1965-must-own-jazz

John Coltrane – Bahia

More of the Music of John Coltrane

  • Bahia appears on the site for only the second time ever, here with solid Double Plus (A++) grades or BETTER on both sides of this early Prestige stereo pressing
  • The sound is everything that’s good about Rudy Van Gelder‘s recordings – it’s present, spacious, Tubey Magical, dynamic and, most importantly, alive in that way that modern pressings never are
  • Full-bodied, energetic, and tonally correct from top to bottom, this copy is guaranteed to bring Coltrane’s music to life – it’s possible that you may not own any Coltrane record that sounds as good as this one
  • The notes for our Shootout Winning copy talk about what is amazing about every aspect of the sound and how well each instrument is recorded – expect to see them on the blog before long
  • Problems in the vinyl are sometimes the nature of the beast with these early pressings, but once you hear just how superb sounding this copy is, you might be inclined, as we were, to stop counting ticks and pops and just be swept away by the music
  • It’s hard to imagine that any list of the best jazz albums of 1965 would not have John Coltrane’s Bahia on it. The sound is out of this world on the best copies.
  • Just make sure you have an early stereo pressing on Prestige, mastered by RVG. Accept no substitutes.

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Horace Silver – Song For My Father

More Horace Silver

More Blue Note Albums

  • This Van Gelder-mastered Blue Note reissue pressing (one of only a handful of copies to hit the site in years) boasts solid grades from start to finish
  • Tubey Magic is the key to the sound of the better pressings, and we guarantee this one has the kind of Tubey Magic that no modern pressing of the last 40 years can offer the audiophile community
  • Energetic, clear and spacious, as well as relaxed and full-bodied (thanks, RVG!) – this pressing was a step up over most other copies we played
  • An incredibly tough album to find with the right sound and decent surfaces, but the music makes it worth all the time and trouble we spent finding this outstanding copy
  • 5 stars: “Horace Silver’s signature LP and the peak of a discography already studded with classics. Silver was always a master at balancing jumping rhythms with complex harmonies for a unique blend of earthiness and sophistication, and Song for My Father has perhaps the most sophisticated air of all his albums…”

The leading edge transients on the horns here are excellent, with the pinched quality you hear on some tracks kept to a minimum. The whole of the ensemble is transparently clear.

The drums on this record have a wonderful quality: they actually sound like hollowed out, three-dimensional objects that are being struck in order to make them resonate — which is kind of what they are — the opposite of the cardboard drums you hear on bad rock records. (We hear a lot of drums on old rock records that sound like somebody is slapping a corrugated shipping carton with a mallet. You lose a lot of points if you’re a record with that sound.)

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Herbie Hancock – Maiden Voyage

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Piano

  • A Maiden Voyage like you’ve never heard, with solid Double Plus (A++) sound throughout this vintage Blue Note pressing (only the second copy to hit the site in many years)
  • Accept no substitutes! Nobody these days knows how to make a record sound as good as this one does
  • Both of these sides are remarkably clean, clear, open, and transparent, with jazz energy to spare – thanks, RVG!
  • You will hear cleaner, smoother, sweeter upper mids and a more extended top
  • 5 stars: “Maiden Voyage…finds Herbie Hancock at a creative peak. In fact, it’s arguably his finest record of the 60s, reaching a perfect balance between accessible, lyrical jazz and chance-taking hard bop.”

We recently finished a big Maiden Voyage shootout and too many copies we played left us cold and bored; this one kept us engaged throughout. It’s got some of the silkiest highs and the breathiest brass we’ve heard for this album. Most of the other copies we played this against didn’t come close to the richness, sweetness, and warmth we heard here.

One Of The Great Blue Notes

This is one of the greatest Blue Note jazz records of all time — 5 big stars in the All Music Guide, which should surprise no one. Freddie Hubbard on this album is nothing short of astonishing.

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John Coltrane – A Love Supreme

More of the Music of John Coltrane

  • This vintage Impulse Stereo copy is close to the BEST we have ever heard, with two STUNNING Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) sides, just shy of our Shootout Winner – remarkably quiet vinyl too
  • One quality that stood out to us on this reissue pressing was just how ENERGETIC the best of them can be, and this one clearly qualifies as one of the best copies we have ever played
  • Tubier, more transparent and more dynamic than practically all other copies, with plenty of that “jumpin’ out of the speakers” quality that only The Real Thing (an old record) ever has – thanks RVG!
  • This copy IS guaranteed to bring Coltrane’s music to life in a way few pressings can
  • 5 stars: “One of the most important records ever made, John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme was his pinnacle studio outing, that at once compiled all of the innovations from his past, spoke to the current of deep spirituality that liberated him from addictions to drugs and alcohol, and glimpsed at the future innovations of his final two and a half years.”
  • If you’re a Coltrane fan, this Impulse title from 1965 is clearly one of his best, and one of his best sounding
  • The complete list of titles from 1965 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

In 2022 when we last did a shootout for this album we discovered we were wrong about the reissues. The right originals on the first label won our shootout and will probably continue to do so far into the future.

The original Impulse pressings on the brown and orange label are the best, right?

Not in our experience. We think that plays into one of the biggest canards in all of record collecting, that the first pressings are always the best sounding.

For this album, having sampled a large group of pressings from every era, we found the originals to be inferior to the best reissues we played. Naturally the ones we offer here as Hot Stampers will be the best of those reissue pressings. We are not the least bit worried that this vintage Impulse LP won’t beat the pants off of any original as well as any reissue you may have heard. And of course it is guaranteed to be dramatically better sounding than any Heavy Vinyl pressing produced by anyone, anywhere, at any time.

The Sound

This record is ALIVE! When you hear a record like this, you don’t need to play the 180 gram reissue to know that an early pressing such as this one is just going to murder it.

If you know anything about this music, you know that Coltrane is blasting away here and it is a thrill to hear him playing with such passion to be sure.

The clarity you will hear on this pressing does not come at the expense of brightness or thinness of any kind. In fact, just the opposite is the case, the sound is so rich and tubey you will be practically bowled over by it.

The extension on both ends of the frequency spectrum is one of the qualities that often sets the better copies apart from the pack. All the top end and the deep bottom end weight and fullness that are so essential to the sound are simply not to be found on most pressings — but here they are.

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Wynton Kelly Trio and Wes Montgomery – Smokin’ at the Half Note

More Wes Montgomery

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Guitar

  • This outstanding pressing boasts solid Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish, a tough record to find these days
  • These sides are doing pretty much everything right – they’re surprisingly rich, full-bodied and Tubey Magical yet still clean, clear and spacious
  • 5 stars: “Smokin’ at the Half Note is essential listening for anyone who wants to hear why Montgomery’s dynamic live shows were considered the pinnacle of his brilliant and incredibly influential guitar playing. Pat Metheny calls this “the absolute greatest jazz guitar album ever made…”

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Cannonball Adderley – Mercy, Mercy, Mercy!

  • With a Triple Plus (A+++) Shootout Winning side one and a superb Double Plus (A++) side two, this pressing one of Adderley’s most enjoyable albums will be very hard to beat
  • The sound here is bigger and livelier than practically any other we played – above all it’s balanced, avoiding the tonality issues we heard on so many other pressings
  • Joe Zawinul (Weather Report) wrote the title song, which became a big hit for Adderley (and later The Buckinghams), and he plays on the album
  • 5 Stars: “Adderley’s irrepressible exuberance was a major part of his popularity, and no document captures that quality as well — or with such tremendous musical rewards — as Mercy, Mercy, Mercy.”

Don’t worry about surface noise on this copy. With the audience making so much noise, you’ll never get a chance to hear it. If you do it will be barely audible under the music and crowd sounds.

I dropped the needle on a copy of this record a year or so ago and heard amazing you-are-there live jazz club sound, and, more importantly, a hot session from one of our favorite saxophone players of all time, the man who contributed mightily to the likes of Kind of Blue, Somethin’ Else, Know What I Mean? and many more. For an Alto player Cannonball is just about as good as it gets.

Fast forward one year and we now have in our possession enough copies to do a proper shootout – originals and reissues on a variety of labels.

These were of course two of the best sides we played. They’re big, rich and natural. The music does manage to sound like a live club, even though it’s live in the studio, playing to an audience. (The AMG review has more on that.)

For mainstream jazz it’s hard to think of any album on our site that would be more enjoyable. (more…)

Wes Montgomery – Bumpin’

More Wes Montgomery

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Guitar

  • Incredible sound throughout with each side earning Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades
  • This vintage stereo pressing is transparent, uncolored and undistorted, as well as tonally correct from top to bottom
  • With Don Sebesky’s lively arrangements and a big group of musicians to play them, a good time is guaranteed for all
  • “Not only is his brilliant command of the six-string present here, so is the vivid color tones of notes and blue notes played between. Backed up by a hauntingly beautiful and mesmerizing orchestra conducted and arranged by Don Sebesky, the music almost lifts the listener off his feet into a dreamy, water-like landscape.”

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Lee Morgan – The Rumproller

No copy we played against it nor any copy we can remember ever hearing sounded any better to us. Both musically and sonically, this is Blue Note at its best!  

There’s LIFE and PRESENCE the likes of which you almost never hear on ANY jazz record. The sound is rich and full, from the extended top end all the way down to the deepest bass.

The trumpet on this album is NEAR PERFECTION! It sounds just right to us — tonally correct with lots of texture and wonderful leading edge transients. The drums, played superbly by Billy Higgins, sound amazing as well. Just listen to the ride cymbal to hear how extended the top end is. The bottom end is Right On The Money as well — deep, punchy, and well-defined. (more…)

Ramsey Lewis Trio – The In Crowd

More Ramsey Lewis

More Jazz Recordings Featuring the Piano

  • A KILLER copy of Ramsey’s breakthrough live album from 1975, with both sides earning nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) grades
  • It may have taken us years, but finally Lewis’s bestselling In Crowd album arrives with exceptionally good Hot Stamper sound
  • If you want to know what jazz at an intimate nightclub would have sounded like in 1965, play this record – this copy has that sound
  • AMG raves “…this is the moment where Lewis shined the brightest, the “in crowd” at the club was verbally into it, and the time for this music was right.”

This original Cadet Stereo pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records cannot even BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing signs of coming back. If you love hearing INTO a recording, actually being able to “see” the performers, and feeling as if you are sitting in a real jazz club, this is the record for you. It’s what Vintage Records are known for — this sound. (more…)