Bob Dylan – Nashville Skyline

More of the Music of Bob Dylan

  • A vintage Stereo 360 pressing with outstanding Double Plus (A++) grades or BETTER on both sides
  • We guarantee this copy will blow your mind, and blow every other copy you have ever played out of the water, or your money back
  • “Lay Lady Lay,” “To Be Alone With You,” “I Threw It All Away,” “Tonight I’ll Be Staying Here With You” are true country-rock standards
  • There are some bad marks (as is sometimes the nature of the beast with these vintage LPs) on “Tell Me That It Isn’t True,” but once you hear just how superb sounding this copy is, you might be inclined, as we were, to stop counting ticks and just be swept away by the music
  • 5 stars: “It’s a warm, friendly album, particularly since Bob Dylan is singing in a previously unheard gentle croon — the sound of his voice is so different it may be disarming upon first listen, but it suits the songs.”
  • This is a Must Own Dylan classic from 1969 that belongs in every right-thinking audiophile’s collection

This vintage Columbia 360 pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern pressings cannot BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing any sign of coming back.

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Prince – Sign ‘O’ The Times

More of the Music of Prince

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  • These vintage Paisley Park pressings were doing just about everything right, with all FOUR sides earning solid Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them
  • The sonics are big, full, lively and spacious with more rock solid energy than most other copies we played (particularly on sides one, two and four)
  • Problems in the vinyl are sometimes the nature of the beast with these vintage LPs – there simply is no way around them if the superior sound of vintage analog is important to you
  • 5 stars: “Fearless, eclectic, and defiantly messy, Prince’s Sign ‘O’ the Times falls into the tradition of tremendous, chaotic double albums like The Beatles, Exile on Main St., and London Calling — albums that are fantastic because of their overreach, their great sprawl. Prince shows nearly all of his cards here, from bare-bones electro-funk and smooth soul to pseudo-psychedelic pop and crunching hard rock, touching on gospel, blues, and folk along the way.”

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Crying on Classic Records

Hot Stamper Pressings of Pop and Jazz Vocals Available Now

Sonic Grade: C

Another Classic Records Rock and Pop LP reviewed.

Not sure if we would still agree with what we wrote back in 2003 when this record came out, but here it is anyway. 

“This is actually a very good sounding record, unlike the first Orbison that Classic did. It’s also a better album.”

Note that the chances of us doing a shootout for this album are close to nil. Where are you going to find half a dozen clean stereo copies to clean and play? I haven’t seen one in longer than I can remember.

These Roy Orbison records we have done shootouts for and hope to again someday.

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Rachmaninoff / Concerto No. 3 – Wrong Again?

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Rachmaninoff Available Now

UPDATE 2026

In 2007 we raved about this title, writing:

Outstanding! Sounds just like the already very good shaded dog, in many ways better. (I don’t have that one around to compare anymore but this LP has that same natural, smooth sound, while being cut a bit cleaner.) 

We have two copies of this Victrola, both with the same stamper numbers, and this is definitely the better of the two sonically. It has more presence, more transparency and better dynamics.

In preparation for our latest big shootout, we decided to give the Victrola another listen, and the one copy we had on hand was not impressive to say the least. It was dark, thin and flat.

Three strikes and it was out. Seems as though we were wrong.

Did we have better copies in 2007? Perhaps, but not likely. We just didn’t know what we were doing when it came to this piece of music. Our advice in 2026: skip it. If you do buy one, buy it for cheap.

Our favorite for sound and performance is the Janis conducted by Dorati on Mercury.

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Joan Jett & The Blackhearts / I Love Rock ‘n Roll – A Surprisingly Well Recorded Album for 1981

More Women Who Rock

  • This stunning copy of Joan Jett’s iconic 1981 release boasts Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them on both sides – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • A surprisingly well-recorded album for 1981 – rich and full-bodied down low, smooth up top, present and natural in the midrange, this audiophile sound quality really took us by surprise
  • And as you can see from the above description, when a pressing sounds like this, you can play it good and loud – the louder you play it, the better it sounds
  • 4 stars: “That dynamic, hard rock crunch is what made the title track into an international hit, but it also gives the album dimension — not only can Jett & the Blackhearts tear up heavy glam rockers, but they also pull off the mock psychedelia of Tommy James & the Shondells’ ‘Crimson and Clover’ with aplomb.”

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The Moody Blues – Days of Future Passed

More of the Music of The Moody Blues

  • With two INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sides or close to them, you’ll have a hard time finding a copy that sounds remotely as good as this vintage UK import
  • According to my notes, the last White Hot stamper copy went up in 2022 (!)
  • The sonics are huge, rich and lively throughout – you need this kind of space for the orchestral parts to work their Moody Magic
  • An album experience beyond practically anything that had come before (Sgt. Pepper excluded)
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Days of Future Passed became one of the defining documents of the blossoming psychedelic era, and one of the most enduringly popular albums of its era.”
  • If you’re a fan of the Moodies, this vintage UK pressing from 1967 surely belongs in your collection
  • 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,” but with the accent on the joy these amazing audiophile-quality recordings can bring to your life

This album is more than 50 years old, for god’s sake! In those 50+ years I’d forgotten how good it is.

“Tuesday Afternoon” is the Perfect Pop Song, with the whole of side two flowing effortlessly from it as each song (each day) is linked by means of the surrounding orchestrations until it reaches its zenith with the climax of “Nights in White Satin.”

The sound is very much a part of the entire experience. The strings of the orchestra sound as sweet as any Decca, the soundstage wide and deep as a symphony. For those of you who still think Mobile Fidelity is the king on this one, here’s a record that demonstrates what a real orchestra sounds like.

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Bach – Musical Offering / Münchinger

More of the Music of Bach

  • This incredible London pressing, with lovely richness and warmth, real space and wonderful immediacy throughout, boasts a Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) side two mated to a solid Double Plus (A++) side one
  • It’s also fairly quiet at Mint Minus Minus, a grade that even our most well-cared-for vintage classical titles have trouble playing at
  • Engineered by the brilliant Roy Wallace at one of our favorite recording venues, Victoria Hall, this is the glorious sound that has not been heard on vinyl (or any other medium) for more than fifty years
  • A spectacular Demo Disc recording that is big, clear, rich, dynamic, transparent and energetic

We used to sell the Speakers Corner Decca pressing back in the late 90s. It was one of the better offerings from that reissue label, and today would probably earn a sonic grade of B or so.

There is a world of difference between a reissue — even a good one such as the Speakers Corner — and the real thing, on either Decca or London press.

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Letter of the Week – “I will spare you the time to comment on my 1992 Analogue Productions Reissue…”

Hot Stamper Pressings of Sonny Rollins’s Albums Available Now

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

Dear Tom and Fred

After having had the opportunity to listen to the next batch of 7 more records, here are my observations on the 40 records I have now bought from you.

First to my listening experience. After receiving the CSNY 4 Way Street and looking for my own record, I thought was a German press easy to beat I realized it was a white label promo first press and thought, oh, did I make a mistake to buy this for this kind of money from you guys, this may be a tough one to crack?

Not so, your SH Stamper clearly beat the WL promo, check!

Next up was the Miles Davis Sketches of Spain White Hot Stamper, one of my very top Miles favorites.

I did not recall that I had the six eye first press, and on side 2, with identical stampers (when your 3/3 WH show up, you do not have the time to check this but hurry :-since your WH 3/3s sell like hot cakes!).

So even more difficult to beat?? Promising start: your WH was clearly better on side 1, now to the identical stampers side 2: not as clearly but still just more transparent, better drums, less shrill on track 2, check!

But it certainly cannot get better than this 3/3 WH stamper, can it?

Next up is Sonny Rollins 3/3 WH Stamper [of Way Out West]. Hard to believe, but yes, even better than the great Miles 3/3 WHS, and I will spare you the time to comment on my 1992 Analogue Productions reissue which I always thought was quite decent.

And so it goes on…

Christian

Christian,

In less than a year you have acquired a large number of simply amazing sounding records. Congratulations.

As you point out about the stampers, you may have a pressing with the right stampers, but our copy will still beat it. How it was pressed and how it was cleaned are critical to the sound, and that is not something the stamper numbers can tell you. It’s a subject we discuss often. Here is a good place to start.

Here on the blog there are a great many examples of records with the same stampers that do not have the same sound.

As for your 1992 Analogue Productions Heavy Vinyl remaster, I honestly don’t know how anyone can listen to a record with sound like that and consider it acceptable, or, in your words, “quite decent.” I went into the long story of the album in this commentary.

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You Won’t Learn Much Playing the Same Record on the Same Setup

More on the Subject of Developing Your Critical Listening Skills 

UPDATE 2026

This commentary was written around 2006, about two years after we started to put Hot Stampers on our website.

This is one of the early posts we wrote to help explain what we were up to.

You learn almost nothing from the same record played back on the same system.

What you must do is learn to listen for differences in the sound, and differences only come about as the result of a change.

You have to change something in the system to develop your critical listening skills.

How about this example: the difference in sound between any two sides of a record.

The only change there involves flipping the record over. No new equipment, no tweaks, no shootouts with dozens of alternate pressings. Just flip the record. How hard can it be?

Almost no record has the same sound on both sides, not the records we sell anyway. Where else have you ever read such a thing? Nowhere else, at least to my knowledge. Because not enough audiophiles and no — and I mean no as in zero — record dealers make the effort to listen critically.

If you can’t hear the difference on at least some of your records, it has to be one or both of the following.

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Bee Gees et al. – Saturday Night Fever

More 5 Star Albums

  • KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it brings this 70s classic to life on these vintage pressings
  • There’s real Bee Gees vocal magic here – “Stayin’ Alive,” “How Deep Is Your Love,” “More Than a Woman,” “Jive Talkin’,” and more
  • One of the most underrated tracks that holds up surprisingly well after all these years is “A Fifth of Beethoven,” and it sounds stunning here on this Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) side two – just shy of our Shootout Winner
  • It’s no walk in the park to find a copy with sonics this good, but here it is
  • Marks in the vinyl are sometimes the nature of the beast with these vintage LPs – there simply is no way around them if the superior sound of vintage analog is important to you
  • 5 stars: “Saturday Night Fever is virtually indispensable as a Bee Gees album, not just for the presence of an array of songs that were hits in their own right but because it offered the Gibb brothers as composers as well as artists…”
  • If you’re a Bee Gees fan, this title from 1977 is surely a Must Own

This copy of the Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack has truly killer sound throughout, and that ain’t no jive talkin’! We collected a bunch of these and put them through the shootout process and were delighted to find out that some of the material on here can sound wonderful on the best pressings.

Like any compilation, some songs are going to sound better than others. The good news here is that most of the tracks you’d hope to be impressive actually are: “Stayin’ Alive,” “How Deep Is Your Love” and “Disco Inferno” are among the better-sounding songs here.

Find your favorite song on here, drop the needle, and see if the dramatically improved sound doesn’t bring back some special memories, and maybe even inspire you to bust a move!

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