art-one-done

These are the titles by an artist or band in which they put everything they had, producing by far their best work. Unless you are a big fan, their other albums are, in our opinion, mostly derivative and second-rate.

We’ve gone to the trouble of playing a great many of their other releases, and been forced to recognize that, for most of our customers, the dropoff in quality seems fairly steep.

If you like Phil Collins, his second album is not bad. However, unless you’re a big fan, the first album is really all the Phil Collins you probably need. If you find that Phil Collins is “your thing,” by all means, try his second album.

Toto, B-52s, Boston, Warren Zevon, Gary Wright, Robin Trower, Carole King, Jeff Beck, The Tubes, the list of One and Done albums is simply our way of saying that you might not feel the need to go too deep into these artists’ catalogs, not at the prices we charge anyway.

Return to Forever – Romantic Warrior

More Jazz Rock Fusion

  • Boasting two excellent Double Plus (A++) sides, this vintage pressing is guaranteed to blow the doors off any other Romantic Warrior you’ve heard
  • Our favorite Jazz Rock Fusion Album of All Time – on the right stereo this is a Demo Disc like no other
  • None rocks harder – of course that wouldn’t mean much without the music being so exciting and brilliant, and we’re happy to report it is!
  • These are four instrumental pyrotechnicians – the band is absolutely on fire like no other album they recorded together
  • 4 stars: “Romantic Warrior is the sound of a mature band at the top of its game, which may help explain why it was Return to Forever’s most popular album, eventually certified as a gold record, and the last by this assemblage. Having expressed themselves this well, they decided it was time for them to move on.”
  • If you’re a Jazz Fusion guy, this title from 1976 is surely a Must Own
  • If you’re looking for the best sounding jazz from the 70s and 80s, you might want to check out these titles

If you’re a fan of ’70s jazz fusion there aren’t many albums better than this. (It’s the only RTF record we bother to carry as a matter of fact.) It’s an absolutely phenomenal recording, and if you have any doubts about that fact, these two pressings are more than capable of disabusing you of such like. (more…)

Rick Nelson – Garden Party

More Country and Country Rock

  • Garden Party returns to the site after a ten month hiatus, here with KILLER Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades on both sides of this original Decca pressing
  • This is an amazingly rich, Tubey Magical recording, and when you get a good copy with enough clarity and top end extension to bring it to life it can sound very good indeed
  • If you like the sound of albums engineered by Stephen Barncard (think Deja Vu, American Beauty and Tarkio for starters) then you are going to find much to like about the rich, smooth, natural and relaxed sound here
  • “Rick Nelson’s Garden Party rocks a lot harder than the title track would lead one to believe, and is also as much of a showcase for the Stone Canyon Band as it is for Nelson.”

It’s tough to find copies without marks or problems in the vinyl to one degree or another, or ones that play this quietly, making this a special one indeed.

The music is quite enjoyable — even the younger guys around here were getting a lot out of it. Drop the needle on the title track (a top ten single) or “Are You Really Real?” to hear these guys at their best. Rick’s Stone Canyon Band at times featured future members of Poco and The Eagles, so that should tell you something.

Acoustic guitar reproduction is superb on the better copies of this recording. The harmonic coherency, the richness, the body as well as phenomenal amounts of Tubey Magic can be heard on every strum.

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Phoebe Snow – Self-Titled

More Singer-Songwriter Albums

  • Snow’s self-titled debut appears on the site for the first time ever, here with INSANELY GOOD Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound throughout this vintage Shelter pressing
  • It’s richer, smoother yet still very clear and highly resolving in precisely the way so few copies are
  • The sonics are rich, warm and natural, with wonderful transparency, ambience and an abundance of Tubey Magic
  • This is a title I have been pursuing since the 90s, with nothing to show for it until now
  • Pressing after pressing let us down for decades, but we finally made the breakthrough we needed, and now we have copies of the album that sound the way you’ve been waiting to hear them
  • 4 1/2 stars: “If anyone has bridged the gap between Joni Mitchell and Aretha Franklin, it’s Snow, who is as confident on the soul-influenced “Good Times” as she is on the introspective jazz offering “Harpo’s Blues.”

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The Tubes – Self-Titled

More of The Tubes

  • The Tubes’ self-titled debut returns to the site after an eighteen month hiatus, here with with INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it from start to finish
  • This copy is simply bigger, richer, fuller, and livelier than practically all others we played
  • Their music is definitely not for everyone – I saw them live many years ago and they did put on one helluva show, but you have to be a fan of eccentric pop or none of it will make any sense
  • This is the band’s best sounding album as far as we know. Roughly 100 other listings for the best sounding album by an artist or group can be found here
  • In our opinion, the first album is the only Tubes record anyone needs. Click on the link to see more titles we like to call one and done
  • “Produced by Al Kooper, this debut by the notorious San Francisco group is best known for the blazing anthem ‘White Punks on Dope.’ Although the Tubes’ raison d’être was their shock-rock stage dynamic, Bill Spooner, Fee Waybill, and company could, on occasion, deliver some offbeat pop splendor.”

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Jennifer Warnes – Famous Blue Raincoat

More of the Music of Jennifer Warnes

More of the Music of Leonard Cohen

  • A Demo Disc quality pressing of this longtime audiophile favorite with solid Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last
  • Turn this one up good and loud (which you can do when the sound is right) and you’ll have a living, breathing Jennifer Warnes singing her heart out right in front of you
  • The space, resolution, and clarity here are wonderful – for evidence, just listen to the rosiny texture on the strings behind the “Song of Bernadette”
  • 4 1/2 stars: “The high point may have been the Warnes-Cohen duet on ‘Joan of Arc,’ but the album was consistently impressive.”

We’re big fans of this album here at Better Records. It’s the only thing Jennifer Warnes ever did that we would consider a Must Own recording or Desert Island Disc. In my humble opinion, it’s clearly both.

This copy showed us the Famous Blue Raincoat Magic we know and love. The drums are big and punchy with plenty of WHOMP and the sound of skins being thwacked. Jennifer’s voice is clear and breathy. If you know the record well you will surely be amazed at just how good this music can sound on a pressing as hot as this one.

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Shawn Colvin – Steady On

More Women Who Rock

  • Colvin’s debut release returns to the site after a thirteen month hiatus, here with INSANELY GOOD Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound throughout this original Columbia pressing
  • These are just a few of the things we had to say about this amazing copy in our notes: “huge and weighty and full”…”jumping out of the speakers”…”very full and lovely vox, breathy”…”fully extended from top to bottom”
  • We guarantee there is dramatically more space, richness, vocal presence, and performance energy on this copy than others you’ve heard, and that’s especially true if you made the mistake of buying whatever Heavy Vinyl pressing is currently on the market
  • 4 stars: “Steady On is a triumph … there are the songs that flow so effortlessly into one another that to remove even one would seemingly upset the entire balance of the cosmos as we know it.”

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The Guess Who – American Woman

More Rock Classics

  • With INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them on both sides, this copy (only the second to hit the site in years) is practically as good as we have ever heard
  • Here are just a few of the things we had to say about this killer copy in our notes: “big and tubey and spacious”…”plucky, deep bass”…”breathy vox”…”big and rich and jumping out of the speakers”…”rich and lively”
  • We have been working on finding this title for twenty years if not more — finally finding some that sounded good to us and played reasonably quietly was a real shock, and that was a whole lotta years ago!
  • Here you will find sound that is big, rich and clear, with plenty of energy, and vinyl that is about on par for any clean copy of American Woman, a title which is exceedingly difficult to find in audiophile playing condition
  • Both the title track and “When Friends Fall Out” sound especially impressive on this domestic original
  • 4 stars: “The Guess Who’s most successful LP, reaching number nine in America (and charting for more than a year), has held up well… the final testament of the original Guess Who.”

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Sinead O’Connor – I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got

More Sinead O’Connor

  • A vintage copy of Sinead O’Connor’s brilliant sophomore release with outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last
  • This early import pressing is big and rich with superb clarity and three-dimensional space that most pressings barely hint at
  • You won’t believe how good “Nothing Compares 2 U” sounds here – it’s surely one of the best torch songs ever written, and her performance of it (as well as the arrangement) is perfection
  • 4 1/2 stars: “…the album plays like a tour de force in its demonstration of everything O’Connor can do… it’s evidence that, when on top of her game, O’Connor was a singular talent.”

I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got, a brilliant and unique piece of work, is widely considered one of the best albums of the ’90s.

I positively adore the album. The emotion is every bit as naked and compelling as that found on Joni’s Blue, and I do not say that lightly. I know the power of Blue, and this album has that kind of power. This is some heavy heavy stuff. Hearing it sound right is a thrill you won’t soon forget.

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Spandau Ballet – True

More Spandau Ballet

More Pure Pop Recordings

  • Boasting two surprisingly rich and natural – dare we say Analog? – sides, this early UK Chrysalis pressing had the sound we were looking for on the band’s third studio album
  • Forget the dubby domestic pressings and whatever dead-as-a-doornail Heavy Vinyl record they’re making these days – if you want to hear the Tubey Magic, size and energy of this wonderful Brit Pop album, an import pressing like this one is the only way to go
  • “… a set of tunes aimed squarely at the charts. The one that succeeded most spectacularly, of course, was the title cut, a glossily-updated Motown-style ballad that became one of the decade’s biggest hits – aided by a video that cast singer Tony Hadley as a young Frank Sinatra, crooning about the sound of his soul.”
  • This is clearly the band’s best sounding album. Roughly 150 other listings for the best sounding album by an artist or group can be found here on the blog
  • In our opinion, True is the only Spandau Ballet record you’ll ever need. Click on this link to see more titles we like to call one and done

Forget the dubby domestic pressings. Like so many British bands on the Chrysalis label, when it came time to master the album for our domestic market, not theirs, the people in charge (whoever they may have been) took the easy way out and simply ordered up a dub of the tape to send across the pond.

Too many wonderful albums by highly accomplished bands had their records ruined by sub-generation masters. (Ruined for audiophiles. The general public couldn’t care less.)

But this is the real British-pressed vinyl from the real master tape, and that makes all the difference in the world. It has the kind of Tubey Magical midrange that modern records can barely 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 the studio with the band, this is the record for you. It’s what vintage all analog recordings are known for — this sound.

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Iron Butterfly – In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida

More Iron Butterfly

More Rock Classics

  • With two outstanding Double Plus (A++) sides, this early Atco pressing of Iron Butterfly’s Psych Rock classic will be very hard to beat
  • Surely this is one of the quietest copies we have ever listed for sale – a fluke, but one we are pleased to be able to offer to those of you who place a premium on quiet vinyl
  • The title track takes up all of side two and we guarantee you have never never heard it sound this good – it’s clean, open, rich and solid, and the vocals aren’t screechy (for once!)
  • Both sides are smooth, rich and Tubey Magical, which means the album is actually enjoyable
  • 4 1/2 stars: “The epitome of heavy psychedelic excess… the group’s definitive album.”

We’ve heard some awful, awful, just really awful sounding pressings of this album over the course of the last twenty years. If you own the album, you know what I’m talking about.

Clean originals that we’d hoped would have the goods rarely lasted more than 30 seconds on our table, they were that bad.

But that was part of the problem — the originals on the plum and gold label tend to be more crude and distorted than the yellow label reissues. That was just dumb “original is better” record collector thinking. If anybody should know better, it’s us.

When we finally got hold of some promising reissues, it was only a matter of time before a shootout could be scheduled. In the case of In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida, finding enough clean copies took us about five years. One of two a year, that’s how many clean copies we can find by going to multiple, high volume, high turnover record stores here in L.A. every week.

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