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Elton John / Tumbleweed Connection

More Elton John

Both sides of this early DJM import pressing have superb sound for Elton John’s 1970 Masterpiece, earning solid Double Plus (A++) grades or BETTER
The sound here is richer, with much less transistory grain, and more of the all important Tubey Magic than most other copies we played
An incredible recording and longtime member of our Top 100 — our pick for Elton’s very best music and sound
5 stars: “….[Elton John and Bernie Taupin’s] most ambitious record to date… A loose concept album about the American West… draws from country and blues in equal measures…”
If you’re an Elton John fan, this is a classic from 1970 that belongs in your collection
We consider this album to be a Masterpiece. It’s a recording that should be part of any serious popular music collection.
As is sometimes the case, there is one and only one set of stampers that consistently wins shootouts for this album. Click on this link to see other titles with one set of stamper numbers that always come out on top

This has to be one of the best sounding rock records of all time — certainly worthy of a Top Ten spot on our Top 100 list. Engineered by Robin Geoffrey Cable at Trident, there is no other Elton John recording that is as big and powerful as Tumbleweed.

A copy like this really tells you why we love this album so. The highs are silky sweet, the vocals are full-bodied and breathy, and the tonal balance is perfection from top to bottom. And big drums — monstrously big. Can’t forget those.

By the way, if you have any doubts that Elton was a pop music genius, simply play this album a few dozen times. It’s all the proof you will need. Tumbleweed Connection and Honky Chateau are the two titles that are as close to perfect pop recordings as will ever exist in this world. 10 on a scale of 1 to 10.

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Our Tumbleweed Connection to the Tubey Magical Top Ten

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Elton John Available Now

You don’t need tube equipment to hear the prodigious amounts of Tubey Magic that exist on Tumbleweed Connection. For those of you who’ve experienced top quality analog pressings of Meddle or Dark Side of the Moon, or practically any jazz album on Contemporary, whether played through tubes or transistors, that’s the luscious sound of Tubey Magic, and it is all over Elton John’s Masterpiece, Tumbleweed Connection

Ranked strictly in terms of Tubey Magic, I would have to put Tumbleweed Connection on our list of Most Tubey Magical Rock Recordings of All Time, right up there with, in alphabetical order (limited to one album per artist or band):

The Beatles / Sgt. Peppers (1967)
David Bowie / Ziggy Stardust (1972)
Dire Straits / Self-Titled (1977, and clearly the outlier in this group)
The Doors / Self-Titled (1967)
The Eagles / Self-Titled (1972)
Pink Floyd / Dark Side of the Moon (1973)
Cat Stevens / Tea for the Tillerman (1970)
Ten Years After / A Space in Time (1970)
The Who / Tommy (1969)

This has to be one of the best sounding rock records of all time — certainly worthy of a Top Ten spot on our Top 100 list. Engineered by Robin Geoffrey Cable at Trident, there is no other Elton John recording that is as rich, big, powerful and dynamic as Tumbleweed Connection. (Honky Chateau, the Self-Titled album and Madman Across the Water would not be far behind. All are amazingly good sounding Rock Demo Discs that — on the right pressings of course — will more than likely put to shame 99% of the records you own.)

Many of the albums you see here played an important role in helping me improve my stereo [1], some of them starting as far back as the mid-70s.

By the 2000s, we had a heavily-treated, dedicated room, and later still a custom built studio. The challenges posed by these recordings were instrumental in helping us make improvements to the quality of the playback in both.

The better the stereo got, the more these records showed us just how amazing the right pressings — we call them Hot Stampers — could sound.

I have been playing some of these albums for more than fifty years. They, more than anything else, helped me learn much of what I think I know about records and equipment.

[1] Here are some links to other records that were instrumental in helping make me a more critical listener and motivated me to improve the quality of my stereo, room, setup, electricity and all the rest.

Were it not for my desire (obsession may be the better word) to get the wonderful music on these albums to sound better on my stereo with each passing year, there would be no Hot Stampers. Hot Stampers are hard to find. No one would go to all that trouble for music that was not overwhelmingly powerful and all but irresistible.

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Letter of the Week – “Talking Old Soldiers is possibly, no IS, the most holographic a vocal and piano recording that I’ve ever heard…”

More of the Music of Elton John

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

Hey Tom,

Thank you VERY much for that one. Worth its weight in gold (last checked gold was $58.19 a gram, x 140 grams = $8,146.00) thus an absolute bargain for $750 – and have only listened to side two so far!

My god, Talking Old Soldiers is possibly, no IS, the most holographic a vocal and piano recording that I’ve ever heard, filling the room floor to ceiling and wall to wall with stunning realness right off the fresh master tape. Then into Burn Down The Mission, same thing, holy shxt! Best EVER.

More of those please and I owe you $7396.00. Lol.

All the best,
Mike S.

Mike, thanks so much for writing. As a special one time consideration, please keep the $7396 you owe us.

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