Top Artists – Randy Newman

Gordon Lightfoot – If You Could Read My Mind (aka Sit Down Stranger)

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  • With INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound from start to finish, this original pressing of Sit Down Young Stranger could not be beat
  • Here are just a few of the things we had to say about this amazing copy in our notes: “tubey and spacious and 3D”…”huge bass”…”very big and rich and open”…”present and spacious”…”tons of space and detail”…”so wide and roomy”
  • Forget whatever dead-as-a-doornail Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – if you want to hear the Tubey Magic, intimacy, and freedom from audio coloration of this wonderful album from 1970, these early pressings are the only way to do it
  • An outstanding recording – Lightfoot’s best in our experience – with “Me and Bobby McGee” sounding as good as we have ever heard it on this superb pressing
  • Originally released in the summer of 1970 as Sit Down Young Stranger, it was reissued under its new title to capitalize on the success of the hit single “If You Could Read My Mind”
  • 4 1/2 stars: “The entire album is rich in the simple beauty of its folky melodies and personal lyrics… the music here is timeless, still feeling and sounding great many years after its release.”
  • This is an excellent title from 1970, which also happens to be a great year for rock and pop music, maybe the greatest of them all

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Randy Newman – Good Old Boys

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  • A superb original pressing of Good Old Boys, with Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) sound on both sides – just shy of our Shootout Winner
  • We guarantee there is dramatically more space, richness, vocal presence, and performance energy on this copy than others you’ve heard, and that’s especially true if you made the mistake of buying whatever Heavy Vinyl pressing is currently on the market
  • 5 Stars: “Good Old Boys is one of Newman’s finest albums; it’s also one of his most provocative and infuriating, and that’s probably just the way he wanted it.”

With Lenny Waronker and Russ Titelman producing, and Lee Herschberg and Donn Landee engineering, this album has the exceptionally smooth, rich, analog sound you would expect to find on a production guided by these men. It also happens to be a sound we love here at Better Records.

It’s the sound of vintage Reprise from 1974. (more…)

Randy Newman – 12 Songs

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  • With two nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) sides, this copy of what some consider Randy Newman’s strongest album is close to the BEST we have ever heard, right up there with our Shootout Winner – relatively quiet vinyl too
  • An excellent pressing, with a very strong bottom end, lovely richness and warmth, real space and separation between the instruments and wonderful immediacy throughout
  • The clarity of the piano and guitar perfectly support and complement Randy’s heartfelt vocals
  • 5 stars: “While much of Randy Newman [his first album] was heavily orchestrated, 12 Songs was cut with a small combo (Ry Cooder and Clarence White take turns on guitar), leaving a lot more room for Newman’s Fats Domino-gone-cynical piano and the bluesier side of his vocal style, and Randy sounds far more confident and comfortable in this context.”

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Randy Newman / Self-Titled – The Later Pressings Win Shootouts

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  • The sound here is rich and full-bodied with much less grain and much more Tubey Magic than every other copy we played
  • 4 1/2 stars: “”Randy Newman creates something new under the sun,” read the banner on the back of Newman’s debut album, but it was more that, in keeping with the intended irony of the statement. . . this was an audacious first album by a major, if extremely quirky, talent.”

The original cover for the album is pictured to the left. It has been our experience that the copies with the second cover and using different metalwork tend to sound a bit better.

Any given pressing can beat any other given pressing, but if you have a stack of these cleaned up and ready to play, the winner will almost certainly be the later pressing.

This vintage Reprise pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records can barely BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing signs of coming back. If you love hearing INTO a recording, actually being able to “see” the performers, and feeling as if you are sitting in the studio with the band, this is the record for you. It’s what vintage all analog recordings are known for — this sound.

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Letter of the Week – “…just pure delight with those New Orleans horns.”

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Randy Newman

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

Hey Tom,   

Another big surprise here; I almost cancelled ordering this before it shipped, as I have an old pressing that to me sounded White Hot Stamper material, impossible to improve on, and I intended just to shoot it out for kicks/education.

But this was a revelation, there was SO MUCH room for improvement. The whole thing as artistic edifice came alive with your pressing, conveying much more on an emotional and intellectual level than I’d picked up on before. And sound-wise it was so juicy in parts, just pure delight with those New Orleans horns.

I might have listened to this record a couple of times a year previously, whereas now it’s become a bible of soul and panache.

Dear Sir,

Thanks very much for your letter.  Allow me to give a short refresher on some Hot Stamper basics that bear repeating:

There can be no hot stamper designation without a shootout for the album having been done.

Good sounding records like the one you owned and was happy with are just good sounding records, not Hot Stampers.

Shootouts will sometimes be a revelation, as was the case here, White Hots especially. 

How high is up?

You can’t know how good a record can sound until you play a bunch of copies and discover the one that shows you just how high “up” really is.

We’ve been doing shootouts for this album for well over a decade. We understand on a purely practical level exactly what the best copies can be expected to do, and how good the best copies can sound. If you haven’t played scores of copies of the album, how could you possibly know any of these things?

Such a great album. Glad to hear you are enjoying it as much as we did.

Best, TP

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Randy Newman – Sail Away

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  • This outstanding pressing boasts solid Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish
  • We guarantee there is dramatically more richness, fullness and presence on this copy than anything you have ever heard, and that’s especially true if you made the mistake of buying whatever godawful Heavy Vinyl pressing is currently on the market
  • Our favorite Newman album for both music and sound (12 Songs being the main competition)
  • 5 stars: “Whether he’s writing for three pieces or 30, Newman makes superb use of the sounds available to him, and his vocals are the model of making the most of a limited instrument. Overall, Sail Away is one of Newman’s finest works, musically adventurous and displaying a lyrical subtlety that would begin to fade in his subsequent works.”

Some of Newman’s best songs can be found on Sail Away, including Political Science, You Can Leave Your Hat On, Last Night I Had a Dream and of course the wonderful title track. AMG goes nuts about Sail Away, giving it the full 5 stars and calling it “musically adventurous” and “one of Newman’s finest works.”

If you only have room for one Randy Newman record in your collection, this would be our pick. (more…)

Harry Nilsson / Nilsson Sings Newman – Our Shootout Winner from 2013

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We’re huge Harry Nilsson fans here at Better Records, and it warms our hearts that many of our customers seem to be as well. We’ve been trying to track down great copies of this album for ages, but they are tough to come by in any condition and are often noisy and/or mediocre when we find ’em. This copy has the kind of rich, full, analog sound that we’ve been trying to find for years with so little luck.

Nilsson Sings Newman is the fourth Nilsson album, the one that came right before his masterpiece Nilsson Schmilsson. Harry is in fine form here, reinterpreting a dozen great Randy Newman songs with Newman himself accompanying on piano. We’ve enjoyed a number of Randy Newman’s songs over the years, but when you take his material and put a voice like Nilsson’s up front, the result is pure magic.

Many copies we’ve played were too gritty, grainy, and thin sounding to get excited about. This one’s got the richness, fullness and smoothness that we’ve been hoping for. The overall sound is lively and dynamic with excellent immediacy. The vocals are breathy, the piano has nice weight and the tonal balance is right on the money.

There’s some surface noise behind the music, pretty much always the case on this album (and also true for most old RCA vinyl on any album — it’s practically never quiet). I don’t think you could find a copy that sounds much better and plays any quieter no matter what you did. Most of the time the surfaces aren’t really a bother, but those of you who are fanatical about such a thing are advised to take a pass on this one. You’ll be missing some lovely music and wonderful sound however. (more…)

Letter of the Week – “I am just amazed by the clarity and vibrancy of the LP. “

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Randy Newman

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

Hey Tom,   

Good afternoon, Tom, I hope you are doing well today! I wanted to thank you so much for the Randy Newman Little Criminals LP I purchased from your website. This White Hot Stamper truly lives up to your assessment of it, with delightfully natural sound.

Thanks for listening!

Jonathan R.

Added 5/18

I was very honored to see my note to you about Randy Newman’s Little Criminals appear on your On the Record website.  Had I known that was a possibility, I would have gone into a lot more detail about how great the record sounds (especially since I’ve heard that early pressings of the album are very noisy, and your beautifully playing White Hot Stamper most decidedly is not).

Listened to it again on Saturday and am just amazed by the clarity and vibrancy of the LP.  That was money very well spent!

Randy Newman / Little Criminals – Our Shootout Winner from 2013

TWO STUNNING A+++ SIDES, making this by far the best copy to ever hit our site! We recently finished our second-ever shootout for Little Criminals and it was a blast. We’ve only found out recently just how good the best sounding pressings of Randy Newman’s records can sound, and we were quite pleased with how rich, full and dynamic the Hot Stampers of this album are.

This album features the big hit “Short People” as well as a number of other great songs, including “Baltimore” which, as far as we’re concerned, is one of the best songs Newman ever wrote.

Both sides here absolutely knocked us out — nothing else in our shootout came close! The soundstage is super open and three-dimensional, the vocals and piano are full and present, and there’s absolutely no trace of thinness or edge.

This was Newman’s first commercially successful album and they stamped out a ton of them. The average copy is thin, dry, and stuck in the speakers — what a shame. Play enough of them, though, and eventually you might find a copy like this one, with wonderfully analog rich and full-bodied sound and the kind of presence that carries the music out of the speakers. (more…)