beatles-letter

Letter of the Week – “Smokes the best of my three UK 1st press red apple covers I have collected.”

Hot Stamper Pressings of Let It Be Available Now

Our customer Michael S. wrote to tell us how much he likes his Hot Stamper pressing of Let It Be.

Hi guys,

The Let It Be 3+/3+ I bought from you few weeks ago is an absolute stunner that smokes the best of my three UK 1st press red apple covers I have collected over the last few years. Thanks again and keep’em coming!

All the best,

Michael S.

Michael,

Thanks for writing. That’s great to hear.

You could buy fifty of those original pressings and the White Hot Stamper pressing we sent you would smoke every last one of them.

We don’t bother with them because we know which pressings can beat them, so why waste the money for the so-called “original” when the reissue is — as you now know — superior sounding?

The conventional wisdom that the original is the way to go with most Beatles records is something we learned was mistaken more than 30 years ago and nothing has changed our minds about it since then, and that’s after having played literally hundreds and hundreds of Beatles records in the ensuing years.

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We Get Letters – “The first time I listened, that moment elicited an involuntary cry, ‘Wow!’”

More of the music of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893)

Dear Tom and Fred,

I just got through listening to my latest haul of records, including a few Pink Floyd White Hot Stampers. They are just fantastic. As is the SRV The Sky is Crying, and every other record I’ve bought from you. They are transformative.

One that deserves special mention is the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto I just got. I expected the violin to sound amazing, and it does. I did not expect to be blown away when the full orchestra joins in. The first time I listened, that moment elicited an involuntary cry, ‘Wow!’

The second time I listened, it evoked the same response. It’s simply magical. Thank you.

Finally, I got a WHS of the Beatles Help! I really love the album. Nearly every song is great. One song that did not move me as I hoped was Yesterday. I read on your blog that some German pressings have amazing versions of Yesterday. Even if the rest sound like crap, I’d be very interested to buy one if you have it laying around.

Thanks again for all you do. I should mention that another of your loyal customers, ab_ba, turned me on to your work, and is largely responsible for helping me find my way.

Dear Bill,

Some thoughts:

As for the Tchaikovsky, glad to hear you liked it so much. Finding a recording that gets the orchestra right is ten times harder than finding a record with a good sounding violin. This we have learned through experience.

I used to think these Heifetz records were a bit crude, but now I realize I just couldn’t play them right back in those days.

As for Help!, we don’t buy the German pressings anymore because it is just too hard to sell a record at the prices we charge in which only one song sounds great. You can find them easily enough if you want to go that route.

As for ab_ba, glad he was able to help you find a better way.

We both owe him a debt of gratitude in that respect.

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Letter of the Week – “The consistent results you’ve given me has turned this into a certifiable hobby that I can really enjoy.”

Hot Stamper Pressings of Rubber Soul Available Now

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

 Hi Tom,

I just bought a copy of Rubber Soul from you which sounds amazing. That will cover all the most important Beatles records I have to have on hand. (Beatles for Sale, Help, Rubber Soul, Revolver, Yellow Submarine) that I can afford right now anyway.

Coming across your blog and business has been such a game changer. If I hadn’t run into you, I would just not understand why some records sound amazing, and others don’t and why it matters to clean them (even if brand new), and how to clean them really well.

(Even if I had understood the importance of cleaning them, you’re the only one who cracked the system to get them cleaner than anyone else by a mile. You really figured it out then shared how to clean them. I have my VPI device just waiting on the labels and packaging so I can clean the records most important to me. )

The consistent results you’ve given me has turned this into a certifiable hobby that I can really enjoy. No more mystery as to how this all works, why some records sound amazing and why some records are mediocre despite being an original pressing that cost a lot and appear clean, yet sound mediocre. I appreciate you sharing your 20 years of research and knowledge. This whole thing wouldn’t work without you generously sharing your hard won knowledge.

Andrew,

Thanks for your letter.

Yes, it does indeed all make sense if you don’t listen to a word the self-styled experts of the record world say.

If you play enough records for long enough, eventually you learn something, and we did!

Good to hear that your musical enjoyment has benefited. That is what it is all about.

Best, TP

P.S.

Music can be a source of great joy in your life.

Music that doesn’t sound “right” — however you choose to define that term and whatever the cause of that judgment may be — is frustrating and joyless.

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Letter of the Week – “I am rocking at a different level now”

Hot Stamper Pressings of Let It Be Available Now

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently. (Italics added.)

Hey Tom,  

I was just now able to give this Let It Be Hot Stamper a thorough listen. I really sat back and put my listening ears on, as I have listened to this album a lot, both on vinyl and on CD. 

It took about three songs into the LP before I was truly able to comprehend what I was hearing and how different it was compared to any other copy I have heard. I still am not sure exactly how to describe it in words, but it is amazing and unlike anything I have ever heard before.

Not only did I hear things I haven’t heard before, the things I have heard hundreds of times prior reached out and grabbed me like I couldn’t ever foresee. I heard a voice in the background of the opening to “Get Back” in clarity this time, where on other copies it was not much more than a mumble.

I guess the closest I can describe it is that this LP has a combination of punch, clarity and realism that I never knew existed on any recorded media before.

Some of the guitar riffs were beyond description. The voices are “live” and the bass is incredibly tight.

Now, being a collector of records for both listening pleasure and sheer collectability, I have paid a lot for some rare stuff. Because of that, I was very leery of paying this crazy price for this copy. Even after listening to it twice, I was still wanting to tell you that it sounded amazingly good, but I was going to send it back because it was just too much money.

But, I then asked myself, do you want to send it back? My immediate answer to myself was hell no, it sounds way too good and I need to have this for a demo disc to show my friends.

Anyway, I am impressed, Tom. I will be an avid watcher going forward and will be picking off some additional Hot Stampers as they show up on your site. Someone wrote you a while back and said he was better off getting a few Hot Stampers instead of a bunch of run-of-the-mill vinyl. I agree!

I am rocking at a different level now.

Bryan S.

Thanks Bryan, happy to be of service, as always.

I get what you mean about being leery of paying so much money for one record — you are not alone in feeling that way — but I see that you had no trouble recognizing the superior quality of the record we sent you, whose sound is where all its value rightfully lies.

Of course one could point out that the music is pretty good too.

Who can put a price on hearing some of the best music The Beatles ever recorded with sound you could have never imagined?

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The Beatles 10 Copy Shootout – “I was near a nervous breakdown.”

More of the Music of The Beatles

Reviews and Commentaries for The White Album

Our good customer Erik in Germany purchased one of our hottest Hot Stamper White Albums ($700) and decided to do his own shootout with the ten — count ’em, ten — copies he had on hand.  

He makes a point to mention that it’s worth the seven hundred bucks he paid (plus international shipping and customs, let’s not forget, so add another 20-25% on to that figure). Some skeptics may think he’s suffering from Cognitive Dissonance, but we say there’s nothing dissonant about the kind of sound Erik describes hearing in the testimonial he sent us, as follows.

[UPDATE: We should note that for about the last ten years we have preferred the right UK pressings of the album over our previous favorite, the right German pressing. A textbook case of live and learn.]

Hello my friends,

I want to say THANK YOU for the Beatles White Album Hot Stamper. I’m so amazed and lucky – I can’t describe it. You graded it correct (A+/A++/A++/A++ to A+++) and it is worth the price, the sound is exactly “sweet, breathy vocals; well-defined bass; stunning clarity; warmth and richness; immediacy; astonishing transparency and spaciousness; clear transients; loads of ambience and more.”

I’m at the source here in good old Germany concerning the German Apple pressings, collected 10 copies (also a UK first issue and one in a box). 4 were crap, half a dozen had the condition for a shootout. But not one single side reach a rating above A-, I was near a nervous breakdown. Now this problem is solved and I can simply enjoy the album in the future.

Kind regards

Erik

Erik, so glad to hear our copy of the White Album so easily vanquished all comers. We live for letters like yours!

We love it when our customers take the time and make the effort to do their own shootouts, especially when we win, which is what happens about 99% of the time.

It is not the least bit unusual for our customers to take another listen and become more aware of the superior sound of the Hot Stamper pressings the second time around.

When we do lose a shootout, we promptly refund the buyer’s money and wish him or her a nice day.

What do we do with the record, assuming the customer had no problem with its playing condition?

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Customers Write to Us About the Sound of Sgt. Pepper

beatlessgtHot Stamper Pressings of Sgt. Peppers Available Now

Below you will find some of the letters customers have sent us after playing one of our Hot Stamper reissue pressings of Sgt. Pepper.

The Beatles are the only group to have their own page on the blog. No surprise there. We’ve written more about their music and sold more of their albums than we have for any other band.

Letter of the Week – “This is absolutely the best vinyl I have found since I began re-collecting 8 years ago.”

Letter of the Week – “What a revelation the Hot Stamper is!”

Letter of the Week – “I feel like I wasted a lot of money on inferior albums. I will continue to make wise purchases from you.”

Letter of the Week – “…an album I know very well, and thought I already had some good pressings of it.”

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Letter of the Week – “No amount of anything can replace the joy in my being upon listening to these sounds.”

More of the Music of The Beatles

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

Hi Tom,
I just had to shoot you this quickie email. I just put on side 2 of my recently purchased WHS of the White Album.

When “I’m So Tired” came on, I found myself standing there in disbelief, mouth wide open, going are you fucking kidding me?!!

Such a simple song sounded like I have never heard it before. Unbelievable… I had not idea it could sound that good.

Simply and absolutely amazing. I am so stoked to be listening to these amazing sounds.

Thanks Again,
Michel

P.S. No amount of anything can replace the joy in my being upon listening to these sounds. I feel so lucky to be experiencing this. Never will I take any of this for granted, as it is really special. You and your team deserve a medal or something!

Michel,

Glad you liked our White Album as much as you did! We feel lucky to be able to play amazing recordings like The White Album and get paid to do it.

We never knew any copy could sound as good as the one you bought either, not until we started doing shootouts for the album around 2005, and it took us until about 2015 before we stumbled upon the right combination of stampers for all four sides. As I wrote to another letter writer:

It’s amazing how good it sounds once you know which pressings are the good ones and which to avoid.

Hint: it’s the originals that are to be avoided, but don’t tell that to the average record collecting audiophile. They will think you have lost your mind.

Thanks for your letter. By the way, no medals needed. We’re just doing our job. Once you catch on to how records work, then finding the best sounding pressings ever made is just a matter of applying the needed resources. It took a staff of half a dozen about ten years to unlock the secrets of The White Album, so if you are trying to do this on your own, you will need something like 10 times 6 man-years, or a total of 60 years if my record collector math is right.

The relatively high price you paid, $1100, covers the costs of running a business with more than ten people dedicated to buying, cleaning, and critically auditioning the greatest recordings of all time, as well as the ten years of research we had to do before we could dare to price “common rock records” for more than a thousand dollars.

The result is the record you now own and can enjoy for the rest of your life.

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Letter of the Week – “…the $900 White Album is blowing my mind…”

More of the Music of The Beatles

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

Hey Tom, 

Loving the recent records… the $900 White Album is blowing my mind… keep thinking I’m going to have to wipe Paul McCartney’s spit off my toes…

And the K. D. Lang… words fail for the sound here (not to mention the music) – it’s MASSIVE and lush.

Also, I’ll include the new AP Kind of Blue UHQR with this return for you to hear. I have been burning in a new phonostage, and my previous impressions were a bit rough and ready given that I was having to use a temporary phonostage at that time… so now I’d say that while yes there is more air in this issue/pressing than the claustrophobic and downright weird MoFi, this doesn’t sound natural; instruments (esp. horns) have no edge to them; piano and horn fade together in a single midi-like tone… see what you think and let me know.

Dear C.,

Looking forward to hearing it. Nothing could be more wrong sounding than the new MoFi Kind of Blue, but AP could certainly give it a run for its money in the weird Audiophile Remastering Race to the Bottom that these labels are currently engaged in, owing to their production of one awful Heavy Vinyl LP after another.

What you describe are the trademark sounds of bad mastering choices, which are the only kinds of choices that Analogue Productions makes it seems.

As you may have read elsewhere on this blog:

As long as Analogue Productions is around, at least no one can say that Mobile Fidelity makes the worst sounding audiophile pressings in the history of the world. They are certainly some of the worst, but not so bad that they have never made a single good sounding record, which is the title that Chad Kassem holds (to the best of our knowledge. Obviously we have only played a small fraction of the records released by him. In our defense let me say that that small fraction was all we could take.)

Thanks for your letter. That White Album was indeed killer. For $900 it had better be!

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Letter of the Week – “…it is smooth, lush, and virtually free of the usual gritty, grainy harshness…’

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

Hey Tom,  

I’ve not written in a while and wanted to share a few thoughts. Upper most in my mind is a new perspective on The Beatles’ White Album. I’ve long been a proponent of a particular school of thought regarding this particular record. You may have heard it before. It goes like this: “If one removed all of the filler from this record, it would make one pretty killer Beatles single LP”.

I now must confess this is a fallacious argument, as it is most certainly based on having only heard the common Capital orange and black label pressings. I now stand corrected and happily enlightened. 

Not only is the overall sound of this Hot Stamper copy so superior tonally, it is smooth, lush, and virtually free of the usual gritty, grainy harshness – the sound jumps out of the speakers. It has a wide, deep sound stage and lots of deep, tight bass.

After the initial pleasant shock of the sound in general, what emerges is a plethora of overlaid tracks and instruments I’d no idea were even there in the first place. To my ears it is quite apparent that every track was carefully, even lovingly made.

This reminds me of a comment somewhere on your site where it is pointed out that hearing a really good pressing of a song you never thought you liked before can suddenly make you a convert. That is definitely the case with this one. All of the Paul and Ringo songs I always thought were lame filler now emerge as really excellent.

Imagine my dismay!

Robert B.

Robert,

That’s the kind of dismay we are going for with our Hot Stampers. When the sound is right, what really improves is the music.

Best, TP

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Letter of the Week – “The sound is better than any other White album I have heard.”

More of the Music of The Beatles

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

Hey Tom,   

I am pleased with the great sounding albums I have purchased from your company and I have followed your advice and purchased 2 products from Walker Audio. The prelude record cleaner kit and the talisman. Today I received my latest album, the Beatles White Album ($399.99).

The sound is better than any other White album I have heard. I am concerned about the pronounced warp on the A/B record. I would think that would affect the tracking of the needle. I wonder what your feelings are about this.

With warm regards,

Ed B.

Ed,

Glad you liked our White Album!

As for a pronounced warp, I’m guessing — I have no way of knowing how warped the record actually is, so guessing is the best I can do — I’m guessing we thought the warp was so slight as to not merit a mention. Many records have light warps. Modern arms track them perfectly with no audible effects, and so we don’t bother to talk about them in our listings.

I’m assuming the record plays perfectly for you the way it did for us.

There should be no effect on the needle, if by effect you mean potential damage.

Hope that helps!

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