- A vintage Asylum pressing that earned outstanding Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them from first note to last
- This copy is doing pretty much everything right, particularly on side two — huge, rich and lively, with Linda’s vocals reproduced to near perfection
- “Her big but pretty voice is a stunning instrument for expressing feelings, particularly intense feelings that require a slightly understated delivery… a fine album that begs closer inspection than, I fear, many of us are willing to give to Linda Ronstadt’s art. Like the best moments of the preceding nine, though, the best moments of Hasten Down the Wind will be with us a long, long time.”
- If you’re a fan of the lovely Ms Ronstadt, her 1976 release is surely one that belongs in your collection
- The complete list of titles from 1976 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here
The sound is rich, smooth, full-bodied and natural on both sides. In other words, this is Classic Analog from the ’70s, recorded by none other than Val Garay, one of our favorite engineers.
Most pressings of this album have quite obvious problems. If you own the record see if you don’t notice some of them on your own copy.
Some have a phony boosted top end, a subject we have discussed on Linda’s records before.
Some are just too fat and Tubey. Perhaps the result of too much Aphex Aural Excitement?
Some are thick, some are thin, some are too clean, some are not clean enough, every sonic issue you can imagine can be heard on this album if you have enough copies to play, and we had plenty.
We know that this copy is about as correct as can be. We know because we cleaned and played it and listened to it critically in comparison to other copies, and we did it all by ourselves. (Of course we did. There’s really no other way to do it.)
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