Folk Rock, American – Commentaries

American Folk Rock / Reviews and Commentaries

The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan – Our Favorite from His Early Days

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Bob Dylan Available Now

The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan is clearly our favorite of the early Dylan albums for both music and sound. We’re picking up both mono and stereo copies when we see them clean (which is rare) and both the mono mix and the stereo mix can sound out of this world.

Hearing these great songs sound so intimate and lifelike on a top-quality pressing can be a sublime experience. We should know; we enjoyed the hell out of this very copy.

The best sides are amazingly spacious, full-bodied, natural and clear with great presence.

It’s clear these classic songs have stood the test of time: Blowin’ in the Wind; Girl from the North Country; Masters of War; A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall; Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right and many more. A Folk Classic from 1963 that should appeal to any fan of early Dylan.

Did I mention all the great songs?

  • Blowin’ in the Wind
  • Girl from the North Country
  • Masters of War
  • A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall
  • Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right
  • Bob Dylan’s Dream
  • Talking World War III Blues

… and five more

These modern classics make this Dylan album, his second, clearly the strongest of his first four. You have to wait for his fifth album, Bringing It All Back Home, to find material this consistently brilliant and groundbreaking.

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Our “Hard Work” in 2005 Continues to Pay Dividends

More of the Music of Neil Young

Below you will find our first Hot Stamper listing for Neil’s masterpiece from 1970.

This is an album we admit to being obsessed with. We love the album and we hope you do too. If you have some time on your hands — maybe a bit too much time on your hands — please feel free to check out our commentaries.

Folks, your Hot Stamper collection is just not complete without a knockout copy of After The Gold Rush; that’s why we’ve named it a Better Records All Time Top 100 title. We built our reputation on finding records that sound like this, because who else can find a copy of this album that delivers so much magic? When you drop the needle on any track on side two, you’ll know exactly why we are able to charge these kind of prices for a record like this — because on the right system, it’ll sound like a million bucks! (more…)

Our Previous Shootout Winner for Judith Was in 2014

UPDATE 2025

We finally got this shootout going again, and you can find our latest review here.

White Hot A+++ sound on side two of this 2-pack, with Shootout Winning sound. Great material including The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress and Sondheim’s Send in the Clowns. Another 2-pack that proves our case – the good sides here are wonderful, the bad sides plainly awful.

The engineer for Judith is Phil Ramone, who went on to win the Grammy the following year for Still Crazy After All These Years. (more…)

Copperfields – Our First Shootout Winner

More of the Music of Dillards

For the first time on the site, Hot Stamper sound for The Dillards! Those of you who enjoy the country-fried style of the Flying Burrito Bros., Gram Parsons or The Byrds will probably get a lot out of this one. We paired up our best sounding side one with our most impressive side two to create this QUIET A+++ / A++ 2-pack. Great sounding pressings for this band are tough to come by, so don’t let this one slip past you if you’re a fan!

We’ve been trying to find great sound for this band for years, but it is one tough task. For one thing, it’s difficult to find clean copies out in the bins and even when we do most of them don’t sound that hot. It took years worth of purchases to get enough of these together for a shootout, and even then very few of them delivered. We couldn’t even come up with a copy with two great sides, so we paired up the two pressings that had the best sound for either side.

The side one here is killer earning our top grade of A+++. The sound is open and transparent with a very wide soundfield, giving lots of room to each of the musicians.

This side one had the best bottom end we heard anywhere. It also had excellent presence, lots of energy and natural texture all around. It couldn’t be beat and I’d be very surprised if you could find a better one.

The side two of this set is nearly as good, smooth and sweet with lots of extension in the extremes. Many copies suffered from a veiled midrange that robbed the instruments of texture, but this one was cleaner, clearer and more transparent. We gave it an A++.

Flip either of the rated sides over to hear what separates a Hot Stamper pressing from the rest! (more…)