1982-best

Willie Nelson – Always On My Mind

More Willie Nelson

  • This wonderful early Columbia pressing boasts incredible Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) sound from start to finish – just shy of our Shootout Winner
  • Just drop the needle on “Bridge Over Troubled Water” to hear Willie and his bandmates doing what they do best
  • Fans of Stardust are going to love this one – it’s another solid album full of Willie’s heartfelt renditions of modern classics
  • Winner of the Album of the Year at the 1982 Country Music Association Awards
  • “…Throughout the late ’70s, Nelson’s freewheeling, organically eclectic music was not just the biggest thing in country, it was also some of its best, most adventurous music… At the time, it was a huge, huge hit — his biggest ever, actually, spending 22 weeks at the top of the country charts…”

This is one of Willie’s best-known and best-loved albums, and when you get the right copy the sound can truly be excellent. This copy is guaranteed to be a big step up from any other copy you’ve heard. With these grades, at these kinds of prices, it had better be!

Fans of Stardust are going to go crazy over this one. It’s another solid album full of Willie belting out heartfelt renditions of standards. Once again, he’s backed by a top-notch backing band of industry session masters. The arrangements are splendid — just drop the needle on “Bridge Over Troubled Water” to hear these guys doing what they do best.

Much like Stardust, a top quality pressing of this record is a real treat for the audiophile, no matter where they may be on the audio scale. The transparency and clarity on the best copies will be nothing less than astonishing. Even if your system isn’t at its best, a great copy of this record will still be musical and involving. On the other hand, if you’ve spent the time and energy to really get your stereo cooking, you’re going to be in for some amazingly soulful country-tinged midrange magic!

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The Clash – Combat Rock

More of The Clash

  • Both the two big jammers are on this killer side one: Should I Stay or Should I Go and Rock the Casbah – you’ve never heard them sound like this!
  • Glyn Johns produced and mixed Combat Rock, so its sonic credentials are certainly in order
  • If you’re a fan of meaty bass, grungy guitars and punchy drums, this is the copy for you
  • …its finest moments — “Should I Stay or Should I Go,” “Rock the Casbah,” “Straight to Hell” — illustrate why the Clash were able to reach a larger audience than ever before with the record.”

Full and natural, energetic and high-res, no other copy came close. A stunning copy, absolutely as good as it gets for this punk classic.

Most of the other copies we played failed in one of two ways: if they weren’t too bright, they were dead as a doornail. But this copy knocked them all out with correct tonal balance and tons of energy. (more…)

Michael McDonald / If That’s What It Takes – A Masterpiece of Blue-Eyed Soul

More Blue Eyed Soul

  • One of the All Time Great Jeff Porcaro Drum Exhibition Records (with the equally amazing Steve Gadd handling the other tracks)
  • Some of the best Pop Rock engineering of all time, courtesy of Lee Herschberg and Donn Landee
  • 4 1/2 stars on Allmusic – more importantly, this is a dramatically better album than anything the Doobies ever released

I’m proud to count Michael McDonald among my favorite recording artists. He made this Desert Island Disc and single-handedly turned the Doobie Brothers into a band I could enjoy and even respect. This is a Must Own if you like the later Doobies and the kind of highly-polished but heartfelt and intelligent pop records the major labels excelled at in the ’70s.

With the right pressing the highs open up and his vocals JUMP out of the speakers. He’s RIGHT THERE. The next step is to check to see if you have punchy, well-defined bass, a key element in this rhythmically complex music. With plenty of presence in the vocals and punch down below, you have a copy that can hold its head high, with sound that really brings this music to life.

Drum Boogie

Let us not forget that this is also one of the All-Time Great Jeff Porcaro Drum Exhibition Records.

His work here on tracks 2, 6, and 8 is pure genius. Play this album against Katy Lied: I think you will find the comparison instructive. If That’s What It Takes and Katy Lied are the pinnacle of achievement for Jeff on the drums.

Drumming for the other six tracks is ably handled by the amazingly talented Steve Gadd, whose drum work on the title track of Aja is the stuff of legend (love that improvised click of the sticks!)

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Giorgio Moroder – Cat People

More Soundtrack Albums

TAS List Super Discs with Hot Stampers

  • You’ll find outstanding Demo Disc sound here, with each side earning solid Double Plus (A++) grades
  • Eno fans should get a lot out of this one, as should anyone who digs the crazy sound of ’70s and early ’80s analog synths
  • Bowie’s Putting Out Fire is the obvious high point of the album and it rocks like crazy on this pressing
  • Superb transparency is key to the best copies and this one has exceptional clarity on both sides

Stunning sound graces both sides of this TAS List Super Disc! We just finished a big shootout for this album, and this knockout copy sounded far better than most of the competition. Drop the needle on any track for some of the best sounding synthesizers you’ll ever hear!

Monstrously huge on both sides, with punchy bass and full-on major Whomp Factor! This kind of low frequency energy really fills the room; the soundscape is wall to wall and floor to ceiling. We know what Harry likes about this one — the Big Bold Sound with tons of Bottom End — and we have to admit that we like it too. This is the kind of record that KILLS on big speakers.

Eno fans should get a lot out of this one, as should anyone who digs the crazy sound of analog synthesizers of the ’70s and early ’80s. The Bowie track (Cat People) is great, of course, but you won’t find anything else resembling a pop song here — just a bunch of dark, trippy soundscapes with animal noises and some wild sound effects.

It isn’t easy to find clean copies of this one anymore. Much like Sergio Mendes’ Stillness, there are passages on here that are being sampled and turned into rap songs. Hey, with all these wild synth sounds, plus the funky Lee Sklar handling bass duties, who can blame ’em?!

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Marshall Crenshaw / Self-Titled

  • A killer copy of Marshall Crenshaw’s debut, earning seriously good Double Plus (A++) sonic grades on both sides
  • Balanced, musical and full throughout – this pressing is a big step up from many of the other originals that we played
  • 5 Stars in Allmusic and a classic of “catchy, relatively unadorned guitar rock.”
  • “The album is an alternately rousing and heartbreaking cycle of infectious pop rockers (“Cynical Girl,” “Rockin’ Around in N.Y.C.,” “She Can’t Dance”) and ballads (“Mary Anne,” “Not for Me”) — none of them clocking in at more than 3:07.”

These songs may seem simple on the surface, but they are heartfelt and catchy, the essence of great popular music. If you like Buddy Holly (and who doesn’t like Buddy Holly?), or any of the people that have been influenced by him to make straight ahead rock and roll, you should find much to like here.

Marshall credits Rockpile and Squeeze as influences on this album. Since I like both those bands, especially Squeeze, this music is right up my alley.

What to Listen For (WTLF)

Less grit – smoother and sweeter sound, something that is not easy to come by on the man’s debut.

A bigger presentation – more size, more space, more room for all the instruments and voices to occupy. The bigger the speakers you have to play this record the better.

More bass and tighter bass. This is fundamentally a pure rock record. It needs weight down low to rock the way the engineers wanted it to. (more…)