a Blue Note with this kind of clarity, this kind of transparency, and this much life. We rate it an A+++ on both sides — Master Tape Sound, As Good As It Gets.

This copy has the power of live music. When we turned it up loud, it was as if we were right up front at one of the best jazz concerts imaginable. The music is every bit as good — soulful hard bop played superbly and passionately.

Just listen to Donald Byrd blowing his lungs out on his own Tanya, or Gordon’s lyrical solo on Darn That Dream — these guys are pros at the top of their game.

Further Reading

Our First Shootout Winner for Dolphy’s Brilliant Out To Lunch Album

More Hot Stamper Pressings on Blue Note Available Now

This review was written in 2019, the year we did our first shootout for Out to Lunch.

A SUPERB JAZZ DEMO DISC on unusually QUIET vinyl! Blue Note fans, take notice — this is a VERY special pressing!

Folks, Out To Lunch is one of the ultimate Blue Note titles for both music and stereo sound, and I don’t think you could find another pressing of the album that sounds this good and plays this quietly no matter how many you played, realistically speaking of course. If you’ve been watching our better Blue Note offerings, you probably know that this is the first Hot copy to ever make it to the site. And what a way to start off — both sides earned A+++ grades.

Dolphy’s debut for Blue Note is an absolute KNOCKOUT musically, and the quality of the sound on this pressing was everything we could have ever hoped for — more, really — (which is not a bad definition of a White Hot Stamper LP when you come to think about it). It’s 100% guaranteed to blow your mind.

This is an amazing album — All Music Guide calls it “Dolphy’s magnum opus, an absolute pinnacle of avant-garde jazz in any form or era” and we think that hits it right on the head.

Thankfully, for us audiophiles the sound on the better pressings can be stunning. The trick of course is finding those copies, and it’s a tough enough job that we’ve never been able to get any Hot Stamper copy up on the site until now. For the fellow who snaps this bad boy up, I am positive this White Hot Stamper will prove well worth the wait.

White Hot All Over

Both sides are KILLER, with mindblowing transparency, stunning immediacy and exceptional clarity. There is tremendous separation between the various players and plenty of natural ambience. This is exactly the kind of record that will make your speakers disappear. Turn this one up good and loud and revel in the glory that is Out To Lunch. Get ready to get lost.

I wish I could tell you to look forward to more great copies like this in the future, but I’m not sure we’d be able to back that up. Clean copies of Out To Lunch are extremely scarce nowadays, and it’s going to take us ages to build up a big enough stack of ’em to get this shootout going again.

One last note — Bobby Hutcherson MURDERS on the vibes on this album. Hearing his stellar, groundbreaking work played back on a White Hot Stamper copy through a high-end stereo is nothing less than a THRILL. We look forward to hearing about it from the lucky person who takes this one home.

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