Top Arrangers – Don Sebesky

Chet Baker – She Was Too Good To Me

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Trumpet

  • You’ll find solid Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them on both sides of this vintage CTI pressing
  • This is the kind of spacious, low-distortion, dynamic and energetic sound Rudy Van Gelder was getting in the early 70s (particularly on this side one) – if you think he was better in the 60s, you need to play some of these recordings from the 70s that show off just how good his work could be
  • “Baker began his comeback after five years of musical inactivity with this excellent CTI date. Highlights include ‘Autumn Leaves,’ ‘Tangerine,’ and ‘With a Song in My Heart.’ Altoist Paul Desmond is a major asset on two songs and the occasional strings give variety to this fine session.”

We guarantee you have never heard this album — or any later Chet Baker album — sound as good as this one does.

There’s so much life in these grooves. The sound jumps out of the speakers right into your lap. This kind of warm, rich, Tubey Magical analog sound is gone forever. You have to go back to 1974 to find it!

The early 70s were a good time for Van Gelder, the engineer for these sessions. Grover Washington Jr.’s All the King’s Horses from 1973 is an amazing Demo Disc for large group. We could easily name-check a dozen others on CTI recorded by RVG that we’ve done shootouts for.

But any album only sounds good on the copies that it sounds good on, on the pressings that were mastered, pressed and cleaned right, a fact that seems to have eluded most jazz vinyl aficionados interested in good sound but axiomatic (if not tautological) here at Better Records.

The extended song structures, ranging from four to seven minutes in length, leave plenty of room for the band to stretch out.

And of course Chet sings the title track beautifully.

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God Bless the Child Has Some of Don Sebesky’s Best Arrangements

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Kenny Burrell Available Now

This is one of our favorite orchestra-backed jazz records here at Better Records. A few others off the top of my head would be Wes Montgomery’s California Dreaming (1966, also Sebesky-arranged), Grover Washington’s All the King’s Horses (1973) and Deodato’s Prelude (also 1973, with brilliant arrangements by the man himself).

On a killer copy like this the sound is out of this world. Rich and full, open and transparent, this one defeated all comers in our shootout, taking the Top Prize for sound and earning all Three Pluses.

What’s especially notable is how well recorded the orchestra’s string sections are.

They have just the right amount of texture and immediacy without being forced or shrill. They’re also very well integrated into the mix. I wouldn’t have expected RVG to pull it off so well — I’ve heard other CTI records where the recording quality of the orchestration was abominable — but here it works as well as on any album I know.

[Or maybe I just had a bad pressing of a very good recording!]

Both sides impressed us with their deep, wide soundstaging and full extension on both the top and the bottom.

The bass is deep and defined; the tonality of the guitar and its overall harmonic richness are right on the money.

The piano has the weight and heft of the real thing.

This kind of warm, rich, Tubey Magical analog sound is gone forever. You might have to go all the way back to 1971 to find it!

Watch out for some of the later pressings, even the later ones still mastered by Rudy Van Gelder. A case in point:

VAN GELDER in the dead wax is no guarantee of high quality sound, on any record.

Side one of this original pressing with later stampers was bright and side two opaque. This pressing was not awful, or even mediocre — the reissues without VAN GELDER in the dead wax would most likely be much worse sounding, we stopped buying them years ago — but at 1.5+ we would say these grades point to the sound is good, not great.

The only way to guarantee higher quality sound is to put the album through a shootout with a good-sized pile of cleaned pressings and find the one that sounds the best using the rigorous testing methodologies we recommend. For this kind of work to be meaningful and reproducible, top quality playback is a must.

There is of course a way to avoid doing all that work and spending all the kind of money it takes to acquire piles of pressings — most of which you will eventually have no use for — and that’s to buy a Hot Stamper copy of the album from us.

The Music

The high point for side one is clearly the first track. It’s got a Midnight Blue relaxed groove going on, the kind that Kenny Burrell seems to be able to bring to any session he plays on. Or maybe it’s the rhythms Ray Barretto works out in the songs that make them so relaxed and swinging at the same time.

Side two is magical from start to finish. The two extended songs, both more than eight minutes in length, leave plenty of room for the band — and the orchestra! — to stretch out.

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Freddie Hubbard – Polar AC

More Freddie Hubbard

  • A Polar AC like you’ve never heard, with KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it throughout this original CTI pressing (only the second copy to hit the site in years)
  • Here are just a few of the things we had to say about this incredible copy in our notes: “rich horns and bass”…”3D and breathy”…”big and weighty”…”full and present trumpet”…”huge and tubey”…”great energy”
  • Both of these sides are clean and clear, punchy and lively, with excellent presence and a strong bottom end
  • All the usual faces are here — Ron Carter, Billy Cobham, George Benson, Airto — and the one and only RVG does his usual brilliant job capturing their performances
  • 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

We’ve been really digging this CTI jazz stuff lately. On the better albums such as this one, the players tend to sound carefree and loose — you can tell they are having a heck of a time with the material. Don’t get me wrong — we still love the Blue Note and Contemporary label stuff for our more “serious” jazz needs, but it’s a kick to hear top jazz musicians laying down the grooves and not taking themselves so seriously…especially when it sounds this good!

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Kenny Burrell – God Bless The Child

More Kenny Burrell

  • Incredible sound throughout this original copy (only the second to hit the site in years), with both sides earning Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them
  • Here are just a few of the things we had to say about this stunning copy in our notes: “spacious and rich guitar and strings”…”big and open and clear”…”jumping out of the speakers”
  • One of our favorite CTI albums, and surely one of the best sounding, especially on this pressing
  • If you’re looking for the best sounding jazz from the 70s and 80s, you might want to check out these titles
  • Credit goes to Rudy Van Gelder once again for the huge space that the superbly well-recorded orchestra occupies
  • 4 stars: “This is Burrell at his level best as a player to be sure, but also as a composer and as a bandleader. Magnificent.”

God Bless The Child is one of our favorite orchestra-backed jazz records here at Better Records. A few others at the top of my list would be Wes Montgomery’s California Dreaming (1966, and also Sebesky-arranged), Grover Washington’s All the King’s Horses (1973) and Deodato’s Prelude (also 1973, with brilliant arrangements by the man himself).

What’s especially notable is how well-recorded the strings are. They have just the right amount of texture and immediacy without being forced or shrill. They’re also very well integrated into the mix. I wouldn’t have expected RVG to pull it off so well — I’ve heard other CTI records where the orchestration was abominable — but here it works as well as on any album I know of.

The bass is deep and defined; the tonality of the guitar and its overall harmonic richness are beautifully rendered. The piano has the weight and heft of the real thing.

This kind of warm, rich, Tubey Magical analog sound is gone forever. You have to go back to 1971 to find it.

The Music

The high point for side one is clearly the first track. It’s got a Midnight Blue relaxed groove going on, the kind that Kenny Burrell seems to be able to bring to any session he plays on. Or maybe it’s the rhythms Ray Barretto works out in the songs that make them so relaxed and swinging at the same time.

Side two is magical from start to finish. The two extended songs, both more than eight minutes in length, leave plenty of room for the band and the orchestra to stretch out.

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George Benson – White Rabbit

More George Benson

  • Benson’s Must Own Masterpiece returns to the site for only the second time in two years, here with INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it throughout this vintage CTI pressing
  • Open and transparent throughout, with wonderfully full-bodied guitars, solid bass and huge amounts of swingin’ jazz energy
  • Superb engineering by the legendary Rudy Van Gelder – White Rabbit features jazz legends Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter, Billy Cobham, Airto, and more
  • 4 stars: “For George Benson’s second CTI project, producer Creed Taylor and arranger Don Sebesky successfully place the guitarist in a Spanish-flavored setting full of flamenco flourishes, brass fanfares, moody woodwinds and such… In this prime sample of the CTI idiom, everyone wins.”

We recently conducted another extensive shootout for White Rabbit and it was a blast. It always is. Benson and his funky jazz all-stars buds (Ron Carter, Herbie Hancock and Airto to name a few) tear through some great material here, and on both sides of this copy the sound is outstanding.

If you want to hear the best George Benson record we know of, this is the one. The Grammy-winning Breezin’ from 1976 is a perfectly good album but it’s quite a bit more commercial than our White Rabbit here from 1972, his first album to make the Top Ten on the jazz charts.

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Astrud Gilberto – Windy

More Astrud Gilberto

More Bossa Nova

  • This superb pressing boasts Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish – remarkably quiet vinyl too
  • Forget whatever Heavy Vinyl imposter is in print – this vintage Verve stereo pressing has the kind of High-Rez Tubey-Magical Midrange that will bring Astrud’s soft samba music to life in your very own listening room
  • “… Windy nevertheless proves one of Astrud Gilberto’s most consistent and sublime efforts, artfully straddling the division between Brazilian bossa nova and American sunshine pop.” 

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Airto / Free

More of the Music of Airto

Hot Stamper Pressings of Jazz Fusion Albums Available Now

This CTI LP has VERY GOOD SOUND. 

We’re on a winning streak with RVG these days (September 2006), three in a row, in fact: Chet Baker (She Was Too Good To Me), Freddie Hubbard (Red Clay), and now this wonderful Airto record.

The best music is found on side two, especially the last two tracks.

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Freddie Hubbard – Sky Dive

More Freddie Hubbard

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Trumpet

  • Outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound on both sides of this classic CTI album – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • This is the kind of spacious, low-distortion, dynamic and energetic sound Rudy Van Gelder was getting in the early ’70s – if you think he was better in the sixties, you need to play some of these recordings from the ’70s that show off just how good his work could be
  • Hubbard got together a great group of Funky Jazz players to support him here, with Don Sebesky doing his usual inventive arrangements
  • 4 Stars: “The charts for the brass and woodwinds are colorful; there is a fine supporting cast that includes guitarist George Benson, Keith Jarrett on keyboards, and flutist Hubert Laws; and Hubbard takes several outstanding trumpet solos.”

Rudy was getting one hell of a lively trumpet sound on tape during this period in his career. If you have a good pressing of one of his early ’70s jazz recordings, the sound can be positively EXPLOSIVE, with what feels like all the size and power of live music. (more…)

Bad Benson and Bad Audio – It’s a Match

More of the Music of George Benson

More Recordings Engineered by Rudy Van Gelder

Some notes about this shootout from years back may be instructive.

White Hot Stamper sound on side two, which means this copy has the power to show you just how well-recorded the album really is, and how much energy and drive there is to both the sound and the music.

No other side of any copy earned the full Three Plus White Hot grade, so this is a very special side indeed. [Now that we are much better at our jobs — see the advice at the end of this review — this happens only a few times a year.]

We didn’t run into any awful CTI originals the way we do with the typical rock record from the 70s, but it’s the rare copy that has a real top end, or much in the way of transparency, or freedom from smear. This copy has all three, without any sacrifice in richness or Tubey Magic.

Rich, full-bodied sound is not hard to find on Bad Benson; most copies had the goods in the bass and lower midrange.

Your Old Stereo (If You Had One in the Seventies)

On the other hand, clarity, top end, transparency and freedom from smear were hard to come by on all but a few copies. Most copies sound pretty much like your old ’70s stereo system — you know, the one you had with the three-way box speakers sitting on concrete blocks.

Fat, blurry down low, thick, opaque and smeary, that sound was everywhere. Pleasant, but not much more than that.

[This seems like an apt description for the records currently being pressed on Heavy Vinyl, wouldn’t you say?]

We’ve come a long way since then. Some pressings still have that sound to a degree, but with so many audio revolutions taking place over the last twenty years, now we can get dramatically more out of even the sub-optimal copies.

Carly Simon / Torch – Surprisingly Rich, Natural Analog Sound for the Eighties

More Carly Simon

  • This outstanding pressing boasts solid Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Surprisingly rich, natural and analog considering the recording date – very little sound of the sound of the day — the kind that ruined most of what was made in the ’80s — is on display here, and thank god for that
  • “Carly Simon’s Torch is a gorgeous throwback to the Fifties and early Sixties… By blending old and new material, and by incorporating a hint of jazz-fusion music into a studio-orchestra sound, Simon and her producer, Mike Mainieri, begin to suggest a continuity between Fifties torch and Eighties pop.”
  • If you’re a fan of Carly’s, this is a Top Title from 1981 that belongs in your collection.
  • The complete list of titles from 1981 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

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