- An original pressing of the The Bridge debuts on the site, here with INSANELY GOOD Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) Demo Disc Living Stereo sound throughout
- It has taken us close to ten years to track down enough orginals (and reissues) to get this shootout going, and the very high price of this copy reflects the work that went into finding it
- Although the best originals will always win our shootouts, the early reissues from 1975 with the later cover can sound quite good – ten years ago those were the ones that won our shootout, but now we know better
- Here’s just one of the things we had to say about this killer copy in our notes: “Tubey and sweet and silk all over. Perfect.”
- The sax sounds just right, and played loud enough it’s almost as if you’re hearing the real instrument and not just a recording of it
- 4 1/2 stars: “The interplay between Rollins and [guitarist Jim] Hall is consistently impressive, making this a near-classic and a very successful comeback.”
Top Artists – Sonny Rollins
Sonny Rollins – Rollins Plays For Bird
More Sonny Rollins
Hot Stamper Pressings of Recordings by Rudy Van Gelder
- Superb Double Plus (A++) sound throughout making this one of the better copies from our most recent shootout
- The best reissue pressings from the ’80s sound right to us, and surprisingly like vintage analog from back in the day – that’s the sound we want from Sonny Rollins at his peak in 1957
- Don’t get us wrong — the best earlier Prestige pressings win our shootouts, but the right OJC pressings give them a run for their money
- It’s beyond difficult to find good sound for the music of Charlie Parker, but this Sonny Rollins Hot Stamper LP gives you just that for some of Bird’s most famous tunes, backed with excellent performances from the likes of Kenny Dorham and Max Roach
- This is a Must Own album from 1957 that belongs in any jazz-loving audiophile’s collection
This is one of the most enjoyable Sonny Rollins records around. It doesn’t seem to get much respect but let me tell you, this is Rollins at his BEST. And when the sound is as good as it is here, that’s the kind of jazz record that makes us sit up and pay attention.
Brilliant Corners – This Pig Sure Wears Pretty Lipstick
Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Thelonious Monk Available Now
During our most recent shootout of Brilliant Corners, we took the opportunity to play the Craft pressing cut by Bernie Grundman and released in 2023.
We thought it was godawful, the worst sounding version of the album we’ve ever played.
But how is that possible? Read all about the best practices being followed and look at the description of the fancy packaging below. Why would they go to all that trouble just to produce a bad souding record?
For the answer to that question, you will have to ask them. We’re stumped.
- Pressed using a one-step lacquer process at RTI utilizing Neotech’s VR900 compound
- All-analog mastering by Bernie Grundman from the original master tapes
- Housed in a foil-stamped, linen-wrapped slipcase
- Numbered and limited to 4,000
They used Neotech’s VR900 compound! Really?! That must be one awesome compound!
Apparently even the VR900 compound was not enough to save this pathetic excuse for a record.
For those of you who might be new to this blog, we should point out that we have been dumbfounded by Bernie Grundman’s work for more than twenty five years. The first RCA he remastered for Classic Records, LSC 1806, was so bright and the strings were so shrill that it probably lasted on our turntable maybe all of three minutes. My ears just couldn’t take it, even on a system that was dramatically darker and less revealing than the one we have now.
Equally bad sounding Classic Records were to follow by the hundreds.
Our quickie notes for side one are shown on the left. After hearing side one fall so short of the mark, we dropped it from the shootout and put the Craft pressing on the shelf to go back to whoever loaned it to us. Who cares what side two sounds like if side one is that bad? Time is money. We are in the business of finding good records to sell to our customers, not playing crap Heavy Vinyl that only the most hard-of-hearing collector types would consider owning.
Before long we had a change of heart. We thought we owed it to Bernie’s fans to be more thorough, so we took our best side two and played it against the Craft pressing.
Robert Brook Shoots Out Brilliant Corners
Robert Brook has a blog which he calls
A GUIDE FOR THE DEDICATED ANALOG AUDIOPHILE
Below you will find a link to the shootout Robert recently conducted for Thelonious Monk’s amazing Brilliant Corners album on OJC.
Sonny Rollins / Tenor Madness on the Prestige Trident Blue Label
- With INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it on both sides, this Prestige not-very-stereo pressing could not be beat
- Like many other Prestige “stereo” reissues, if there is any left-right information, you would never know it without checking for it with a pair of headphones
- In other words, this 50s mono recording has been mastered in the 60s to sound like it’s supposed to sound – there’s absolutely nothing artificial or modern here, which makes this a very special pressing indeed
- Again and again the notes read “solid, big and rich,” and that’s the kind of sound fifty year old records give you, in spades
- “Tenor Madness was the recording that, once and for all, established Newk as one of the premier tenor saxophonists, an accolade that in retrospect, has continued through six full decades and gives an indication why a young Rollins was so well liked, as his fluency, whimsical nature, and solid construct of melodies and solos gave him the title of the next Coleman Hawkins or Lester Young of mainstream jazz.”
- If you’re a fan of Sonny’s, this is a Top Title from 1956.
Robert Brook Flips Out Over a Killer Pressing of Way Out West
Hot Stamper Pressings of Sonny Rollins’s Albums Available Now
Robert Brook has a blog which he calls
A GUIDE FOR THE DEDICATED ANALOG AUDIOPHILE
He recently found himself in the possession of a killer copy of Sonny Rollins’ famous Way Out West album, one that was clearly superior to everything he used to think sounded just fine. Recent improvements meant that his stereo was now capable of showing him a Way Out West he had no idea existed.
This, as you can imagine, is music to our ears. We know exactly how he feels. This has happened to us countless times over the course of the last twenty years. Sometimes we even write about our experiences with these kinds of breakthrough pressings.
Two quick points:
1) This is the reason why all serious audiophiles do their own shootouts. It’s the only way to find the pressing that can show you just how good a record can sound.
2) And it’s the reason that constant audio improvements are the cornerstone of evolving music appreciation.
“… I’m hearing the studio space and everything in it a whole lot better, and I’m relishing all the more the insane chemistry these musicians have on this record. Musically I could always appreciate how dialed in Rollins, Manne and Brown are on WOW, but now I can actually hear that in the sound of the record, and this brings the performance and the experience of listening to it to a whole new level.”
Whole new level? That’s what I’m talking about!
Sonny Rollins – Alfie
- This Sonny Rollins classic finally returns to the site boasting superb sound on both sides of this original Impulse stereo pressing
- A triumph for Rudy Van Gelder, a Top Impulse Title, and as much a showcase for Oliver Nelson as it is for Sonny Rollins
- 4 1/2 Stars: “Rollins attempts to capture the textures of life through his incisive and energetic playing, his coherent improvisations, and variations on musical themes.”
- If you’re a fan of Sonny Rollins, this Impulse from 1966 surely belongs in your collection.
This album is on the TAS Super Disc list, which is probably what first alerted me to it. I know I was listening to this album decades ago, just from the memory of hearing it in the condo I used to live in. It sounded great back then and it sounds even better now! It may just be my personal favorite of all his work.
What makes this album so great? For starters, great players. Kenny Burrell is wonderful as always. Interestingly, I never realized that Roger Kellaway is the pianist on these sessions. I saw him live years ago with Benny Carter (who was 90 at the time) and he put on one of the most amazing performances at the piano I have ever seen. For some reason, he was never able to make it as a recording artist, but the guy is a genius at the keyboard.
Of course, any orchestration by Oliver Nelson is going to be top flight and this is no exception. Two of his records are Must Owns, in my book: Jimmy Smith’s Bashin’ and his own The Blues and the Abstract Truth. No jazz collection without them can be taken seriously.
Sonny Rollins Plus 4 – Defending the Indefensible
Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Sonny Rollins Available Now
We reviewed this album in 2014 or thereabouts.
I cannot recall hearing a more ridiculously thick, opaque and unnatural sounding pair of audiophile records than this 45 RPM Analogue Productions Heavy Vinyl release, and I’ve heard a ton of them.
Surely someone must have noticed how awful these records sound.
So, being an enterprising sort, with a few idle moments to spare, I did a google search. To my surprise it came up pretty much empty. Sure, dealers are selling it, every last one of the bigger mail-order types.
But how is it that no reviewer has taken it to task for its oh-so-obvious shortcomings?
And no one on any forum seems to have anything bad to say about it either. How could that be?
We don’t feel it’s incumbent upon us to defend the sound of these pressings. We think that for the most part they are awful and want nothing to do with them.
But don’t those who DO think these remastered pressings sound good — the audiophile reviewers and the forum posters specifically — have at least some obligation to point out to the rest of the audiophile community that at least one of them is spectacularly bad, as is surely the case here.
Is it herd mentality? Is it that they don’t want to rock the boat? They can’t say something bad about even one of these Heavy Vinyl pressings because that might reflect badly on all of them?
I’m starting to feel like Mr. Jones: Something’s going on, but I don’t know what it is. Dear reader, this is the audiophile world we live in today. If you expect anyone to tell you the truth about the current crop of remastered vinyl, you are in for some real disappointment.
We don’t have the time to critique what’s out there, and it seems that the reviewers and forum posters lack the — what? desire, courage, or maybe just the basic critical listening skills — to do it properly.
Which means that in the world of Heavy Vinyl, it’s every man for himself.
And a very different world from the world of vintage vinyl, the kind we offer. In our world we are behind you all the way. We guarantee your satisfaction or your money back.
Now which world would you rather live in?
UPDATE 2025
Still not a single review on Discogs for this pressing.
Sonny Rollins – Our Man In Jazz
More Sonny Rollins
More Living Stereo Recordings
- An original Black Label Living Stereo copy, with outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER from the first note
- A superb 1963 Living Stereo recording with tons of Tubey Magic, one of Sonny’s best
- We’ve played quite a number of Our Man in “X” RCA titles, and I don’t think we have ever heard a bad one
- It’s the exceptionally rare copy that sounds as good as this one does – let’s find it a good home!
- Recorded live in 1962 at the Village Gate in Greenwich Village, NY and featuring Bob Cranshaw, Don Cherry, and Billy Higgins
Sonny Rollins / The Sound of Sonny – Reviewed in 2007
Riverside White and Blue original 2 Mic Label Mono LP. Side one sounds like a typical old Riverside jazz record, but side two sounds EXCELLENT! I don’t know when I’ve heard an early Sonny Rollins record sound better. His horn is really full-bodied and dynamic and has amazing IMMEDIACY on some tracks. It makes side one sound sick in comparison.
The surfaces for old jazz records are always the problem. This one plays M– to EX++ and has some groove damage in the inner grooves — nothing too serious, but it’s definitely there. We played all the marks and only a few of them repeat, and not for long. I’ve never seen a clean quiet copy of a record like this in my life. I’m sure they exist, but I don’t come across them, at any price. (more…)