12-2018

Santana’s Guitar Solos Soar on Inner Secrets

Hot Stamper Pressings of Albums with Especially Dynamic Guitar Solos Available Now

On side two the final guitar solo Santana takes on Well All Right gets as loud in the mix as any guitar solo on any rock record that I know of (off the top of my head).

This link will take you to some of the other records with especially dynamic guitar solos we have auditioned to date.

The sound gets louder after the first chorus, then louder still right before the second solo, and then the solo itself gets even louder until it seems to be as loud as live music. (Operative word: seems.)

Does it seem odd to you that the only audiophiles writing about the amazing sound of this recording are those who happen to work for Better Records?

Oh, we’ve gotten pretty used to it by now. It’s mostly a function of two things: cleaning and playing lots of copies of the same album to find the ones with the incredible dynamics we’re discussing here, and playing them on big speakers at loud levels so that the power of the music gets reproduced in all its glory.

Two points to keep in mind:

  • Some copies get loud and some do not.
  • Some stereos are dynamic and some are not.

If you have the right stereo, set at the right volume, and the hottest of our Hot Stamper copies, you will hear something that not one out of one hundred audiophiles (or music lovers) have ever heard on a record — LIVE ROCK SOUND.

What makes it possible to play this record so loud and still enjoy it? Simple. Just like Nirvana, when the sound is smooth and sweet, completely free of aggressive mids and highs, records get BETTER as they get LOUDER. (This of course assumes low distortion and all the rest, but the main factor is correct tonality from top to bottom, and this record has it.) 

One reason the turn up your volume test is such a great test — the louder the problem, the harder it is to ignore.

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The Parker’s Band Saxophone Battle Listening Exercise

More of the Music of Steely Dan

More Reviews and Commentaries for Pretzel Logic

Take three or four Pretzel Logic pressings, clean them up and just play the saxophone battle we discuss below. You won’t find any two copies that get those saxes to sound the same. We had twenty and no two sounded the same to us. 

By far the TOUGHEST test on side two is the saxophone battle at the end of the song. If you’ve got a badly mastered or pressed copy it’s sure to be an unmitigated sonic DISASTER: aggressive, hard, shrill, sour, irritating — pick whatever adjective makes you wince, because wincing is exactly what you will find yourself doing with the typical ABC or MCA LP on your table.

You need a copy with an extended top end to allow the harmonics of the saxes to be reproduced correctly. This is the only way they will sound balanced. Otherwise you will be left with a honky upper midrange aggressiveness that will no doubt be doing its level best to tear your head off. If the pressing in question has any added grit or grain, and they almost all do, you are in for even more trouble. Only the sweetest, most tonally correct, grain-free, full-bandwidth copies will let you dig those battling bopish saxes.

Ah, and it’s so good when they do.