- With INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it on both sides, this Prestige not-very-stereo pressing could not be beat
- Like many other Prestige “stereo” reissues, if there is any left-right information, you would never know it without checking for it with a pair of headphones
- In other words, this 50s mono recording has been mastered in the 60s to sound like it’s supposed to sound – there’s absolutely nothing artificial or modern here, which makes this a very special pressing indeed
- Again and again the notes read “solid, big and rich,” and that’s the kind of sound fifty year old records give you, in spades
- “Tenor Madness was the recording that, once and for all, established Newk as one of the premier tenor saxophonists, an accolade that in retrospect, has continued through six full decades and gives an indication why a young Rollins was so well liked, as his fluency, whimsical nature, and solid construct of melodies and solos gave him the title of the next Coleman Hawkins or Lester Young of mainstream jazz.”
- If you’re a fan of Sonny’s, this is a Top Title from 1956.
early-press-wins-reissues-fine
Herbie Mann – Live At The Village Gate
- A vintage Atlantic stereo pressing of what is probably the most well known album Herbie Mann ever made, here with two superb Double Plus (A++) sides
- One of the better flute jazz albums we’ve heard, both in terms of sonics and music
- Problems in the vinyl are sometimes the nature of the beast with these vintage LPs – there simply is no way around them if the superior sound of vintage analog is important to you
- 4 1/2 stars: “In addition to ‘Comin’ Home Baby,’ Mann and his men perform memorable versions of ‘Summertime’ and ‘It Ain’t Necessarily So’; the latter is 20 minutes long. Recommended.”
- It’s hard to imagine that any list of the Best Jazz Albums of 1962 would not have this record on it
We’ve been trying to track down top pressings of this one for ages, but they are tough to come by and often noisy.
Both sides really shine with a meaty bottom end, lots of energy, an extended top and wonderful transparency. The soundstage is big and open with lots of depth, giving room to all the various players and their instruments.
Would you believe a song from this album was sampled and turned into a big hit in the ’90s? The great version of Gershwin’s Summertime on side one provided the backbone for the band Sublime’s 1997 single Doin’ Time. Maybe not of much interest to most of us baby boomer audiophiles, but the younger guys around here all had a good laugh when they recognized the break. Maybe your kids will too? (more…)
Dave Brubeck Quartet – Time Further Out in Mono
More Dave Brubeck
Mono or Stereo? Both Can Be Good
- With superb Double Plus (A++) sound throughout, this vintage 6-Eye Mono pressing will be very hard to beat – fairly quiet vinyl too
- It’s extremely unlikely that any mono pressing will win a shootout, but just to keep us on our toes, we like to put some monos of famous albums in our shootouts from time to time to see how they measure up
- This 2+ early pressing was the best of the bunch, and it’s guaranteed to beat the pants off any modern Heavy Vinyl pressing ever made
- These sides are Tubey Magical, rich, full-bodied and warm, yet clear, lively and dynamic
- This copy demonstrates the big-as-life Fred Plaut Columbia Sound at its best – better even than Time Out(!)
- 4 1/2 stars: “The selections, which range in time signatures from 5/4 to 9/8, are handled with apparent ease (or at least not too much difficulty) by pianist Brubeck, altoist Paul Desmond, bassist Eugene Wright, and drummer Joe Morello on this near-classic.”
- Mono or stereo? Both can be good
Time Further Out is consistently more varied and, dare we say, more musically interesting than Time Out.
If you want to hear big drums in a big room, these Brubeck recordings will show you that sound better than practically any record we know of. These vintage recordings are full-bodied, spacious, three-dimensional, rich, sweet and warm in the best tradition of an All Tube Analog recording.
Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong – Porgy and Bess
More of the Music of Ella Fitzgerald
More of the Music of Louis Armstrong
- Amazing sound throughout these original Stereo Verve pressings, with INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound on all FOUR sides this Ella and Louis classic
- Spacious, full-bodied and Tubey Magical, with Ella and Louis front and center, this is the sound you want for their brilliant collaboration from 1958
- Two vocal giants came together to perform Gershwin’s timeless opera, revered by both music lovers and audiophiles to this day
- If you’ve never heard exceptionally well recorded male and female vocals from the 50s, this is a great opportunity to have your mind blown
- 4 1/2 stars: “What’s really great about the Ella and Louis version is Ella, who handles each aria with disarming delicacy, clarion intensity, or usually a blend of both.”
Kris Kristofferson – Me and Bobby McGee (aka Kristofferson)
More Kris Kristofferson
More Singer-Songwriter Albums
- This vintage Monument pressing was giving us the sound we were looking for on Kristofferson’s debut LP, earning seriously good Double Plus (A++) grades from start to finish
- You won’t believe how rich, Tubey Magical, big, undistorted and present this copy is (until you play it anyway)
- Although the self-titled originals will always win our shootouts, the early reissues with the cover you see above can sound quite good on the right pressing
- 5 stars:: “[Kristofferson] brought a conviction to his vocals and a complete understanding of the nuances of the lyrics. The songs were so personal that they seemed to demand a personal interpretation, and established the persona of a poor songwriter struggling against despair.”
- This is an excellent title from 1970, which just happens to be a great year for Rock and Pop Music, maybe the greatest of them all
Charles Mingus – Mingus Revisited
More Charles Mingus
- You’ll find excellent sound on this original Limelight LP – both sides play exceptionally quietly too
- We used to think the early Limelight pressing here was impossible to beat, but the original Mercury showed us just how wrong we were – it takes the recording to another level
- A classic case of Compared to What? – who knew the recording could sound any better than this Limelight pressing?
- This copy sounds like a big room full of musicians (25 in all!) playing live, which is exactly what it was
- The Tubey Magical richness of this 1960 recording (released in 1961) is breathtaking – no modern record can touch it
- Allmusic gives it 4 stars and we think it’s maybe even a bit better than that
- Two tracks are contrapuntal arrangements of two swing era pieces, whereby “Take the “A” Train” (left channel) is paired with a simultaneous “Exactly Like You” (right channel), and likewise “Do Nothin’ Till You Hear From Me” with “I Let a Song Go Out of My Heart”.
The better copies recreate a live studio space the size of which you will not believe (assuming your room can do a good job of recreating their room). The sound is tonally correct, Tubey Magical and above all natural. The timbre of each and every instrument is right and it doesn’t take a pair of golden ears to hear it -so high-resolution too.
If you love ’50s and ’60s jazz you cannot go wrong here. Mingus was a genius and the original music on this record is just one more album’s worth of proof of the undeniability of that fact.
Grieg / Piano Concerto and Favorite Encores / Rubinstein
Hot Stamper Pressings of TAS List Records Available Now
- This superb recording of Grieg’s piano music returns to the site with INSANELY GOOD Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) Living Stereo sound on both sides of this vintage Shaded Dog pressing
- The Lupu on Decca is the only other performance I would put in its league, and the sound of the best pressings of both recordings is comparable as well, so take your pick
- A Must Own Piano Concerto from the Romantic era no collection should be without
- These sides are big, full-bodied, clean and clear, with a wonderfully preset piano and plenty of 3-D space around all of the players
- “But Grieg’s Concerto is much more than a vehicle for pianistic virtuosity. It has been described as a ‘tone poem for piano and orchestra’ in which an array of colors and moods unfolds. From the beginning of the first movement’s first theme, the piano and the instruments of the orchestra enter into an almost constant dialogue.”
- More entries in our well recorded classical albums – the core collection
- More well recorded classical albums available now
I had a chance to see the first movement of the work performed in a church some years ago. It was a thrill to be twenty feet from the performers of such exquisitely powerful music.
This copy is exceptionally lively and dynamic. The sound is BIG and BOLD, enough to fill up your listening room and then some. The piano is clean and clear, and the strings are rich and textured.
The great Artur Rubinstein’s performance of this wonderful work is superb, as is his performance of the shorter coupling works on side two.
Our Shaded Dog pressing here offers plenty of Living Stereo magic. This wonderful record boasts a natural orchestral perspective and superb string tone. It also presents the listener with a correctly-sized piano, which is fairly unusual for Rubinstein’s recordings.
Brahms – Concerto for Violin and Cello on the Masterworks Label
More Recordings Featuring the Violin
More Vintage Columbia Pressings
- An outstanding reissue of this wonderful Columbia recording with Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish – fairly quiet vinyl too
- The right reissues can sound quite good, as is the case here – the best early pressings are better, but plenty of early pressings just sound like old records, which simply means that having a clean original is no guarantee of anything in this crazy record world
- This copy showed us the balance of clarity and sweetness we were looking for in the violin and cello – not many Columbia recordings from this era can do that
- Some old record collectors (like me) say classical recording quality ain’t what it used to be – here’s the proof
- When you hear how good this record sounds, you may have a hard time believing that it’s a budget reissue from the ’70s, but that’s precisely what it is and we don’t mind saying so
- Even more extraordinary, try wrapping your head around budget reissue pressings for other titles that actually win shootouts, and we’re especially proud of the fact that we’ve discovered quite a number of them
Strauss / Schubert – Dances of Old Vienna / Boskovsky
More Classical and Orchestral Recordings
- An original UK Decca pressing of this wonderful sounding record boasting STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades from first note to last
- Tonally correct from top to bottom and full of Tubey Magic, it’s unbelievably spacious and three-dimensional, with depth to rival any recording you may own
- The violin (played by Boskovsky himself) is immediate, real and lively here – there is a transparency and ease to the sound that is not often heard in recordings from any era, making this a very special record indeed
- Gordon Parry and James Lock handled the engineering duties for Decca and their work here is hard to fault
Wow, what a find! This is a WONDERFUL sounding record with vintage Decca/London sound. There is not a trace of hyped-up sound to be found on this record.
So spacious! This is a fairly small ensemble, not a huge orchestra, playing in a lively hall, exactly the kind of hall in which this music was meant to be heard. The reason everything on this disc sounds right is that the venue, the sound and the music are authentic to these works in practically every detail.
Herbie Mann and Joao Gilberto – Herbie Mann and Joao Gilberto With Carlos Jobim
More Joao Gilberto
More Bossa Nova
- This vintage Atlantic stereo pressing boasts outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound from first note to last – exceptionally QUIET vinyl too
- It’s big, lively, clear and present, with the kind of Tubey Magical richness we flip out for here at Better Records
- A difficult record to find with audiophile playing surfaces – we go years without seeing a clean copy in stereo
- Side two has the best condition grade we give out, Mint Minus – there may not be another record on the site with vinyl that quiet!
- “The two make an effective team, with Gilberto’s sometimes sentimental, sometimes impressionistic works effectively supported by Mann’s lithe flute solos.”