Top Artists – James Taylor

James Taylor – JT

More of the Music of James Taylor

  • A vintage copy of Taylor’s 1977 breakthrough album that was doing practically everything right, earning STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them on both sides
  • It’s a superb recording – a member of our Top 100, in fact – but it takes a pressing like this to show you just how big and lively it can sound
  • The big hits “Your Smiling Face” and “Handy Man” both sound great here – thanks, Val Garay!
  • Don’t waste your money on any copy that doesn’t have TML stampers on both sides – they never sound any good
  • Interestingly, this time around even the worst side of any TML pressing earned a (1.5+) Hot Stamper grade
  • If you are using the Prelude Record Cleaning system on the right machines, you can’t go wrong with the early pressings of this title (although you can go much more right if you do a shootout and find a top copy like this one)
  • 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
  • 4 stars: “JT was James Taylor’s best album since Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon because it acknowledged the darkness of his earlier work while explaining the deliberate lightness of his current viewpoint, and because it was his most consistent collection in years.”
  • If I were to compile a list of my favorite rock and pop albums from 1977, this album would definitely be on it

The good copies really rock on songs like Honey Don’t Leave L.A. or I Was Only Telling A Lie, yet have lovely, delicate vocals on ballads such as Another Grey Morning or There We Are (two of our favorite songs on the album).

Just turn up the volume and play the opening to Honey Don’t Leave L.A. — this is James Taylor and his super-tight studio band at the peak of their powers. Russ Kunkel hits the drum twice, then clicks his sticks together so quickly you can hardly notice it, then goes back to the drums for the rest of the intro.

On the best copies, the subtleties of his performance are clearly on display. Until the right copies came along, we had never even noticed that stick trick. Now it’s the high point of the whole intro.

Here are more of our favorite records with exceptionally punchy bass and here are more of our favorite records with exceptionally punchy drums.

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Energy Is Key to the Best Copies of JT

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of James Taylor Available Now

The good copies really rock on songs like I Was Only Telling A Lie, yet have lovely transparent, delicate sound on the ballads Another Grey Morning or There We Are.

Just turn up the volume and play the opening to Honey Don’t Leave L.A. — this is James Taylor and his super-tight studio band at the peak of their powers. Russ Kunkel hits the drum twice, then clicks his sticks together so quickly you can hardly notice it, then goes back to the drums for the rest of the intro. On a superb copy like this one, the subtleties of his performance are clearly on display.

Until copies like this one came along, we had never even noticed that stick trick. Now it’s the high point of the whole intro.

Sound and Music

As audiophiles, we all know that sound and music are inseparable. In our shootout, after dropping the needle on a dozen or so copies, all originals by the way, we know when the music is working its magic and when it’s not.

As with any pop album, there are always some songs that sound better than others, but when you find yourself marvelling at how well-written and well-produced a song is, you know that the sound is doing what it’s supposed to do. It’s communicating the musical values of the material.

The most important of all these musical values is energy, and boy do the best copies of JT have it going on.

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James Taylor – Sweet Baby James

More of the Music of James Taylor

  • An early Green Label pressing with seriously good sound for this inarguable JT Masterpiece, earning solid Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them on both sides
  • All that lovely echo is a dead giveaway that side one of this pressing has resolution far beyond that of the others you may have heard (and of course the Rhino Heavy Vinyl), and side two is not far behind in all those areas
  • Richness and body and Tubey Magic are every bit as important – when those big choruses kick in, you want the sound of all those singers to be as big as life without the strain that accompanies their voices on so many copies
  • Finding early pressings without marks or groove damage is no mean feat these days, but here’s one to prove it can be done
  • Top 100 and 5 stars: “Sweet Baby James launched not only Taylor’s career as a pop superstar but also the entire singer/songwriter movement of the early 70s that included Joni Mitchell, Carole King, Jackson Browne, Cat Stevens, and others…”
  • If you’re a James Taylor fan — and what audiophile wouldn’t be? — this title is clearly one of the best albums released in 1970 and a true Must Own for the singer-songwriter-loving audiophile

Vocal reproduction is key to the better sounding copies of Sweet Baby James, as it is on so many singer-songwriter albums from the era.

To find a copy where Taylor’s vocals are front and center — which is exactly where they should be — but still rich, sweet, tonally correct and Tubey Magical is no mean feat. Only the better copies manage to pull it off.

Out of the dozen or more Green Label early pressings we play every year, relatively few have the full complement of Midrange Magic we know the best copies can have. As a rule of thumb, the hotter the stamper, the better the vocal reproduction on that copy.

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Two Qualities Are Hard to Come By on Dad Loves His Work

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of James Taylor Available Now

As usually happens in one of our shootouts, we learned that there’s so much more to this album than just great songs.

What really made this music work on the best copies was the result of two qualities we found were in fairly short supply:

Correct Tonality

Most copies have a phony MoFi-like top end boost in the 10k region that we found irritating as hell. The longer we listened the less we liked the copies that had that boost, which adds a kind of “sparkle” to cymbals and guitars that has no business being there.

Now if you’re a MoFi fan, and you like the boosted highs that that label is famous for, don’t waste your money buying a Hot Stamper copy from us. Our copies are the ones with the correct and more natural-sounding top end. The guitars will sound like real guitars and the voices will sound like real voices.

Lower Midrange and Bottom End Weight

When the vocals sound thin, bright and phony, as they do on so many copies of this album (partly no doubt the result of the grainy crap vinyl Columbia is infamous for) that hi-fi-ish sound takes all the fun out of the music.

Many tracks have background vocals and big choruses, and the best copies make all the singers sound like they are standing in a big room, shoulder to shoulder, with the full lower midrange weight that that image implies.

The good copies capture that energy and bring it into the mix with the full-bodied sound it no doubt had live in the studio. When the EQ or the vinyl goes awry, causing Taylor and crew’s voices to take on a lean or gritty quality, the party’s over.

This is one of our favorite Taylor albums here at Better Records.

It’s the last album by the man that bears any resemblance to the genius of his early work. It’s steeply, steeply downhill after DLHW. (Case in point: His specials for PBS of the last few years [make that twenty or more] are a positive cure for insomnia, with every song slowed down and all the energy drained from the material.)

But he still had fire in his belly when he made this one — one listen to Stand and Fight is all the evidence you need; the song rocks as hard as anything the guy ever did. (And it’s got plenty of cowbell, always a good sign.)

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Listening in Depth to Sweet Baby James

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of James Taylor Available Now

Before you play one of our Hot Stamper pressings, be sure to have your system fully warmed up and tweaked to perfection. Then turn up the volume good and loud. You’re about to hear some amazing music with superb sound. For me, and I hope you, when it comes to music this good, nothing less will do.

Side One

Sweet Baby James
Lo and Behold
Sunny Skies

James’ voice and the acoustic guitars should be warm, sweet, and surrounded by ambience. On a good copy, one that gets this song right, it’s pure milk and honey.

Steamroller

A big production number with rockin’ guitars and big brass. Some copies will be too bright and aggressive when the horns come in, and the majority of those that aren’t will be too dull on the other tracks. Only a copy with superb tonal balance will sound correct for both the rockers and the ballads.

Country Road
Oh Susanna

For some reason this song is too loud relative to the others on side one, so if you want it to sound right we recommend you bring the volume down a notch or two. (Those of you with a remote on your preamp finally have a good use for it.)

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Is Mud Slide Slim in a Booth or Isn’t He?

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of James Taylor Available Now

One thing we noticed this time around was that for some tracks James’ vocals are recorded in a booth and for others they are not. Listen to the first track — there is no ambience, no room around his voice whatsoever. He’s in a padded booth, and they sure padded the hell out of it. Now play Long Ago and Far Away on side two. No booth! Lots of studio space around the vocal. MUCH more natural acoustic.

We don’t have the luxury of playing every track on both sides for these shootouts. We pick two or three songs that have specific qualities we know to look for and play them on every copy. (Shootouts like this almost always involve at least a dozen pressings, sometimes more, and it’s impossible to keep them all straight with more copies than that.)

So here’s a potentially fun exercise — assuming you find this sort of thing fun — that we thought about doing but just don’t have the time to devote to at present, with so many other shootouts waiting in the wings. Take your own copy, assuming you have at least a decent one, and play each track listening for only one thing: does James sound like he is in a booth, or does he sound like he is in an open space in the studio? If you have the typical original WB pressing you will probably not be able to get very far and will be quickly tempted to give up, the frustration of a murky midrange being more than most of us audiophiles can bear.

But maybe you have a good copy; the possibility certainly exists. And if you find much success with this exercise we encourage you to drop us a line, we will be more than happy to print it.

James Taylor / Mud Slide Slim

More of the Music of James Taylor

  • A wonderful copy of JT’s classic followup to Sweet Baby James with KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them on both sides
  • This early Green Label pressing demonstrates the Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records almost never reproduce
  • The sound of most of the tracks on the better pressings is raw, real and exceptionally unprocessed
  • Some of old JT’s strongest material: “You’ve Got a Friend,” “You Can Close Your Eyes,” “Hey Mister, That’s Me up on the Jukebox” and more
  • 4 stars on Allmusic – it destroys the recent reissue, which lacks the texture and warmth you get in abundance on these killer originals
  • If you’re a James Taylor fan — and what audiophile wouldn’t be? — this title is clearly one of the best releases of 1971 and a true Must Own for the audiophile

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James Taylor / One Man Dog – A Personal Favorite and Forgotten Gem

More of the Music of James Taylor

  • This early Green Label pressing boasts STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it from start to finish – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Big, rich and solid on both sides, with a more relaxed, musical quality, as well as the clarity that was missing from most other copies we played
  • The sound of the best pressings is raw, real and exceptionally unprocessed
  • There is not a false note to be found on side one: it’s brilliant from start to finish, and side two is almost as good – we love the Abbey Road-like medley that makes up most of it
  • “Taylor turns in his best singing performance, running through the songs with fire, force, and enthusiasm…” – Rolling Stone
  • If you’re a fan of old JT, this overlooked title from 1972 surely belongs in your collection

Play Chili Dog here, one of our favorite tracks, and note not only the clarity and spaciousness, but the PUNCH and LIFE of the music. This song is supposed to be fun. The average lifeless and dull copy only hints at that fact.

Then skip on down to the hit at the end of the side, Don’t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight, another favorite track for testing. There’s a lot of bass in the mix on this track, but the best copies keep it under control. When it gets loose and starts blurring the midrange, the vocals and guitars seem “blocked”. The best copies let you hear all that meaty bass, as well as into the midrange.

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James Taylor / Dad Loves His Work

More of the Music of James Taylor

  • This original Columbia pressing of JT’s 1981 release boasts incredible Shootout Winning sound
  • Both of these sides are exceptionally rich, Tubey Magical and spacious – thanks, Val Garay!
  • We were knocked out at how good this album sounds on a great pressing like this one – one of the more impressive 80s pop recordings we’ve played in some time
  • The sound may be heavily processed, but that kind of sound works surprisingly well on the highest quality pressings
  • 4 stars: “James Taylor bounced back from the spotty Flag with this all-original album led by his collaboration with J.D. Souther on ‘Her Town Too,’ his biggest pop hit since ‘Handy Man,’ and his biggest non-cover hit since his first, ‘Fire And Rain’…”
  • If you’re a fan of JT’s, or Folky Pop in general, this has to be seen as a top title from 1981.
  • We’ve recently compiled a list of records we think every audiophile should get to know better, along the lines of “the 1001 records you need to hear before you die,” but with less of an accent on morbidity and more on the joy these amazing audiophile-quality recordings can bring to your life. Dad Loves His Work is a good example of a record many audiophiles would benefit from knowing better.

The soundstage and depth on our best Hot Stamper copies is HUGE — this is without a doubt the most spacious recording by James Taylor we’ve ever heard. If you want your speakers to disappear, replaced by a huge studio full of musicians playing their hearts out, this is the album that can do it.

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Bass Blockage Is Often a Problem on One Man Dog

More of the Music of James Taylor

Play Chili Dog here, one of our favorite tracks, and note not only the clarity and spaciousness, but the PUNCH and LIFE of the music. This song is supposed to be fun. The average somewhat compressed and dull copy only hints at that fact.

Then skip on down to the hit at the end of the side, Don’t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight, another favorite track for testing.

There’s a lot of bass in the mix on this track, but the best copies keep it under control.

When it gets loose and starts blurring the midrange, the vocals and guitars seem “blocked.” The best copies let you hear all that meaty bass, as well as letting you hear into the midrange too.

One Man Dog, like many early WB pressings, has a tendency to be dull and opaque. (Most side twos have a real problem in that respect.)

When you get a good one, with more of an extended top end, it tends to come with much more space, size, texture, transparency, ambience and openness.

Of course it does; that’s where much of that stuff is, up high.

Most copies don’t have nearly enough of it, but thankfully the best copies do.

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