1959

East of Suez – Reviewed in 2012

Hot Stamper sound on this 101 Strings album, can you believe it? Then again, why shouldn’t it have amazing Golden Age Stereo sound? It’s recorded in the late ’50s, using all tube equipment and probably a minimum of mics — there’s no reason to assume the sound should be substandard just because the retail price of the record was only $1.98.

For a budget priced Whitehall record we recently put up, we had this to say,

This budget Whitehall pressing is one of the most incredible SLEEPERS in the entire classical catalog, with SUPERB sound as well as performances of the highest quality from the Vienna Festival Orchestra. The sound is big and bold, spacious, open and sweet in the best golden age tradition.

And this album is full of real classical pieces, not Mantovani-style kitsch. (more…)

Art Blakey – At The Jazz Corner of the World, Vol. 1

  • An outstanding copy of this superb live album, with solid Double Plus (A++) sound from the first note to the last
  • Both sides here have big, full-bodied master tape sound – huge, Tubey Magical and lively
  • The presence is astonishing — turn it up loud and it’ll be as if you were right there at the Jazz Corner of the World with Blakey and the boys
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Mixing up standards and favored originals from peer group composers, the band is, in the vernacular of the era, cooking… this band was as definitive a modern jazz ensemble as there ever was, and the immaculately chosen repertoire elevates this to one of the greatest live jazz session ever, and belongs on the shelf of all serious jazz listeners.”

There’s lots of deep, note-like bass to go a long with plenty of extension up top. The transparency is mindblowing — you can really hear the sound of the musician’s breath moving through the horns. (more…)

Oscar Peterson – Plays The Jimmy McHugh Song Book

  • This superb Oscar Peterson album boasts a Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) side one and an outstanding Double Plus (A++) side two – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • The piano has heft, the drums are big, and everything is relaxed and natural – this copy is doing pretty much what we want a top quality ’50s Peterson album to do
  • Songs you know well – I’m In The Mood For Love; On The Sunny Side Of The Street; I Can’t Give You Anything But Love, etc.
  • The last in the “Oscar Peterson Plays” series – Oscar puts his sublime touches to these timeless Jimmy McHugh classics
  • “[Peterson’s] sound was consistently classy and first rate here, as it was for his entire career… impeccable taste and technique and the best songs out there…”

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Shostakovich & Ravel / Piano Concerto No. 2 & more / Bernstein – Reviewed in 2011

Super Hot Stamper or BETTER sound for the Shostakovich Piano Concerto No.2, which is positively SUPERB on this later Columbia pressing. It’s shockingly transparent, rich and sweet, with wonderful depth and clarity. Where is the shrill, upper-midrangy, glary, hard sound we’ve come to expect from ’60s Columbia recordings like this one?

Well, dear reader, I’ll tell you. Right here on this very side two, the Ravel side. It’s typical Columbia from the period, with nasally, pinched upper-mids, the kind which make the strings and brass screech and blare at you in the worst way.

If Columbia’s goal was to drive the audiophile music lover screaming from the room, on this side two they have succeeded brilliantly. On side one they’ve failed; it sounds great! (more…)

Bloch / Concerto Grosso Nos. 1 & 2 / Hanson

This is a famous TAS list record with amazing string sound! It’s incredibly textured and dynamic.

Harry Pearson put this record on his TAS List of Super Discs.

This is an Older Classical/Orchestral Review

Most of the older reviews you see are for records that did not go through the shootout process, the revolutionary approach to finding better sounding pressings we started developing in the early 2000s and have since turned into a veritable science.

We found the records you see in these older listings by cleaning and playing a pressing or two of the album, which we then described and priced based on how good the sound and surfaces were. (For out Hot Stamper listings, the Sonic Grades and Vinyl Playgrades are listed separately.)

We were often wrong back in those days, something we have no reason to hide. Audio equipment and record cleaning technologies have come a long way since those darker days, a subject we discuss here.

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Frank Sinatra – No One Cares

More Frank Sinatra

  • This orchestrated album of ballads boasts superb 1959 Sinatra All Tube Analog sound
  • This early pressing has the MIDRANGE MAGIC that’s missing from the later reissues we’ve played – it gives you the sense that Frank Sinatra is right in the room with you
  • These two exceptionally good sounding sides have two very important qualities – both the breath, and the front and center immediacy, of Sinatra’s vocals, with Jenkins’ tubey rich orchestral arrangements in support
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Jenkins gives the songs a subtly tragic treatment, and Sinatra responds with a wrenching performance.”
  • If you’re a fan of the man, and what right-minded audiophile wouldn’t be, this superb All Tube Recording from 1959 belongs in your collection.
  • The complete list of titles from 1959 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

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Ornette Coleman – The Shape of Jazz to Come – Reviewed in 2005

More Ornette Coleman

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Saxophone

This minty avant-garde jazz record has AMAZING SOUND! The recording is by the famous engineer Bones Howe, the man behind some of the greatest pop and jazz recordings of all time. He gets some of that Rudy Van Gelder bite that we love, but with less distortion and more dynamic contrasts. Whether you’ll like the music or not is another question — this is free form jazz; not everybody’s into it, that’s for sure.

Ornette Coleman’s Atlantic debut, The Shape of Jazz to Come, was a watershed event in the genesis of avant-garde jazz, profoundly steering its future course and throwing down a gauntlet that some still haven’t come to grips with. The record shattered traditional concepts of harmony in jazz, getting rid of not only the piano player but the whole idea of concretely outlined chord changes.” — AMG

This is an Older Jazz Review.

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Henry Mancini – More Music From Peter Gunn – Our Shootout Winner from 2011

The Super Hot Stamper Sound found on side two of this original Living Stereo pressing will show you just how LIVELY and FUN this music can be! The sound is really JUMPIN’, much more than the other copies we played (and this side one as well). You also get a healthy dose of Tubey Magic on both sides as befits Mancini recordings on RCA. 

Mancini is lucky to have had the RCA engineers from the era on his team. Six of his albums are in our Hall of Fame and this one will make seven. We love to do these Hot Stamper Mancini shootouts but finding clean Living Stereo copies of his albums is getting harder every day. Fans may want to jump on this one while the jumpin’ is good.

Side One

With a grade of A+ to A++ this side had much to offer, mostly Tubey Magic. It’s a bit dark and smeary compared to side two but quite musical and enjoyable.

Side Two

Super Hot Stamper A++ sound. It’s clear and has very low distortion, even a pretty extended top, something you rarely hear on the old Living Stereo pressings. There’s bass but what it really lacks is Whomp Factor down low. It just needs more weight down there, something that would have put it right up there with the best we’ve heard by Mr. Mancini. (more…)

Henry Mancini / The Music From Peter Gunn – Our Shootout Winner from 2010

Living Stereo Titles Available Now

200+ Reviews of Living Stereo Records

This early White Dog pressing (4s-6s) has plenty of the Living Stereo Magic RCA was justly famous for back in 1958. Both sides earned a sonic grade of A+ to A++. (The best Hot Stamper copies of More Music from Peter Gunn show you just how well this kind of music can be recorded.)

Listen to all that crazy reverb on the piano and drums — it may not be the most natural sound in the world but it’s pretty cool when it’s done this well.

Both sides here had excellent brass as well. So often the pop records from this era have smeary, blary, shrill brass reproduction, but this copy managed to avoid that problem. The brass could use a bit more weight on side one and on side two it sounded a bit more crude than we had heard previously.

There was plenty of 3-D space on both sides, although the overall sound was a bit more distant and dark than we would have liked. (more…)