Record Lists

I Was Wrong about a Half-Speed Mastered Record – Not for the First Time, But I Hope for the Last

dixiedregsdd

Hot Stamper Pressings of Jazz Rock Fusion Albums Available Now

A classic case of live and learn.

I’d always preferred the famously rare Half-Speed to the domestic copies I had auditioned back in the day, the day being the 80s and 90s. That’s all changed now of course.

Now, with changes to the stereo and better cleaning techniques and all the rest, that Half-Speed’s weaknesses are hard to ignore.

Where is the rock ’em, sock ’em bottom end that the best originals have?

Gone without a trace.

Yes, the smeary, veiled quality of the typical original pressing is gone too, which is why I used to like the DD Labs version better. It’s simply another case of a reasonably good Half-Speed beating a bad domestic pressing, and in turn being beaten (soundly) by The Real Thing, the kind of record we like to call a Hot Stamper.

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Donald Byrd – Black Byrd

More of the Music of Donald Byrd

  • Black Byrd is back on the site after a nearly five year hiatus, here with solid Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER throughout this vintage Blue Note pressing
  • Both of these sides are Tubey Magical, lively and clear, with three-dimensionality that will fill your listening room from wall to wall
  • 5 stars: “Never before had a jazz musician embraced the celebratory sound and style of contemporary funk as fully as Byrd did here – not even Davis, whose dark, chaotic jungle-funk stood in sharp contrast to the bright, breezy, danceable music on Black Byrd. Byrd gives free rein to producer/arranger/composer Larry Mizell, who crafts a series of tightly focused, melodic pieces often indebted to the lengthier orchestrations of Isaac Hayes and Curtis Mayfield.”

We played a bunch of these recently and only a few had the kind of sound we were looking for. This one was one of the better we heard — big, bold and lively with excellent presence. The bottom end is meaty and punchy, the highs are sweet and extended, and the mids sound right on the money. Most copies didn’t jump out of the speakers the way this one does! You’ll have a hard time finding such rich, smooth sound for this wonderful jazz album.

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The Rolling Stones – Tattoo You

More of the Music of The Rolling Stones

  • Both sides of this vintage copy were giving us the big and bold sound we were looking for, earning incredible Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) grades – just shy of our Shootout Winner
  • The midrange is both rich and clear, with Jagger’s vocals front and center, exactly where they belong
  • The piano has real weight, the grungy guitars are suitably distorted, and the tonal balance is correct from top to bottom – our classic Hot Stamper sound in a nutshell
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Tattoo You captures the Stones at their best as a professional stadium-rock band… ‘Waiting on a Friend’ and the vigorous rock & roll of the first side make Tattoo You an essential latter-day Stones album, ranking just a few notches below Some Girls.”
  • If you’re a Stones fan, this title from 1981 is one of their better later releases

In the tradition of other late-70s / early-80s Stones albums (Some Girls, Goats Head Soup, It’s Only Rock And Roll), the sound is a bit raw at times, but a copy like this one gives you the kind of energy, body and richness to make for some very enjoyable serious listening.

The sound here is big and rich, with more “meat on the bones” as we like to say. The guitars are chunky and powerful, which exactly the sound you want for a song like Start Me Up, which leads things off here. The best sides have more extension up top and more size to the soundfield as well.

As with any Stones album, don’t expect any sonic miracles. Hot Stampers aren’t going to turn this into Tea For The Tillerman. If you want to hear an amazing sounding Demo Quality record, this ain’t it, but if you love this music and are frustrated with the sound of the typical pressing, I bet you’ll enjoy the heck outta this one. (more…)

Sting – The Dream Of The Blue Turtles

More Sting and The Police

  • An original A&M pressing that was doing just about everything right, with both sides earning outstanding Double Plus (A++) or BETTER grades – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Remarkably big, full-bodied and musical, with wonderful presence for the most important element of the recording, Sting’s voice
  • Even though the album was recorded at studios all over the world, the best sound can be found on the domestic pressings Robert Ludwig cut for Masterdisk
  • It was a wise move on Sting’s part to pick RL, a man who could bring the best aspects of analog to a modern recording that could really use them
  • Don’t waste your money on whatever dead-as-a-doornail Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – if you want to hear the Tubey Magic, size and energy of Sting’s debut solo album, a vintage 80s pressing like this one is the only way to go
  • 4 stars: “Sting incorporated heavy elements of jazz, classical, and worldbeat into his music, writing lyrics that were literate and self-consciously meaningful… he proves that he’s subtler and craftier than his peers.”

This album has long been a favorite among audiophiles and it’s pretty easy to see why. What Sting does here with jazz music is very similar to what Paul Simon later did with African music on Graceland.

Sting surrounded himself with legitimate jazz musicians and together they created an album that gives you the loose, relaxed feel of jazz mixed with Sting’s distinct pop sensibility.

There are elements of worldbeat, reggae, and soul here as well, but the album never feels disjointed. Sting managed to pull it all together to create a sound that is somehow unique and familiar at the same time.

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Venice on Classic Records

Hot Stamper Pressings of Classical and Orchestral Music

Classic Records remastered the tapes for LSC 2313 and even the people who like the sound of Classic’s Heavy Vinyl pressings used to complain about it, so you can imagine what we think of it.

What a piece of garbage. With smeary, shrill, screechy strings, it gives no indication of the beauty that is on the tape. 

The Victrola reissue, VICS 1119, is dramatically better sounding than any other reissue of the album we have played, including of course the Classic, and may even be better sounding that the Shaded Dog original itself.

This Heavy Vinyl reissue is noticeably lacking in a number of areas that are important to the proper presentation of orchestral music. If you own a copy of this title, listen for the qualities we identified above in the sound that came up short.

Below you will find links to other records that have the same shortcomings we heard when playing the Classic Records pressing of LSC 2313.

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Bill Evans – Montreux II

More of the Music of Bill Evans

  • This vintage copy of this classic live jazz recording boasts solid Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last
  • An excellent pressing, with lovely richness and warmth, real space and separation between the instruments
  • Recorded at the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland, this 1970 release showcases Evans’s stylings in the trio setting that marked his best work
  • “Bill Evans’ second recording at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1970 was a highly anticipated concert, finding the pianist in peak form, accompanied by bassist Eddie Gómez and drummer Marty Morell. “

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Jimmy Smith / Bashin’ – The Unpredictable Jimmy Smith

More of the Music of Jimmy Smith

  • This Big Band Jazz classic led by Jimmy Smith returns to the site for only the second time in four years, here with solid Double Plus (A++) grades from start to finish
  • If you own only one Jimmy Smith album, make it this one – with Oliver Nelson‘s arrangements ferociously blasting away, at good loud levels the first side here has the power to swing like you will not believe
  • 5 stars: “On the first half of the program, Smith was for the first time joined by a big band. Oliver Nelson provided the arrangements, trumpeter Joe Newman and altoist Phil Woods have a solo apiece, and “Walk on the Wild Side” became Smith’s biggest hit up to that point.”
  • It’s hard to imagine that any list of the Best Jazz Albums of 1962 would not have this record on it

This is tube mastering at its finest. Not many vintage tube-mastered records manage to balance all the sonic elements as correctly as this copy does.

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Pink Floyd – A Saucerful of Secrets

More of the Music of Pink Floyd

  • This vintage UK stereo pressing was doing just about everything right, with both sides earning solid Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them
  • Forget whatever sleep-inducing Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – if you want to hear the Tubey Magic, size and energy of these wonderful sessions from 1967 (some with Syd, some with David), this is the only way to go (particularly on this side one)
  • Bernie Grundman remastered the mono tapes for a Record Store Day release, and if you want to know why we have lost all respect for Bernie, you can go to the blog and read our review on his work in painful detail
  • In 2014, Nick Mason named A Saucerful of Secrets as his favorite of Pink Floyd’s studio albums. “I think there are ideas contained there that we have continued to use all the way through our career,” he says. “I think [it] was a quite good way of marking Syd [Barrett]’s departure and Dave [Gilmour]’s arrival. It’s rather nice to have it on one record, where you get both things. It’s a cross-fade rather than a cut.”

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Buffalo Springfield – Retrospective

More of the Music of Buffalo Springfield

  • With solid Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them on both sides, this original Atco pressing will be very hard to beat
  • Big, full-bodied, clear and present, the Tubey Magical richness of the better pressings is a joy to hear on modern high resolution equipment (particularly on this side two)
  • “Kind Woman” and “I Am A Child” are just two of the best sounding songs – listen to all that space around the voices and instruments (particularly “I Am A Child” on this side two)
  • And the Pysch stuff – “On the Way Home,” “Broken Arrow” and “Expecting to Fly” – is guaranteed to be more three-dimensional than you’ve ever heard it
  • 5 stars on AllMusic – this is Must Own Music from one of the most groundbreaking and accomplished groups of the late-60s (even though they never cracked the Top 40 Album chart)

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Something Not Very Cool on Cisco

Hot Stamper Pressings of Pop and Jazz Vocals Available Now

We went back and played the Cisco version about 6 or 7 10 or 15 years ago and were quite a bit less impressed with the sound than we had been when it first came out. We wrote the review you see below sometime around 2015 or so.

This is a decent Cisco LP, which is now long out of print. Audiophiles who love female vocal albums and pass on this one are missing the boat, because finding a better sounding original in clean enough condition to play is practically impossible these days.

Of course, if you already have a clean original you sure don’t need to waste your money on this LP.    

To recap briefly:

In 2015 or thereabouts we liked the record a lot less than we did when it came out in 2002.

Our take in 2025: I doubt we could sit through it with a gun to our head.

As we mention throughout this blog, Cisco’s titles had to fight their way through Kevin Gray’s opaque, airless, low-resolution cutting system, a subject we discuss in some depth here. (It was even more opaque back then than it is today.)

Other bad sounding records that Kevin Gray mastered can be found here.

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