dylannashv

Bob Dylan – Nashville Skyline

More of the Music of Bob Dylan

  • A vintage Stereo 360 pressing with outstanding Double Plus (A++) grades or BETTER on both sides
  • We guarantee this copy will blow your mind, and blow every other copy you have ever played out of the water, or your money back
  • “Lay Lady Lay,” “To Be Alone With You,” “I Threw It All Away,” “Tonight I’ll Be Staying Here With You” are true country-rock standards
  • There are some bad marks (as is sometimes the nature of the beast with these vintage LPs) on “Tell Me That It Isn’t True,” but once you hear just how superb sounding this copy is, you might be inclined, as we were, to stop counting ticks and just be swept away by the music
  • 5 stars: “It’s a warm, friendly album, particularly since Bob Dylan is singing in a previously unheard gentle croon — the sound of his voice is so different it may be disarming upon first listen, but it suits the songs.”
  • This is a Must Own Dylan classic from 1969 that belongs in every right-thinking audiophile’s collection

This vintage Columbia 360 pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern pressings cannot BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing any sign of coming back.

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An Amazingly Good Nashville Skyline, But Side Two Fell Short in One Area

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Bob Dylan Available Now

You just can’t beat a well-produced, well-engineered Columbia from this era. There’s a richness and a naturalness to the sound that’s almost completely disappeared from the modern world of music, and by “modern world” we mean both modern recordings and modern remasterings of vintage recordings.

Practically none of them ever have the qualities of this wonderful record from 1969.

You really do have to go back to these old originals to find it. And then you have to find just the right old originals for it to be there. Here are the notes for one we played not long ago.

As you can see from the notes, side one of our most recent White Hot stamper shootout winning copy was doing everything right. We marvelled at these specific qualities in the sound:

Track three

  • Big and spacious and lively
  • The vocals and guitars are big and weighty and jumping

Track one

  • Spacious and great size and detail
  • Vocals jump out
  • Realistic acoustics

However, we had a side two that was slightly better than the side two you see here.

When we played the two best copies back to back, side one of this copy came out on top, earning a grade of 3+, but the side two of another copy showed us there was potentially even more presence to Dylan’s vocals in the recording than we had assumed. As a consequence, we felt it best to drop side two’s grade a half plus to 2.5+.

Track one

  • Tubey bass
  • Weighty
  • Very full vocals
  • A bit veiled but better than most

Track one on side two was doing practically everything right, but it slightly lacked presence, and for that we dropped the grade one half plus to 2.5+.

Midrange presence is one of the most important qualities of any rock or pop recording we might evaluate, and for a Bob Dylan album it is absolutely essential.

You want Dylan to be front and center, neither recessed nor behind a veil.

To aid you in doing your own evaluations, here is a list of records that we’ve found to be good for testing midrange presence.

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Bob Dylan Listening Test – Here’s One to Wet Your Whistle

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Bob Dylan Available Now

Presenting today’s Home Audio Exercise. Play your copy of Nashville Skyline — on speakers, no fair cheating on headphones! — and see if you can answer this question. At the beginning of one of the songs on this album two sounds are heard, neither of which is produced by an instrument, but could be said to have been produced by a singer. What are these two mysterious sounds?  

If you have a good copy of the record, a good stereo and the ability to listen critically, you should have no problem figuring out what these sounds are. When you do, drop us an email. Until we come up with a better prize, for now we can offer you an extra 10% off your next order.

Have fun. Once you hear it you will be pretty amazed that you never noticed it before. We sure were.

What’s most striking about this album is the sound of Johnny Cash’s voice in the duet he sings with Bob (we’re on a first name basis, don’t you know). I can’t remember when’s the last time I heard Johnny Cash sound better.

The stuff he did for American Recordings had much to recommend it; the first album sounded especially good. It was practically Mono.

But you just can’t beat a well produced, well engineered Columbia from this era. There’s a richness and a naturalness to the sound that has almost completely disappeared from the modern world of music.

You really do have to go back to these old originals to find it. And then you have to find just the right old originals for it to be there.

Hey, want to find your own top quality copy?

Consider taking our moderately helpful advice concerning the pressings that consistently win our shootouts.

This record has been sounding its best for many years, in shootout after shootout, this way: