Top Artists – Jack Sheldon

Art Pepper – Smack Up on Contemporary

More of the Music of Art Pepper

  • This is a classic from Pepper – all the songs were written by saxophonists and he tears into them with gusto and naked emotion, the hallmarks of his playing style
  • This is some seriously good-sounding saxophone-led jazz, thanks to Roy DuNann and Lester Koenig
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Pepper is very much on top of his game throughout, ably demonstrating a capacity for precision and intimidating passion. Nowhere is proof more readily available than on these sides, which project Pepper at the peak of his craft.”

The horns are really jumpin’ out of the speakers here, but they never get hard or squawky like they do on some pressings. This combination of clarity and fullness is not easy to come by, but it lets the music flow in glorious waves of All Tube 1960 analog. With the always wonderful Jack Sheldon on trumpet, this is a great date from the Golden Age of Jazz Recordings. (more…)

Jack Sheldon / Unreleased UHQR Test Pressing – Reviewed in 2007

More Hot Stamper Pressings of Digital Recordings with Audiophile Quality Sound

UPDATE

2007 was a long time ago, so please take that into condideration when reading this review.

This is a practically brand new UHQR JVC test record.

I’m SHOCKED at how good this record sounds.

It has AMAZING live jazz sound. 

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The Curtis Counce Group – Carl’s Blues

More Contemporary Label Jazz Recordings

 

  • Both sides of this vintage Contemporary recording pressed on exceptionally quiet OJC vinyl boast solid Double Plus (A++) grades
  • This pressing has the studio space, presence, driving energy, and Midrange Magic that’s almost always missing from whatever 180g reissue (at 33 or 45, don’t fall for that BS) has been made from the 65 year old tapes
  • Out of the five pressings we could find in audiophile playing condition, only two had Super Hot or better sides, and no copy earned a White Hot grade for side two
  • Which simply means that finding good sound on this title is tough — for those of you who like to do your own shootouts, we wish you good luck, you’re going to need it
  • 4 stars: “Although the Curtis Counce Quintet was not a commercial success, their four Contemporary albums were all timeless in their own way, undated examples of high-quality hard bop from the late 50s. Excellent music that still sounds fresh four [now six] decades later.”

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Tom Waits – Foreign Affairs

More Tom Waits

  • Foreign Affairs is back on the site after a six month hiatus, here with a KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) side one mated to a solid Double Plus (A++) side two
  • These are just a few of the things we had to say about this incredible Triple Plus side one in our notes: “tubey sax and bass”…”vox jumping out [of the speakers]”…”sweet and rich and 3D”…”deep bass”
  • This early Asylum label pressing will put Tom Waits right in front of you, with a batch of great session players behind and to the side, all playing live in the studio
  • “Foreign Affairs is one of the most unjustifiably overlooked titles in Waits’ catalog. It holds its appeal – and sounds less dated – than many of his more popular entries.”
  • “Produced and engineered by Bones Howe, Foreign Affairs was recorded live in studio by a quintet that included West Coast jazzmen Jack Sheldon on trumpet, saxophonist Frank Vicari, bassist Jim Hughart, and drummer Shelly Manne.”

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The Curtis Counce Group – Vol. 2: Counceltation

More Curtis Counce

More Contemporary Label Jazz Recordings

  • With excellent Double Plus (A++) grades throughout, you’ll have a hard time finding a copy that sounds remotely as good as this vintage Contemporary pressing
  • Another Classic Roy DuNann recording, this one is from 1957 and it is going to be very hard to beat for audiophile sound
  • Counce is a wonderful bassist and here he’s joined by Jack Sheldon, Harold Land, Carl Perkins and Frank Butler; I think you’ll be very impressed with how good this music from the late ’50s still sounds today
  • 4 1/2 Stars: “Bassist Curtis Counce led one of the finer West Coast-based groups of the 1950s, a quintet that was greatly underrated… This excellent music falls somewhere between hard bop and cool jazz.”
  • If you’re a fan of Mr. Counce, this is a Top Jazz Title from 1957 that surely belongs in your collection.
  • The complete list of titles from 1957 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

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The Hi-Lo’s / And All That Jazz – A Demo Disc for Tubey Magic

More Pop and Jazz Vocals

  • Superb sound throughout this early 6-Eye Stereo pressing, with both sides earning excellent Double Plus (A++) grades – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • On the right system, the better copies of this All Tube Demo Disc from 1958 will demonstrate the superiority of both the analog medium and the vintage pressing (not to mention the concept of Hot Stampers)
  • With a copy this good, The Hi-Lo’s will appear as living, breathing (albeit disembodied) persons right in your very own listening room – we call that “the breath of life,” and there is plenty to be found on this record
  • “The Hi-Los weren’t really a jazz unit, but more of a pop band that knew how to incorporate jazz’s harmonic sensibilities. This was among their better albums, complete with catchy title.”
  • More records with exceptionally Tubey Magical sound

An audiophile friend of mine played me this album on his big system in a huge dedicated sound room, and the effect was so glorious that to this day I can still remember the feeling it gave me.

Let’s be honest: The Hi-Lo’s are a white-bread vocal group from the 50s that made a lot of forgettable easy-listening albums.

But for one album, and one album only, they hooked up with Marty Paich and his Dek-Tette, which included players like Herb Gellar, Bill Perkins, Bud Shank, Jack Sheldon — top West Coast jazz players all — and recorded this album of standards with jazz accompaniment.

What makes this album exceptional is the recording itself. The voices are uncannily real. When the jazz musicians take their solos the sound of their instruments is as real as if you were in the studio with them. You will have a very hard time finding better sound anywhere, especially considering how beautifully spread out the players are on such a wide and deep soundstage.

Folks, if you’re looking for a Vocal Group album to beat them all, here it is. This album is overflowing with sonic qualities we look for as both audiophiles and music lovers: Tubey Magic, energy, immediacy, richness, breathy vocals — all the stuff that you will never hear on anything but the best vintage analog vinyl pressings. And you can take that to the bank.

Marty Paich Is an Arranging Genius

The high point here is “Then I’ll Be Tired Of You.” The sound is so perfectly suited to the song — everything is exactly where you want it to be, and Marty Paich’s arrangement is constantly surprising.

The first track on side one is very reminiscent of Art Pepper Plus Eleven, another Marty Paich arranging job that ranks with the best large jazz ensemble works ever recorded.

What The Best Sides Of All That Jazz Have To Offer Is Not Hard To Hear

  • The biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space
  • The most Tubey Magic, without which you have almost nothing. CDs give you clean and clear. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes in 1958
  • Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low
  • Natural tonality in the midrange — with all the instruments having the correct timbre
  • Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional studio space

No doubt there’s more but we hope that should do for now. Playing the record is the only way to hear all of the qualities we discuss above, and playing the best pressings against a pile of other copies under rigorously controlled conditions is the only way to find a pressing that sounds as good as this one does.

What We’re Listening For On And All That Jazz

  • Energy for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?
  • Then: presence and immediacy. The vocals aren’t “back there” somewhere, lost in the mix. They’re front and center where any recording engineer worth his salt would put them.
  • The Big Sound comes next — wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.
  • Then transient information — fast, clear, sharp attacks, not the smear and thickness so common to these LPs.
  • Tight punchy bass — which ties in with good transient information, also the issue of frequency extension further down.
  • Next: transparency — the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the instruments.
  • Extend the top and bottom and voila, you have The Real Thing — an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.

Side One

Fascinating Rhythm
Small Fry
Something’s Coming [From West Side Story]
Love Locked Out
The Lady in Red
Agogically

Side Two

Some Minor Changes
Then I’ll Be Tired of You
Mayforth
Moon-Faced, Starry-Eyed
Summer Sketch
Of Thee I Sing

Julie London – Julie (in Stereo)

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More Recordings Engineered by Ted Keep

  • This STUNNING vintage Liberty stereo pressing boasts Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound from first note to last – exceptionally quiet vinyl for a Julie London album too (don’t get me started)
  • In-the-room presence, preternaturally breathy vocals, and boatloads of wonderful Tubey Magic
  • This amazing sleeper of a record belongs right up at the top of Ms. London’s oeuvre (25 albums strong) along with Julie Is Her Name – high praise indeed
  • 4 stars: “Usually put into a torch song setting, this release allows London to shed that garment and become jazzy. Instead of being sultry, she becomes dazzling and sparkling. She also becomes more adept at phrasing and timing and takes a risk or two in the tradition of a jazz singer.”
  • If you’re a fan of Julie’s, this is a Top Title from 1957 that we think belongs in your collection.
  • The complete list of titles from 1957 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

The great Jimmy Rowles plays piano, handled the arrangements and fronts the big group here, taking the music in a wonderfully jazzy direction that suits Julie’s vocal style perfectly. (more…)

Julie London – Julie (in Mono)

More Julie London

More Recordings Engineered by Ted Keep

  • This outstanding vintage Liberty MONO pressing boasts outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last
  • In-the-room presence, preternaturally breathy vocals, and boatloads of wonderful Tubey Magic
  • This amazing sleeper of a record belongs right up at the top of Ms. London’s oeuvre (25 albums strong) along with Julie Is Her Name – high praise indeed
  • 4 stars: “Usually put into a torch song setting, this release allows London to shed that garment and become jazzy. Instead of being sultry, she becomes dazzling and sparkling. She also becomes more adept at phrasing and timing and takes a risk or two in the tradition of a jazz singer.”

The great Jimmy Rowles plays piano, handled the arrangements and fronts the big group here, taking the music in a wonderfully jazzy direction that suits Julie’s vocal style perfectly.

Having done this for so long, we understand and appreciate that rich, full, solid, Tubey Magical sound is key to the presentation of this primarily vocal music. We rate these qualities higher than others we might be listening for (e.g., bass definition, soundstage, depth, etc.). The music is not so much about the details in the recording, but rather in trying to recreate a solid, palpable, real Julie London singing live in your listening room. The best copies have an uncanny way of doing just that.

If you exclusively play modern repressings of older recordings (this one is now more than 63 years old), I can say without fear of contradiction that you have never heard this kind of sound on vinyl. Old records have it — not often, and certainly not always — but less than one out of 100 new records do, if our experience with the hundreds we’ve played can serve as a guide. (more…)

The Curtis Counce Group – Volume 1 – Landslide

More Contemporary Label Jazz

More Jack Sheldon


  • A STUNNING copy of the group’s 1956 release with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound on both sides – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • The clarity and transparency on this vintage pressing are wonderful, but more importantly it’s the unerringly correct tonality that’s most impressive when you play these real Contemporary pressings against the competition
  • Yet another amazing All Tube Contemporary recording from Roy DuNann and Lester Koenig at the beginning of the stereo era
  • 4 1/2 stars: “During 1956-1957, bassist Curtis Counce led an excellent Los Angeles-based hard bop quintet… All of Counce’s recordings are well-worth getting by collectors [and especially audiophiles] interested in 1950s straight-ahead jazz [with top quality sound].”

Jack Sheldon is absolutely amazing and completely original on trumpet here. Check out his stellar work on the first track, Landslide. Not only that, but the sound of his instrument is wonderful — you’ll never hear a trumpet sound so rich and full on a Rudy Van Gelder recording, that’s for sure!

Both sides are over twenty minutes, giving you a lot of well-played West Coast Jazz for your money. (more…)

Mel Torme – Back in Town – Reviewed in 2011

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Mel Torme Albums We’ve Reviewed

This is a nice looking Verve LP with relatively quiet vinyl and surprisingly good sound. Natural, smooth and sweet, I doubt there are copies out there that sound much better. The music itself is great fun. Hearing Mel sing with the female vocalists is really a treat.

This is an Older Review.

Most of the older reviews you see are for records that did not go through the shootout process, the revolutionary approach to finding better sounding pressings we developed in the early 2000s and have since turned into a fine art.

We found the records you see in these older listings by cleaning and playing a pressing or two of the album, which we then described and priced based on how good the sound and surfaces were. (For out Hot Stamper listings, the Sonic Grades and Vinyl Playgrades are listed separately.)

We were often wrong back in those days, something we have no reason to hide. Audio equipment and record cleaning technologies have come a long way since those darker days, a subject we discuss here.

Currently, 99% (or more!) of the records we sell are cleaned, then auditioned under rigorously controlled conditions, up against a number of other pressings. We award them sonic grades, and then condition check them for surface noise.

As you may imagine, this approach requires a great deal of time, effort and skill, which is why we currently have a highly trained staff of about ten. No individual or business without the aid of such a committed group could possibly dig as deep into the sound of records as we have, and it is unlikely that anyone besides us could ever come along to do the kind of work we do.

The term “Hot Stampers” gets thrown around a lot these days, but to us it means only one thing: a record that has been through the shootout process and found to be of exceptionally high quality.

The result of our labor is the hundreds of titles seen here, every one of which is unique and guaranteed to be the best sounding copy of the album you have ever heard or you get your money back.

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