Top Artists – The Doors

Waiting for the Sun – Don’t the DCC Pressings All Sound Different Too?

More of the Music of The Doors

I recently had a chance to listen again to this DCC pressing for the first time in many years. I was putting it up on ebay to sell and dropped the needle to check the sound. I can’t say I liked what I heard. Knowing the record as well as I do, I could her that the DCC was clearly to be brighter in the midrange.

When I went back to read what I had said about the DCC years ago, I saw that I had described that copy the same way. You can read it for yourself.

Our old review follows.

We rate the DCC LP a B Minus

We used to like the DCC pressing of this Doors album. Now… not so much. It’s a classic case of Live and Learn.

Keep in mind that the only way you can never be wrong about your records is simply to avoid playing them. If you have better equipment than you did, say, five or ten years ago, try playing some of your MoFi’s, 180 gram LPs, Japanese pressings, 45 RPM remasters and the like. You might be in for quite a shock.

Of course the question on everyone’s mind is, “How does this Hot Stamper copy stack up to the famous DCC pressing?” After all, the DCC was the one we were touting all through the ’90s as The One To Beat.

Well, to be honest, the DCC is a nice record, but a really special original copy throws a pretty strong light on its faults, which are numerous and frankly fairly bothersome.

The top end on the copy I played was a touch boosted, causing a number of problems.

For one, the cymbals sounded slightly tizzy compared to the real thing, which had a fairly natural, though not especially extended, top end.

But the real problem was in the midrange. Morrison sounded thinner and brighter, more like a tenor and less like a baritone, with a somewhat hi-fi-ish quality added to the top of his voice. Folks, I hate to say it, but if someone had told me that the record playing was half-speed mastered, I probably would have believed it. I detest that sound, and the DCC pressing bugged the hell out of me in that respect.

Morrison has one of the richest and most distinctive voices in the history of rock. When it doesn’t sound like the guy I’ve been listening to for close to forty years, something ain’t right.

The mid-bass was also a tad boosted — not in the deep bass, but more in that area around 100-200 cycles, causing the sound to be overly rich. None of the originals we played had anything like it, so I’m pretty sure that’s a bit of added EQ Hoffman introduced for reasons best known to him. (Did he like it that way, or was he pandering to some of the audiophile community’s preference for overly rich sound, the kind they confuse with “analog”? Nobody knows.)

Not So Fast There, O Hot Stamper Guru

But wait a minute — don’t all records sound different? Is it really fair to paint his version with such a broad brush on the basis of having played only one copy?

Of course not. Perhaps other copies sound better. It wouldn’t be the first time. (Maybe they sound worse. Think about that.)

So here’s our offer to you, dear customer: We absolutely guarantee our Hot Stamper copies will handily beat the DCC pressing or your money back. We’ll even pay the return domestic shipping if for some reason you are not 100% satisfied with the sound of our Hot Stamper. Now there’s an offer you can’t refuse, for any one of you who love the album and have a wad of money burning a hole in your pocket.

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The Doors’ Debut – MoFi Reviewed

More of the Music of The Doors

Sonic Grade: D 

If anyone still thinks that this pressing is anything but a bad joke played on the audiophile public — so sucked out in the midrange, bass shy and compressed to death — that person still has a way to go in this hobby.

A very long way.

You can hear that something is off with this pressing from another room. The sound is bad enough to have earned a place in our Mobile Fidelity Hall of Shame.

But wait just a gosh darn minute.

I liked the MoFi just fine when it came out. I guess I had a way to go in this hobby too.

That was back in the early ’80s. I like to think I’ve learned a thing or two in the last forty years.

Some reviewers and a great many audiophiles may be stuck in the 80s, but I sure as hell don’t think I am one of them.

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Letter of the Week – “Thanks to everyone for all the great sounding vintage LPs”

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of The Doors Available Now

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

Hi Tom,

Thanks everyone for all the great sounding vintage LP’s. The WHITE HOT DOORS STRANGE DAYS I recently purchased is off the chart! Keep up the great work.

Dennis

Dennis,

Thanks for your letter. White Hot and off the chart are pretty much the same thing to us. As Good As It Gets is another way of saying it.

Best, TP

Further Reading

How Do the Butterfly and Small Red E Pressings Sound on Strange Days?

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of The Doors Available Now

The Butterfly and Small Red E labels are so contemptibly thin and harsh they are not worth the vinyl they were pressed on.

You would be much better off with the DCC Gold CD than any of the reissue vinyl we’ve played.

The fact of the matter is that good digital beats bad analog any day.

This a Must Own Record, a 1967 recording with unbelievable RAW POWER. Most audiophiles very likely have no idea how well recorded this album is, simply because most pressings don’t do a very good job of translating the energy and life of the master tape onto the vinyl of the day.

The second Doors album is without a doubt one of the punchiest, liveliest, most POWERFUL recordings in the entire Doors catalog, right up there with their debut.

I’m guessing this statement does not comport with your own experience, and there’s a good reason for that: not many copies of the album provide evidence of any of the above qualities. Most pressings are opaque, flat, thin, veiled, compressed and lifeless. They sound exactly the way so many old rock records sound: like any old rock record.

Botnick Knocks It Out of the Park

But this album is engineered by Bruce Botnick. The right pressings give you the kind of low-end punch and midrange presence you hear on Love’s first album (when you play the right gold label originals). Botnick engineered them both, and what’s even more amazing is that The Doors second is in many ways an even better recording than Love’s!

Very tubey from start to finish, the energy captured on these Hot Stampers has to be heard to be believed. Not to mention the fact that the live-in-the-studio musicians are swimming in natural ambience, with instruments leaking from one mic to another, and most of them bouncing back and forth off the studio walls to boot.

But the thing that caught us most by surprise is how much LIFE there is in the performances on the better Hot Stamper copies. Morrison pulled out all the stops on songs like Love Me Two Times and the last track on the album, When the Music’s Over. Unless you have a very special pressing there is almost no chance you will ever hear him with this kind of raw power.

Top 100? If we could find more than a sporadic few clean, good sounding copies each year it would surely make the list, joining the other two of the band’s first four albums on there now.

How to Make All Your Records Sound Like MoFi’s – For Free!

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of The Doors Available Now

The Doors first album is yet another obvious example of MoFi’s predilection for a sucked-out midrange.

Scooping out the middle of the midrange has the effect of creating an artificial sense of depth where none belongs. Play any original Bruce Botnick engineered album by Love or The Doors and you will notice immediately that the vocals are front and center.

When the DCC Doors first album was released on vinyl, we noted that the vocals were finally back where they belonged. After having lived with the MoFi for so many years, we’d almost forgotten.

And now of course we can’t tolerate the smear and opacity of the DCC. We like to think we’re simply setting higher standards these days.

The midrange suckout effect is easily reproducible in your very own listening room.

Pull your speakers farther out into the room, and also farther apart, and you can get that MoFi sound on every record you play. I’ve been hearing it in the various audiophile systems I’ve been exposed to for years.

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What Happens When the Gold Label Doesn’t Have the Best Sound on Both Sides?

More of the Music of The Doors

It gets marked the sonic grade it earns.

If a Big Red E label pressing sounded better to us on side two, if it somehow managed to sound better than any of our Gold Label originals, then it would earn the top grade on side two.

Here is how we described a killer copy we had not long ago:

With a Triple Plus (A+++) shootout winning side two and a Double Plus (A++) side one, this copy is practically as good as it gets. The sound on this Gold Label pressing is incredibly powerful — big, rich, full-bodied, present and lively. It’s HUGE, RICH, and FULL-BODIED, exactly the way it should be.

But note that side two was clearly not as good as side one. Even the best early pressings cannot be relied on to get both sides right. The pressing above is proof. We discuss the issue in the commentary below.

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The Doors – Self-Titled

More of The Doors

More Top 100 Rock and Pop Albums

  • An outstanding copy of the band’s debut with solid Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish – we guarantee you’ve never experienced The Doors like this!
  • The sound is incredibly big, rich and spacious, with a rock solid bottom end and energy that puts the lie to the modern reissue veiled and lifeless sound
  • Only the right Gold Label originals can win a shootout, and few of them are not going to have condition issues, but the two here are fairly minor all things considered
  • A must-own album “whose nonstop melodicism and dynamic tension would never be equaled by the group again, let alone bettered.”
  • 5 stars: “A tremendous debut album, and indeed one of the best first-time outings in rock history, introducing the band’s fusion of rock, blues, classical, jazz and poetry with a knockout punch.”
  • Any list of the Best Rock and Pop Albums of 1967 would surely have title right up at the top

Superb sound on this copy of the Doors self-titled classic! You won’t believe how good the sound is here — big and rich with plenty of bottom end and an energy level that’s really something to hear! Thanks, Bruce Botnick, you da man!

Honestly, we must return or reject 80% of the copies that come through the door, which should go a long way towards explaining why they hit the site with such irregularity. We know what the best stampers are and have for quite a while. What we have a devil of a time doing is finding anyone selling the album who knows how to grade it properly, especially when it comes to the kind of groove damage that’s common to records played on turntables that lack anti-skate. (more…)

Listening in Depth to Waiting For The Sun

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of The Doors Available Now

Presenting another entry in our extensive listening in depth series with advice on what to listen for as you critically evaluate your copy of Waiting For The Sun.

Here are some albums on our site you can buy with similar track by track breakdowns. 

My favorite of the first three Doors album, this one is imbued with more mystery and lyricism than previous efforts. The album shows them maturing as a band, having smoked large amounts of pot and preparing themselves for the wild ride of their next opus, the ambitious Soft Parade.

Actually, as I listen to this album it reminds me more and more of that one. Now that it sounds as good as The Soft Parade, I find I’ve gained a new respect for Waiting for the Sun.

Side One

Hello, I Love You
Love Street
Not To Touch The Earth

Listen to the hard rockin’ duel between the keyboards (left channel) and the guitar (right channel) in the middle of the song. Morrison is screaming is head off and Densmore is really slamming the drums. There’s a HUGE amount of information in the grooves there, and only the best copies will be open and spacious enough to not get a bit congested.

Summer’s Almost Gone

On a Hot Stamper pressing, this song is Tubey Magical analog at its best — warm, sweet, rich, and full-bodied.

Wintertime Love
The Unknown Soldier

Side Two

Spanish Caravan
My Wild Love
We Could Be So Good Together

This song is a bit midrangy on every last copy we’ve played. On a Hot Stamper copy, it can still sound quite wonderful, just a little boosted in the midrange.

Yes, The River Knows

This song is the best test for transparency and bass definition on side two. You should be able to hear the bassist really pulling on the strings and sliding his fingers up and down the fretboard.

Five to One

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Listening in Depth to The Soft Parade

Hot Stampers of The Soft Parade

Letters and Commentaries for The Soft Parade

doorssoftinner

Our shootout from way back (2014) included a minty Gold Label pressing, which did reasonably well, but not great, on side one. Side two however was OFF THE CHARTS and won the shootout on that side handily. The fact that side one wasn’t a knockout is yet more evidence that individual pressings with the same label — even the “right” label — vary dramatically in sound.

In-Depth Track Commentary

Side One

Tell All the People

Jim Morrison, a man with no professional experience as a singer before he formed The Doors, was blessed with one of the most beautiful baritones in the history of Rock and Roll. If his voice isn’t rich, full and Tubey Magical on this track, the sound on side one isn’t likely to be either. If that’s the case you are not in for an easy ride my friend. Chuck that sucker in the trade-in pile and move on.

Touch Me

There’s big bass on this track; you need to be able to hear it right from the start or this track is going to sound like it’s playing through a car radio.

Listen also for the texture on the strings. If you have that rare, tonally correct early pressing with a real top end, the strings won’t sound steely, strident or smeared (the three S’s, don’t you know).

Shaman’s Blues
Do It
Easy Ride

Side Two

Wild Child
Runnin’ Blue

Fiddle and mandolin (we thought it might be a banjo at first but we’re pretty sure it’s a mandolin; listen for strumming at the end) accompaniment on a Doors song? Hey, why not? Let the guys stretch out a bit.

That’s what this album is all about. They’re not trying to be Blood Sweat and Tears. They’re trying to add some new colors to their palette, and I for one am glad they did. (When they went back to the basics for Morrison Hotel, they turned in one of their weakest efforts ever, if not The Weakest.)

Wishful Sinful

Bruce Botnick Tubey Magic To Die For! Does it get any better for audiophiles than this?

Listen for the lovely timbre of the oboe, a featured element of this track. The orchestral arrangements here rival those of the legendary George Martin (himself an accomplished oboist). If large scale orchestral arrangements are good enough for The Beatles, how can The Doors be criticized for incorporating them into their music?

The Soft Parade

Ya gotta love that spoken word intro. Once you’ve heard it you’ll never forget it as long as you live. The best early copies (gold label or big red E) have echo bouncing off every wall of the studio endlessly.

The weight the best copies have below 250 cycles is where much of the studio ambience is. Play the typical leaned-out copy and all that space collapses.

L.A. Woman on German Heavy Vinyl, Part Two

Part One can be found here.

I have a Super Saver budget reissue domestic pressing of LA Woman. Want to guess what it sounds like? It sounds exactly like this German version. When I described the sound of the German version to Steve, he immediately recognized what I was talking about. There is a tape — they call it “the master tape” — of L.A. Woman that has exactly the bad qualities I have described above. I’m guessing that my Super Saver copy is a flat transfer of that bad tape. (When budget reissues are mastered, it’s often the case that the transfer is flat or something very close to it, because little time and expense is justified for a cheap reissue.)

Now if the Super Saver is a flat transfer and sounds just like this German pressing, I think we can safely infer that this new 180 gram remastered record is a flat transfer. It’s a flat transfer of a bad tape. Nothing more, nothing less.

And nothing new. There are tons of badly remastered records out there. I’m sure you’ve bought some. I could spend days listing them in the Records We Don’t Sell section. Most of the records found on my competitor’s Web sites could be cut and pasted into that section if I wanted to take the time to do it.

But how is it that such a bad record seems to have met with such favor among audiophiles? I’m frankly at a loss to understand it. I’m sure some of you reading this commentary own the record. Some of you no doubt LIKE the record. So let me think of a few reasons why you might not have noticed how bad sounding a record it is.

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