6-2019

Our Tarkio Four Plus Shootout Winner from 2012

Hot Stamper Pressings of Hippie Folk Rock Albums Available Now

UPDATE 2026

Here is our 2012 review for this amazing sounding breakthrough pressing of Tarkio.

It’s records like these that are the payoff for all the money, time and effort you’ve put into your system.

This White Hot Stamper side one of our beloved Tarkio, Brewer and Shipley’s Folk Rock Masterpiece, is without a doubt the BEST SOUND we have ever heard on any pressing bar none. This side sets a standard that no other copy on any side could touch. True, we awarded a Triple Plus grade to an amazing side two copy, but this side one is still the better of the two. We could easily have called it Four Pluses but chose to go with the simpler A+++ and this explanation.

However you frame it, this side is OFF THE CHARTS in a big way. It’s amazingly rich, yet clear and transparent as any we played — what a combination!

This, like Dark Side and so many other White Hot Stamper records we offer to the discriminating audiophile, is ANALOG at its finest. To our knowledge there hasn’t been a single record mastered in the last thirty years with this kind of sound, and we know whereof we speak: we’ve played them by the hundreds.

A Desert Island Disc for me with wonderfully NATURAL sound. This copy had the ULTIMATE Side One (A+++) and a very competitive Side Two (A++), making it the King of our Shootout. If you love this record as much as you should, this is the copy to own. I would love to keep it for my desert island, but we know there is surely a deserving soul out there who will treasure it as much as I do, and probably play it a lot more often, so if you know the album at all this is your chance at greatness. (And I still haven’t found a desert island I’m all that partial to anyway.)

Not Really One Toke Over the Line

Please don’t assume that this album has much in the way of uptempo country rockers like One Toke Over the Line, Flying Burrito Brothers style. Nothing could be further from the truth. Practically every other song on the album is better, almost all of them are taken at a slower pace, with none of them having the “poppy” arrangement of that carefully calculated Top Forty hit. The rest of the music on the album, the music you probably don’t know, is much better than the music that you do know if what you know is that song.

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Letter of the Week – “…the overall sound is like as if I have upgraded my entire system.”

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Neil Young Available Now

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

Hey Tom, 

I just wanted to thank you for helping me own my first “White Hot Stamper.”

I have had two copies of After the Gold Rush and none of them comes close to my WHS copy.

I’m perfectly happy owning Hot Stampers and a few Super Hot Stampers, but this WHS is really different. To begin with, it is a quiet copy that allows you to hear and almost feel the texture of the instruments. It also has lots of energy, tight bass, big sound stage, and most of all a silky top end. 

Without exaggeration, the overall sound is like as if I have upgraded my entire system.

My biggest challenge now is, with few exceptions, all my favorite non-Hot Stamper albums need upgrading too. But with you guys around, I just have to wait till my favorite albums show up on your Hot Stampers list.

Gerardo

Gerardo,

Thanks for writing, and thanks for taking the time to do your own shootout.

Now you know from your own experience just how good the right pressings of After the Gold Rush can sound.

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Lady Soul Can Be Bright

More of the Music of Aretha Franklin

Hot Stamper Pressings of Soul, Blues and R&B Albums Available Now

We’ve been playing a ton of Aretha Franklin records around here in recent days, but it’s hard to find pressing that separate themselves from the pack to give you audiophile-friendly sound for her recordings, which (naturally) seem to be optimized more for the radio than for your hi-rez audio rig. Every now and then, however, we’ll luck into a copy that delivers some real soul magic in its grooves, and this was one of those copies. Chain Of Fools and Aretha’s great version of Natural Woman sound JUST RIGHT. 

Most of the Aretha records we’ve played tend to be a bit too bright, which brings out a lot of grit, grain and edge. I don’t want to be presumptuous, but I can’t imagine that’s the sound the Queen Of Soul was going for. A copy like this gives you smoother, sweeter sound with a more natural tonal balance. It makes the music work so much better — the sound is easier on the ears and not nearly as fatiguing, plus it lets you turn up the volume good and loud without giving yourself a headache. When Aretha’s really wailing, you’re going to FEEL it. And man, does it ever feel good.

Bottom line? You’d need either a lot of copies, a lot of luck or both to come up with a pressing that sounds this correct and plays this quietly on both sides.

AMG 5 Star Rave Review

Appearing after a blockbuster debut and a sophomore set that was rather disappointing (in comparison), 1968’s Lady Soul proved Aretha Franklin, the pop sensation, was no fluke. Her performances were more impassioned than on her debut, and the material just as strong, an inspired blend of covers and originals from the best songwriters in soul and pop music… Powered by three hit singles (each nested in the upper reaches of the pop Top Ten), Lady Soul became Aretha Franklin’s second gold LP and remained on the charts for over a year.

We Found the Missing Bass Player on Clap Hands Here Comes Charlie in 2009

Hot Stamper Pressings of Ella Fitzgerald’s Albums Available Now

This commentary is fairly old and some of it is a bit out of date. Check our newest listings for our current understanding of the album. We still love the mono but we prefer the stereo pressings now.

Folks, this record came as a SHOCK — the first and ONLY mono pressing we have ever played that not only was competitive with the best stereo copies, but actually bettered them in some ways. Some IMPORTANT ways I might add. We’ve only played a handful of mono pressings of Clap Hands over the years, and for good reason — they’re exceedingly mediocre. On almost every one Ella was distant, dull and lifeless. Feh! Who wants to play a record the sounds like that?

(Side two is pretty much what you would expect from a good mono, A to A+, better than average but hardly competitive with the best, or with this side one for that matter.)

What’s So Special About This Mono Side One Anyway?

Well I’m more than happy to tell you. It’s simply this: the mono lets you know that there was a bass player at the session in a way that the stereo copies — none of them — do not. The bass player is front and center (in mono where else would he be?) in the mix and he DRIVES the rhythmic elements of the songs so strongly that the songs actually seem to pick up pace compared to the way they sound on the stereo LPs. For the first time you really get the feeling that this is a tightly-knit, swinging jazz combo that Ella is fronting. Everybody is playing together, right there in the center, with the drums and the bass as a unit laying down a super-solid rhythm line behind Ella.

What was surprising, even shocking in a way, was how much better Ella got as a singer. She swings more. She’s more energetic. She’s picked up the tempo, how I don’t know, but that’s the feeling you get when you hear her in mono on this copy.

And every bit as surprising was the fact that the slow songs got better too! Round Midnight and Signing Off aren’t faster, but she seems to somehow be feeling the lyric more, finding more emotion in it. Again, I have no idea how. I just know I heard it and felt it. It’s real.

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Letter of the Week – “A drastic improvement to my music collection…”

More of the Music of Carole King

Reviews and Commentaries for Tapestry

Our good customer Owais purchased our hottest Hot Stamper Tapestry and wrote to tell us that even his wife agreed that the premium that he paid for it was money well-spent.

I am very pleased with all of my purchases from you. In particular, the Carole King ‘Tapestry’ was breathtaking!

You weren’t wrong when you claimed that Side One was the world’s best sounding version.

I have had so many different versions of this album, both in analogue and in digital form, and nothing even comes close. This is my wife’s favourite album of all time and even she had to admit that the premium that I paid for it was money well-spent. 

A big thank you for drastically improving the quality of my music collection!! (more…)

Let’s Dance – Analog Only

More of the Music of David Bowie

I have never heard a CD in my life with this kind of tubey magical richness and sweetness. That medium never does justice to the sound of recordings like this one, in my experience anyway.

People who exclusively play CDs have forgotten what that sound is; that’s why they can happily live without it.

I sure can’t. At present this sound is exclusively the domain of analog and likely to remain so well into the future.

Hearing a top copy of Let’s Dance is truly a special experience; the damn thing is amazingly well recorded, especially considering it came along well after the Golden Age of Rock Recording (the ’60s and ’70s, don’t you know). The sound is analog at its best; rich, full and super-punchy.

Omar Hakim

In addition, the musicianship is Top Notch and then some. Omar Hakim’s drumming is powerful, energetic, and performed with military precision. The guy is out of his mind on this album.

The combination of Nile Rodgers and the Legendary Stevie Ray Vaughn on guitar makes for a tasty, intricate mix of subtle rhythm work and searing leads. Or is that soaring leads? Hey, on this album it’s both.

Aqualung – Our Four Plus Shootout Winner from 2013

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Jethro Tull Available Now

We award this copy’s side two our very special Four Plus A++++ grade, which is strictly limited to pressings (really, individual sides of pressings) that take a given recording to a level we’ve never experienced before and had no idea could even exist. We estimate that about one per cent of the Hot Stamper pressings we come across in our shootouts earn this grade.

  • Our lengthy commentary entitled Outliers & Out-of-This-World Sound talks about how rare these kinds of pressings are and how to go about finding them.
  • Nowadays we place them under the general heading of breakthrough pressings. These are records that, out of nowhere, reveal to us aspects of sound that completely change our understanding of these familiar recordings.
  • When this pressing (or pressings) landed on our turntable, we found ourselves asking “Who knew?“ Perhaps an even better question would have been “How high is up?”

This original Reprise Aqualung has a STUNNING Beyond WHITE HOT side two that just may have the best sound we’ve ever heard for the album. It will absolutely MURDER the British Originals and make mincemeat out of any reissue! Folks, for hard rockin’, Tubey Magical, psychedelic early ’70s analog, it just does not get any better. Here’s a knockout copy that will bring the power of Aqualung to life right in your very own listening room.

Keep in mind that most copies of Aqualung do almost nothing right. In fact, in one of our recent shootouts we didn’t find a single copy worthy of a three-plus grade. This one was so impressive, we felt that A+++ was not enough. No, Three Pluses won’t do for an Aqualung that sounds this good.

We’re calling it A++++. It’s some of the best Jethro Tull sound to grace our listening room in a very, very long time. We’ve missed our old friend and we’re glad to see he’s back and better than ever. (more…)

On Street-Legal, Play Side Two First

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Bob Dylan Available Now

This copy from years back had an insanely good Triple Plus (A+++) side one backed with an excellent Double Plus (A++) side two. 

Which breaks the rules a bit because most side twos earned a sonic grade that was about a half plus higher than the average copy’s grade for side one.

Side two most of the time just plain sounds better than side one, so when evaluating your copy be sure to check side two first to hear what is probably going to be the best sound on the album.

Here are some other albums with notable Side to Side Differences.

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Aretha Franklin – Gritty Sound or Smeary Sound? You Gotta Pick One

More of the Music of Aretha Franklin

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Aretha Franklin

We pulled together enough clean copies for a big shootout years ago and most of them sounded the way you’d expect — thin, bright, and grainy. The best copies did a much better job of communicating the music, giving you the kind of life and energy this music needs to work its magic.   

There’s a touch of grit and grain at times, but that’s unavoidable unless you get a smeary later pressing that robs the instruments and vocals of their texture. I couldn’t stand to listen to a copy like that — I’ve heard plenty — so I’ll take the grit and the grain with my 60s soul and call it a day. 

Tons of great material on here, including Aretha’s fun version of the Stones’ Satisfaction and the rockin’ classic 96 Tears.

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