Top Artists – Heart

Heart – Dog and Butterfly

You’ll find insanely good Triple Plus (A+++) sound on the first side of this Heart rocker and superb Double Plus (A++) sound on the second – quiet vinyl too
Straight On is the killer track on this 1978 release, and with Triple Plus (A+++) sound you can be sure it will rock your world on this pressing
The sound is RICH and WARM without sacrificing clarity and punch, this is classic ’70s ANALOG at its best
Turn it up and hear the wonderful, grungy texture to the guitars and a big fat snare keeping the beat
“…the more resounding punch of Straight On went all the way to number 15 as the album’s first single. With the vocals and guitar work sounding fuller and more focused, the band seems to be rather comfortable once again.”

Like the best copies of Dreamboat Annie and Little Queen, this is classic ’70s ANALOG at its best. The sound is RICH and WARM without sacrificing clarity and punch. (more…)

Heart – Little Queen

A distinguished member of the Better Records Rock Hall of Fame and another in the long list of recordings that really comes alive when you Turn Up Your Volume.

This is a Classic Rock Demo Disc to beat practically anything you could throw at it. Love Alive and Barracuda on this copy will deliver the full Rock and Roll Power of your system. If you’ve got The Big Sound, this is the record that will truly show it off.

Even though our graphic scale only goes to three pluses, you’ll know the Four Plus sound on this side one the moment you hear it.

You get HUGE meaty guitars, BIG bass, a smooth top end, full-bodied vocals, incredible rock energy and dynamics, loads of richness and incredible transparency.

There are plenty of commentaries that discuss the sound of this recording and what it can really do when you get hold of a good pressing… and have the system that can play it… and turn up the volume good and loud. We proudly present here a copy with the kind of Big Sound that we think backs up every claim we make. (more…)

Heart – Little Queen – CBS Half-Speed Debunked

Sonic Grade: D

No slam, no real weight and no deep deep bass, just that 30-plus-cycles stuff and barely any of that, mostly 40 and up if you’re lucky, and BLUBBERY.

Our good customer Roger wrote to tell me how much better he liked our $100 Hot Stamper of Little Queen compared to his CBS Mastersound Half-Speed Mastered LP.

As you can see from our old commentary I used to actually think the Mastersound pressing was pretty good, with better extension on the top to help overcome this album’s typically dull, thick, opaque sound.

But that’s before I discovered the Hot Stampers, which fix EVERYTHING and turn this album into a real Demo Disc. (more…)

Heart – Dreamboat Annie – Our Shootout Winner from 2012

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Dreamboat Annie

A distinguished member of the Better Records Rock Hall of Fame and another in the long list of recordings that really comes alive when you Turn Up Your Volume.

MASTER TAPE SOUND and QUIET VINYL on BOTH SIDES! If you’re an audiophile who loves classic rock, you just haven’t lived until you’ve heard Magic Man and Crazy On You on a Hot Stamper pressing, and they don’t get ANY hotter than this copy! We play dozens upon dozens of these every year, and based on that experience this Hot Stamper will be virtually unbeatable for EITHER side. (more…)

Heart – Dreamboat Annie – Nautilus Hot Stamper (from Long, Long Ago)

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This is a Minty looking Nautilus Half-Speed Mastered LP with SURPRISINGLY GOOD SOUND on side two. I think I finally figured out why people like these half-speed mastered records so much. If you get one like this, it’s great! The mids and highs are transparent, sweet, open, and tonally correct. There’s none of that MOFI 10k top end boost here! Listen critically to the vocals — there’s almost no phony hi-fi-ish quality to the midrange, the kind you hear on so many half-speed mastered records.

Flip the record over to side one and there they are, plain as day: audiophle BS vocals. That makes this a Hot Stamper on side two and a pretty much run-of-the-mill stamper for side one.

Both sides actually have pretty good bass (for a half-speed), so maybe that’s being a bit too harsh. More accurately one could say both sides are better than average, with side two actually being pretty much right on the money. (more…)

Heart – Dog and Butterfly – Our Shootout Winner from 2011

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A distinguished member of the Better Records Rock and Pop Hall of Fame.

White Hot Stamper sound on side one, which means you get a Straight On that really ROCKS! Like the best copies of Dreamboat Annie and Little Queen, this is classic ’70s ANALOG at its best. The sound is RICH and WARM without sacrificing clarity and punch. This very copy really made the case for just how good the album can sound, with wonderful grungy texture to the guitars and a big fat snare keeping the beat. (Heart in the old days had a great band behind them. When they left so did much of the reason to play Heart’s records.) (more…)

Heart – Little Queen – Listening in Depth

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Presenting another entry in our extensive Listening in Depth series with advice on what to listen for as you critically evaluate your copy of Little Queen.

In-Depth Track Commentary

Side One

Barracuda

One of the little tricks I used toward the end of my marathon Little Queen tweaking session from a few years back (which lasted more than six hours one Saturday evening, leaving me euphoric but exhausted) was to listen to the ending of Barracuda. Some of the big guitar chords at the end of the song are louder than others, and the more the differences in level among them can be heard, the better the stereo and the room must be doing.

You can’t make the guitarist play some of the notes at the end louder than others, you can only reveal the fact that he indeed must have. This is what is meant by FIDELITY, the higher the better. (more…)

Letter of the Week – Dreamboat Annie

Dreamboat Annie

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

Hey Tom,

Hope you don’t mind me E-mailing you with comments on my recent purchase of Dreamboat Annie but I’m busting to tell somebody. Now for the comments.

I am stunned. I had one “run of the mill” copy and one of the Nautilus albums which I thought was pretty good. It’s good if you never hear a Hot Stamper. The Hot Stamper just blew them both away. I read the description of the HS on your site and every word was spot on. The energy, the bass, the clarity was all there. I still can’t get over it. Near the end of Magic Man the synthesizer goes down to a very low octave and just drags you with it and keeps you there. It’s amazing.

It’s hard to understand why these people on the audio forums mock and degrade you guys. I guess they are afraid to spend a little money and see what a Hot Stamper sounds like. I have a feeling even if they knew how good the HS was they still would not buy one simply because it’s more money than they are willing to part with. So to justify not buying one they put the Hot Stamper down. It’s just my opinion. They sure don’t know what they’re missing.

Only bad thing about you guys is once you hear how good a record can sound the rest of your collection kind of takes a back seat to the HS. Oh well, I can’t stop now.

Steve E.

Letter of the Week – Dreamboat Annie

Dreamboat Annie

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

Hey Tom,

I put on side one of my A+++/A+++ “Dreamboat Annie.”

I’ve found my new Demo Disc.

The drums are from another world. Cranked to the halfway mark on my preamp, I feel the drums and bass in my chest like they’re right here in my living room.

The guitar solo on “Magic Man” is intoxicating — especially the twisting interplay when the second guitar comes in. And when the synthesizer comes in and slides down the scale to hit that low note, I swear the hair on the back of my neck stood up! (more…)

Dog and Butterfly – Listen for the Fat Snare on Straight On

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Another in our series of Home Audio Exercises with advice on what you should be listening for when critically evaluating your copy (or ours) of the album.

Take five copies of the album, clean them well and then cue up Straight On. Now listen for how fat and solid the snare sounds. At least three will have a snare that doesn’t have the heft of the real thing. At most one will show you what it should really sound like.

Of course the copy with the right snare sound may have other problems, most assuredly does have other problems, which is why you need about ten to fifteen copies to really do a proper shootout. (more…)