Decca/London (rock, pop, jazz, etc.)

Labels We Love – Decca/London (rock, pop, jazz, etc.)

The Moody Blues – Seventh Sojourn

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Reviews and Commentaries for The Moody Blues

  • Seventh Sojourn is back on the site for only the second time in thirteen months, here with solid Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER on both sides of this original Threshold pressing
  • Side two was sonically very close to our Shootout Winner – you will be shocked at how big and powerful the sound is
  • Forget the dubby domestic pressings and whatever crappy Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – the UK LPs are the only way to fly
  • Great sound isn’t easy to come by for the Moody Blues – it takes a lot of copies to find sound as good as this
  • The Moodies’ biggest success on the American charts – “I’m Just a Singer (In a Rock & Roll Band)” is the killer hit from the album
  • Marks in the vinyl are sometimes the nature of the beast with these vintage LPs – there simply is no way around them if the superior sound of vintage analog is important to you

This pressing is excellent on both sides. It has lovely vocals — sweet and breathy — so critical to the Moodies sound. It’s also spacious and energetic, two qualities that the average copy simply has very little of. To top it all off, this copy rocks about as much as this album, in our experience, CAN rock. Most pressings are shockingly compressed, recessed and murky.

And the domestic copies are made from dubs; they’re brighter but grainy and transistory as hell. They convey NONE of the Moodies magic.

Moody Blues records have a marked tendency to sound somewhat murky and muddy; that’s obviously the sound these guys were going for because you hear it on every album they released.

Compound their “sound” with bad mastering, bad pressing or bad vinyl — not to mention vinyl that hasn’t been cleaned properly — and you will find yourself trying to wade through an impassable sonic swamp. With anything but a Hot Stamper the result is going to be sound so fat, thick, and opaque that it will confound any attempt you might make to hear into it. (more…)

How Good Are the Original Deccas of Satanic Majesties?

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How good is the original unboxed Decca on Satanic Majesties?

Good. But not as good as the right later pressings with the Decca in a box label, the ones produced from about 1970 on.

The Unboxed Decca pressing earned a Super Hot Stamper grade (A++). The later pressing, which seems to always have the same stamper, showed us just how good the album can sound.

Since the originals are pricey and hard to find, not to mention noisier than the later pressings as a rule, we don’t pick them up unless they are very cheap. They cannot win a shootout in our experience.

Want to find your own top quality copy?

Consider taking our moderately helpful advice concerning the pressings that consistently win our Hot Stamper shootouts. This record has been sounding its best for a very long time this way:

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The Rolling Stones – Let It Bleed

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  • Boasting two solid Double Plus (A++) sides, here is an outstanding All Analog pressing showcasing the Stones at the peak of their rock and roll powers
  • “Love In Vain” is one of the best sounding Stones songs ever recorded – the acoustic guitar harmonics and the rich whomp of the snare prove indisputably that Glyn Johns is one of the engineering greats
  • Problems in the vinyl are sometimes the nature of the beast with these Classic Rock records – there simply is no way around them if the superior sound of vintage analog is important to you
  • Top 100, 5 stars – Jason McNeil wrote that Beggars Banquet and Let It Bleed are “the two greatest albums the band’s (or anyone’s) ever made.” [Add Sticky Fingers to complete the ultimate Stones Trilogy.]
  • This is a Must Own album from 1969, one that should have a place in any audiophile’s pop and rock section

This is, in our humble opinion, the second or third best record the Stones ever made. (Sticky Fingers is Number One, and either this or Beggar’s Banquet comes in a strong second.) With this wonderful early domestic pressing we can now hear the power and the beauty of the recording itself, a fact that we consider the very definition of a Hot Stamper.

Killer Stones Sound

Both sides have more ambiance, more life, and more presence than you probably dreamed possible. Take the sound of “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” to pick just one example. The breathtaking transparency of this copy allows you to pick out each voice in the intro. The vocals on the other songs are no less present, full-bodied and breathy.

There’s also plenty of deep, tight bass, which is crucial to a song like “Monkey Man.” “Gimme Shelter” is pretty tough to get right but it sounds correct here as well.

Testing Love In Vain

This is our favorite test track for side one. The first minute or so clues you into everything that’s happening in the sound. Listen for the amazing immediacy, transparency, and sweetly extended harmonics of the guitar in the left channel. Next, when Watts starts slapping that big fat snare in the right channel, it should sound so real you could reach out and touch it.

If you’re like me, that Tubey magical acoustic guitar sound and the rich whomp of the snare should be all the evidence you need that Glyn Johns is one of the five best rock engineers who ever lived. Ken Scott, Stephen Barncard, Alan Parsons, Geoff Emerick, Bill Halverson, and a few others are right up there with him of course. We audiophiles are very lucky to have had guys like these around when the Stones (and The Beatles and Pink Floyd and Bowie and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young were at their writing and performing peak.

A Must Own Stones Record

I would hope that it would go without saying that this is a recording that belongs in any serious Rock Music Collection, along with a number of other Stones albums.

Others that belong in that category can be found here.

We would love to get the prices down for these must own titles, but finding good sounding vintage pressings with clean surfaces is getting harder every day.

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The Moody Blues – On The Threshold Of A Dream

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Reviews and Commentaries for The Moody Blues

  • A stunning vintage UK pressing with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it from start to finish
  • You will not believe how punchy, lively, dynamic, and exciting some of these tracks sound here – this is one of their best albums for both music and sound!
  • We shot out a number of other UK imports (the only copies that sound any good to us) and the richness, presence, clarity, and dynamic power of this outstanding copy placed it above the competition on side one, and right up there with the best on the second side
  • 4 1/2 stars: “… [I]n 1969 this was envelope-ripping, genre-busting music, scaling established boundaries into unknown territory, not only “outside the box” but outside of any musical box that had been conceived at that moment…”

Both sides give you silky highs, surprising clarity, amazing openness and transparency, real weight to the bottom end, lots of air in the flutes, wonderful texture to the strings, and so much more. The acoustic guitars sound impressive, with the proper balance between pluck and body. The vocals are shockingly clean and clear throughout.

Copies like this bring all the psychedelic Moody Blues magic to life in your living room. The richness, sweetness, and warmth on this one give you exactly the sound you want for this wild music. You get lovely Tubey Magic and clarity. The sound is cleaner, clearer, richer, sweeter, and more present that you could have imagined.

It has been my experience that, as good as the British originals of the Moody Blues records are — and I think they are the best sounding pressings of their music that can be found — their one consistent shortcoming is an overly smooth top end. We managed to find a handful of copies that break with that tradition, and the results are wonderful. (more…)

The Rolling Stones – Beggars Banquet

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  • You’ll find solid Double Plus (A++) sound on both sides of this vintage London pressing of this surprisingly well-recorded Stones album from 1968
  • The long lost Tubey Magic of these early pressings has them sounding better than we ever thought possible with the audio equipment of the day
  • This is exactly the way you want Beggars Banquet to sound and it sure doesn’t take a pair of golden ears to hear it
  • One of a select group of Rolling Stones Must Own titles we prize above all others – Sticky Fingers and Let It Bleed round out the trio
  • 5 stars: “Basic rock & roll was not forgotten, however: ‘Street Fighting Man’… was one of their most innovative singles, and ‘Sympathy for the Devil’… was an image-defining epic.”
  • If you’re a Stones fan, this vintage pressing of their 1968 classic belongs in your collection
  • No Expectations, the second song on the first side, is one of the greatest Demo Tracks for Tubey Magical Guitar Reproduction we know of. The next year, Glyn Johns would pull off another acoustic guitar recording of that quality with Love in Vain on Let It Bleed.

Good pressings are certainly not easy to come by — this kind of rich, full-bodied, musical sound is the exception, not the rule. And there’s actual space and extension up top as well, something you certainly won’t hear on most of the vinyl that’s been pressed over the 50+ years since this album was released.

What sets the best copies apart from the pack is a fuller, richer tonal balance, which is achieved mostly by having plenty of bass and less upper midrange. Those are the copies that sound tonally correct to us, and you should have no trouble appreciating the difference.

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Edmundo Ros – Rhythms of the South

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Hot Stamper Imports on Decca & London

  • Rhythms of the South makes its Hot Stamper debut on this original London Stereo pressing with solid Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER from first start to finish – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Side one was very close in sound to our Shootout Winner – you will be amazed at how big and lively and tubey the sound is
  • This copy is super spacious, sweet and positively dripping with ambience — talk about Tubey Magic, the liquidity of the sound here is positively uncanny
  • These sides are simply bigger, clearer, richer, more dynamic, transparent and energetic than most of what we played

It’s unfortunate that Edmundo Ros and his orchestra command so little respect these days from the record buying public. As for audiophiles, it’s doubtful that many even know who he or they is/are. We at Better Records are doing our best to change all that.

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ZZ Top – Fandango

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  • An original pressing with superb Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them from top to bottom – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • From first note to last, the sound works for this music — tonally right, lively and plenty of top end extension (particularly on side two)
  • This is some of the grungiest guitar rock we’ve heard in a while and we were lovin’ every minute of it
  • “… they were a kick-ass live band… these are really good live cuts — and ‘Backdoor Medley’ and ‘Jailhouse Rock’ were fine interpretations, making familiar songs sound utterly comfortable in their signature sound — and Fandango! remains one of their better albums…”

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The Rolling Stones – Between The Buttons

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Records We Only Offer on Import Vinyl

  • A killer UK boxed Decca copy with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them on both sides, and pressed on fairly quiet vinyl too
  • This is classic 60s Stones sound courtesy of Dave Hassinger, working in L.A. (RCA) and London (Olympic + Pye)
  • If you’re looking for the ideal combination of Tubey Magical richness and transparency, this British Decca LP in stereo is one of the few that will show it to you
  • 5 stars – Richie Unterberger hailed it as one of the Rolling Stones’ “strongest, most eclectic LPs” and, according to Robert Christgau, Between the Buttons was “among the greatest rock albums.”

This LP has the British track listing, so don’t pick this one up if you’re looking for great sounding versions of “Let’s Spend The Night Together” or “Ruby Tuesday.” A bummer, but the domestic copies sound awful, so what can you do?

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The Rolling Stones – Let It Bleed on Decca

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  • With outstanding Double Plus (A++) grades or close to it on both sides, this Boxed Decca UK pressing showcases the Stones at the peak of their Rock and Roll powers – remarkably quiet vinyl too
  • Having played a number of Decca pressings of this album, including quite a few that were just plain awful, we doubt that any UK LP is going to win a shootout
  • We have a category for records like this: imported pressings that can sound very good, but can’t beat the best domestics
  • “Love In Vain” is one of the best sounding Stones songs ever recorded – the acoustic guitar harmonics and the rich whomp of the snare prove indisputably that Glyn Johns is one of the Engineering Greats
  • Top 100, 5 stars – Jason McNeil wrote that Beggars Banquet and Let It Bleed are “the two greatest albums the band’s (or anyone’s) ever made.” [Add Sticky Fingers to complete the ultimate Stones Trilogy.]

This is, in our humble opinion, the second or third best record the Stones ever made. (Sticky Fingers is Number One, and either this or Beggar’s Banquet comes in a strong second.) With this wonderful early domestic pressing we can now hear the power and the beauty of the recording itself, a fact that we consider the very definition of a Hot Stamper.

“Love In Vain” on a copy like this is one of the best sounding Rolling Stones songs of all time. In previous listings, I’ve mentioned how good this song sounds — thanks to Glyn Johns, of course — but on these amazing Hot Stamper copies it is out of this world.

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The Moody Blues – A Question of Balance

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Reviews and Commentaries for The Moody Blues

  • A very special first UK pressing that boasts two seriously good Double Plus (A++) sides
  • Huge and spacious, as well as wonderfully Tubey Magical – to our way of thinking, if this isn’t exactly the way the band wanted to sound in 1970, we can’t imagine what would be
  • This pressing has some of the best Moody Blues sound we’ve ever heard – it’s a truly exceptional recording in their canon
  • Includes the big hit “Question,” one of the all time greats by the band, which sounds fantastic here of course

Achieving just the right balance of “Moody Blues Sound” and transparency is no mean feat. You have to be using the real master tape for starters. Then you need top end extension, a very rare quality on these imports, and finally, good bass definition to keep the bottom end from blurring and bleeding into the midrange. No domestic copy in our experience has ever had these three qualities, and only the best of the British imports (no Dutch, German or Japanese need apply) manages to get all three on the same LP.

Allow me to steal some commentary from a Moody Blues Hot Stamper shootout we did years ago, for the wonderful In Search of the Lost Chord, in which we say that, on the best Hot Stamper pressings, the clarity and resolution come without sacrificing the Tubey Magical richness, warmth and lushness for which the Moody Blues recordings are justifiably famous.

We guarantee this copy will take the Moodies’ wonderful music to a level you have never experienced in all your music-loving days.

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