Top Artists – Spirit

Spirit in ’68 – One of the Most Phenomenal Debuts of All Time

More of the Music of Spirit

Hot Stamper Pressings of Psych Rock Albums Available Now

Want a glimpse into the kind of energy the band was generating in the studio? Drop the needle on the opening track, Fresh Garbage, and you will hear this band come alive in a way you probably never imagined you’d experience.

It’s positively startling how immediate and lively the sound is here.

This is the band at their best, fired up and ready to show the world that The Doors are not the only SoCal rock band who have innovative ideas about rock music and the performing chops to pull them off, not to mention the studio wizards who managed to get it all down on tape with State-of-the-Art ’60s Rock sound quality.

The venerable jazz arranger Marty Paich was brought in to lend his talents to the project, something I never knew until I glanced at the liner notes during a shootout many years ago. No wonder the arrangements, especially the string arrangements, are so innovative and interesting. I can think of no Psych record outside of The Beatles’ with better strings.

Spirit’s first album checks off a few of our favorite boxes:

The Doors Vs. Spirit

If I had to choose between The Doors’ first album and Spirit’s, say for a nice drive up the coast with the top down, no contest, Spirit would get the nod (not to take anything away from The Doors mind you). I had the album on 8 Track back in high school and played it to death. Doing this shootout, hearing the album sound so good after so many years, was nothing less than a THRILL. (I went right up to Amazon and bought a CD for the car. Might just take a drive up the coast.)

If you like Surrealistic Pillow and Revolver/Sgt. Pepper-era Beatles and early Doors albums, and you don’t know the album well, you are really in for a treat. It’s a classic of its day that still holds up forty-plus years later.

I simply cannot recommend any current album on the site more highly.

This Demo Disc Quality recording should be part of any serious Rock Collection. Others that belong in that category can be found here.

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Spirit / Self-Titled – A Psych Rock Masterpiece (The First of Two)

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  • Wall to wall, with layered studio depth like you will not believe, the kind of space you hear on an engineering classic like Dark Side of the Moon
  • 4 1/2 stars on Allmusic, but in our estimation it deserves at least five – it’s simply one of the All Time Greats from the era
  • 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,” with an accent on the joy these amazing audiophile-quality recordings can bring to your life. Spirit’s First Album is a good example of a record many audiophiles may not know well but would be well advised to get to know better.
  • If I were to make a list of my Favorite Rock and Pop Albums from 1968, this album would definitely be on it, close to the top I should think.

Need a refresher course in Tubey Magic after playing too many modern recordings or remasterings? These Ode pressings are overflowing with it. Rich, smooth, sweet, full of ambience, dead-on correct tonality — everything that we listen for in a great record is here.

No recordings will ever be made that sound like this again, and no CD will ever capture what is in the grooves of this record. There is of course a CD of this album, quite a few I would guess, but those of us with a good turntable could care less. (more…)

Spirit’s Third Album, Clear – Another Useless Sundazed Heavy Vinyl LP

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Spirit

Hot Stamper Pressings of Psychedelic Rock Recordings Available Now

Sonic Grade: F

Although it’s been many years since I last played it, I’m fairly confidant that the Sundazed only hints at the real sound of the best copies. Most Sundazed records would end up in our Audiophile Hall of Shame if we ever bothered to audition them.

Being in the “record business,” such as it is, I’ve played my share and more of awful sounding Heavy Vinyl.

Even back in the (embarrassing) days when we were selling them we carried only about one out of ten that were in print. A big portion of the nine we didn’t stock were just awful as I recall.

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Spirit – The Mono Rocks

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Spirit

This review was written in 2010. I doubt we would prefer the mono pressings to the stereo pressings were we to do the shootout this year, but you never know. (Don’t get your hopes up. We simply can’t find clean copies of this album anymore.)

That’s what shootouts are for, to give you the data to back up your opinions and your guesses. Without more current data, who can say which of the two we would prefer?

Our old review:

A distinguished member of the Better Records Rock Hall of Fame, not for the best Hot Stamper stereo copies, but for this amazing MONO. 

This killer pressing from 2010 has almost EVERYTHING you want from this ’60s Psych Pop Masterpiece — the energy, presence and sheer rock and roll POWER made a mockery of every stereo copy we played.

Want a glimpse into the kind of energy the band was generating in the studio? Drop the needle on Fresh Garbage, the opening track of this amazing mono pressing, and you will hear this band come alive in a way you never imagined you’d ever hear them.

It’s positively startling how immediate and powerful the sound is here.

That said, from an audiophile point of view, mono does involve a sacrifice — the huge three-dimensional soundstage of the best stereo copies is nowhere to be found here.

From a musical or performance point of view, this mono cannot be beat; it shows the band at their best, fired up and ready to show the world that The Doors are not the only SoCal rock band who have innovative ideas about rock music and the performing chops to pull off their conceptions, not to mention the studio wizards backing them to get it all down on tape.

If I had to choose between The Doors’ first album and Spirit’s, say for a nice drive up the coast with the top down, no contest, Spirit would get the nod. I had the album on 8 Track back in high school and played it to death. Doing this shootout, hearing the album sound so good after so many years, was nothing less than a THRILL. (I went right up to Amazon and bought a CD for the car. Might just take a drive up the coast.)

If you like Surrealistic Pillow and Revolver/Sgt. Pepper-era Beatles and early Doors albums, and you don’t know this album well, you are really in for a treat. This album is a classic of its day that still holds up forty plus years later. I cannot recommend any current album on the site more highly.

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Spirit – The Family That Plays Together

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  • The band’s sophomore release finally makes its Hot Stamper debut here with KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound on both sides
  • A very difficult album to find with good sound and audiophile quality surfaces
  • Both sides have presence, size and space we guarantee you have never heard on this album in all your born days
  • I Got A Line On You was the big hit and it really rocks on this copy
  • 4 1/2 stars: “On this, the second Spirit album, the group put all of the elements together that made them the legendary (and underrated) band that they were. Jazz, rock & roll, and even classical elements combined to create one of the cleanest, most tasteful syntheses of its day.”

This is a record I grew up with and like to think I know well. I’m a huge fan of the band. For audiophiles the first album and Clear are better recordings. This one has its problems, but so does Twelve Dreams and that album belongs in any rock collection worthy of the name.

The sound on the better copies isn’t unlike a good Jefferson Airplane record. It’s crazy psychedelic ’60s music with a LOT going on, and I’m guessing it was pretty hard to get the raw power of this band onto tape. (more…)

Spirit – Clear

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  • Excellent Double Plus (A++) sound from beginning to end for Spirit’s classic third album
  • These Hot Stampers give you the Tubey Magical sound that’s missing from the CD and the Sundazed vinyl
  • Dark Eyed Woman was the big hit from this one, and it rocks with the kind of all-out psychedelic energy the band was known for
  • 4 Stars: “Several moments of brilliance that prove what a revolutionary band they were.”

This is yet another example of the band ready to show the world that The Doors are not the only SoCal rockers with innovative ideas about rock music, not to mention the performing chops to pull off their conceptions. (more…)

Spirit / Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus

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 A record that belongs in any serious Rock Music Collection.

  • A stunning copy of Spirit’s 1970 Trippy Masterpiece – Triple Plus (A+++) or very close to it on both sides – exceptionally quiet vinyl too!
  • Huge, lively and dynamic – this legendary Psych album creates a wall to wall, three dimensional psychedelic world of its own
  • Nature’s Way, Animal Zoo and Mr. Skin all sound amazing on this copy – there’s really not a bad track to be found
  • “Spirit’s crowning moment and one of the era’s great underrated albums … enriched by meaty horn arrangements, imaginative vocal harmonies, and a structured approach to psychedelic studio trickery such as stereo panning and tapes run backward.”

The soundfield is huge and transparent, there’s real richness and body to the instruments, and there’s no edge at all to the vocals. Believe me, it’s the rare copy that has all of these qualities, the only one in our shootout as a matter of fact.

This and Spirit’s first album are absolute Rock Classics in my book, records that belong in any popular music lover’s collection.

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Spirit – Sundazed Heavy Vinyl Mono Reviewed

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Spirit

Hot Stamper Pressings of Psychedelic Rock Recordings Available Now

Sonic Grade: D

Another Sundazed record reviewed and found to be way off the mark.

As usual, the Sundazed only hints at the exceptionally good sound found on the best early pressings. We recommended it back at the day — let’s face it, we had a lot to learn.

In its defense, allow me to point out that it’s tonally correct, so for fifteen bucks you are getting your fifteen bucks worth, and probably not a dime’s more. We just cannot take this kind of sound seriously anymore.

Once you’ve heard the real thing, this pressing just won’t do.

Kevin Gray remastered this title, and we have found that the bulk of the records he’s involved with are rarely better than awful. Here is a good example of a record he mastered that falls far short of any record that would qualify to have the words “audiophile pressing” attached to it.

Look for these obvious signs that you are playing one his recuts:

The sound is opaque. It resists your efforts to hear into the recording. This is to be expected. Modern records in general tend to lack transparency, one of the most important qualities that the better vintage pressings we sell have in abundance.

In addition, Gray’s records consistently lack ambience and air. We discuss that subject in more depth here.

If you are looking for audiophile sound on vinyl, our advice would be to avoid any record he is associated with.

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Spirit / The Family That Plays Together – The Hit Can Be Rough

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Spirit

Hot Stamper Pressings of Psychedelic Rock Recordings Available Now

This is a review from our first shootout, 2013. I had been playing the album since 1968, but by 2013, a mere 45 years later, we had the cleaning technologies and the stereo system to finally get the album to sound right, to us anyway.

This is, for the millionith time, what progress in audio in all about. As your stereo improves, some records should get better, some should get worse. It’s the nature of the beast for those of us who constantly make improvements to our playback and critically listen to records all day.

We get asked about this classic album a lot, but until recently we were not convinced that we’d ever be able to find a great sounding copy. We built up a huge stack of copies and finally took the plunge; I am pleased to report that even though you’ll never hear a copy of this album that screams “Demo Disc”, you can certainly find ones that communicate the music well if you clean and play enough of ’em.

This is a record I grew up with and like to think I know well. I’m a big fan of the band. I have almost never heard this record sound good at all, which is why you’ve never seen a Hot copy on the site. We’ve finally managed to find a few good copies — it wasn’t easy.

The sound isn’t too dissimilar from what you get on a good Jefferson Airplane record. It’s crazy psychedelic ’60s music with a LOT going on, and I’m guessing it was pretty hard to get the raw power of this band onto tape.

Side one rates A++ to A+++ and side two is close behind at A++. A copy with grades like these gives you bigger, fuller, more open sound as well as more energy and presence.

Importantly, there’s more separation between the various instruments here, a feature that really allows you to make sense of the music and appreciate everything that’s going on. This copy is more open and transparent than the typical pressing by a mile.

The first track on side two is a step down from the rest sonically, I’m afraid.

And there are times on the album where you can hear some grit and distortion, but trust us — that’s on the tape, and any steps taken after the fact to remove it would rob the instruments of their natural texture.

We all enjoy rich, smooth sound, but it’s not worth losing musical information. This record may not sound perfect, but it sounded right to our ears, and most copies just plain don’t. (more…)

Spirit – Which Labels Have the Best Sound?

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Spirit

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Here is some Moderately Helpful Advice concerning the pressings that tend to win shootouts.

Don’t bother with the black label Epic reissues. In our experience they are consistently awful.

Yellow is the original label and orange the first reissue; both can be good.

The reviews reproduced below tell the story of the album far better than I can. If you like Pink Floyd, The Beatles (circa Revolver and Pepper), and the myriad other bands who took off in the direction of Psych Rock and Art Rock, you should find much to like here.

And if you don’t we give you your money back.

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