Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Frank Sinatra Available Now
It’s actually pretty good. Compressed and veiled, but the tonality is correct. I give it a B.
It will beat the vast majority of reissues, which tend to be thin, gritty, and woefully lacking in Tubey Magic.
And the vinyl will be quiet, which is something not many of the best pressings can offer.
But who wants to listen to a B grade record when we you can buy A and better pressings from us? (more…)
Sonic Grade: B
This is an IMMACULATE Mobile Fidelity LP with EXCELLENT SOUND. I’m surprised how good this copy is. The mids and highs are close to Right On The Money (ROTM). The bass is not as deep and well defined as it should be, but that’s the fault of Half-Speed mastering, not MOFI.
One of their best titles. And quite rare to boot.
Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Elvis Presley
Sonic Grade: B-? C+?
As you can imagine, this album changed everything for Elvis. I first heard it the way I heard so many albums back in the late ’70s and early ’80s: on the Mobile Fidelity pressing.
I was an audiophile record collector in 1981 when this album was remastered and if MoFi was impressed enough with the sound and the music to offer the album to their dedicated fans, of which I was clearly one, then who was I to say no to music I had never heard?
Soon enough I would learn my lesson about MoFi’s A&R department. The MoFi release of Supersax Plays Bird, a record that had virtually nothing going for it, was the last time I took their advice seriously.
Turns out, they did a pretty good job on the Elvis album, not that I would have had any way to know that. Back then it would never have occurred to me to buy a standard RCA pressing and compare it to my Half Speed mastered with tender loving care, pressed-in-Japan, double-the-price-of-a-regular disc LP.
A decade or thereabouts later it would be obvious to me that MoFi had fooled around with the sound and that the right (heavy accent on the word “right”) real RCA pressing would be more correct and more natural (though probably not as quiet of course, but advances in cleaning technology fixed most of that and left MoFi in the dust). (more…)