scientific-method

Neil Young and the Limits of Expert Advice

More of the Music of Neil Young

Reviews and Commentaries for Zuma

Richard Feynman gave a series of lectures concerning the workings of the scientific method. Here is an excerpt from one of them that I would like you to keep in mind as you read the discussion that follows.

Now I’m going to discuss how we would look for a new law. In general, we look for a new law by the following process. First, we guess it (audience laughter), no, don’t laugh, that’s the truth. Then we compute the consequences of the guess, to see what, if this is right, if this law we guess is right, to see what it would imply and then we compare the computation results to nature or we say compare to experiment or experience, compare it directly with observations to see if it works.

If it disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong. In that simple statement is the key to science. It doesn’t make any difference how beautiful your guess is, it doesn’t matter how smart you are who made the guess, or what his name is … If it disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong. That’s all there is to it.

Back in 2015, a mastering engineer by the name of Phil Brown contacted me in reference to a Hot Stamper pressing of Neil Young’s Zuma he had seen in our mailer. (Apologies in advance for not giving out the stamper numbers; we frown on that sort of thing around here.) He wrote:

  Hey Tom,   

I see it’s a featured disc in the newsletter. I’m curious what the matrix numbers are since I mastered it.

I replied as follows.

Phil, you did a great job, we love the sound of Zuma!

The top copy has sold so we don’t know the numbers, but the next best copy is 1[redacted], 1[redacted]. For side one we have also liked 1[redacted] in the past, and we had a 1[redacted] side.

Of course, all these numbers are just as likely to sound bad, or mediocre, as to sound good. We buy any clean Zuma original we can find and let the sonic chips fall where they may. Anyway, once again, good job!

He then offered this:

I can explain the numbering system for you if you like.

[Three numbers and letters, redacted] are from the original run of lacquers and [redacted] would have been from the first recuts so I did those as well.

I replied:

Sure, would love to learn more.

He continued:

Well, what would you like to know? For instance, Zuma was pressed by Columbia. Dash numbers 1A and 1B were pressed at Pitman, F was pressed at Santa Maria, the best plant CBS had at the time. C and D would have been pressed at Terre Haute. H would be a recut and could go anywhere. I worked for CBS and Warners and know all about those companies.

My point is that the only masters that you can be sure were cut from the original master is the first run of lacquers. And in my opinion, and I started cutting in 1971, only masters cut from the original tape, not a copy as is common with recuts, are worth listening to.

This is where I take issue with him on how helpful the information he provided may or may not be.

Phil, interesting stuff but probably not of much use to us in our work. Any of those stampers can sound good or bad and we have to play them all to know which are which so the pressing plants are not really much of a concern, unless of course one plant were to be exceptionally good or bad, and we have not found that to be the case.

Thanks for writing.

He replied:

How can you tell if you don’t know the matrix numbering systems and how they worked? At any rate, I’m not a customer so it doesn’t really matter and your model of selling records that you’ve verified sound good works.

I countered:

Phil, point well taken, but we don’t sell copies made from dubs, there are plenty of good originals around.

Then added:

Phil, there is no way to know whether a record is any good without playing it, early stamper, late stamper or any other stamper. First pressings (A, 1A, A1) don’t always win shootouts. If they did we would simply buy only those stampers.

So many other things go into the production of a record that have nothing to do with how early the stamper is that A versus B versus C becomes practically meaningless. There is a hot stamper for a certain Zep album that always wins the shootouts, [redacted]. Beats the hell out of A and B. In fact we don’t even buy those other stampers because they are expensive and rarely sound good enough to recoup our investment.

Some of the hottest stampers for other Zeps are D, E and F. But that doesn’t mean we don’t buy A, B and C on those titles because they can still be pretty good. When you’ve played these kinds of records by the score over the course of twenty odd years you learn things empirically that no one who hasn’t done the work can know, and that is why we do things the way we do them: because it works. Customers are very happy these days, and that’s what really counts.

He replied:

Well, the Led Zep discs you like are from the first run of lacquers. And if you think I haven’t listened to thousands of records over the past 40 years you’re mistaken.

And then he wished me luck. I added one last note:

Phil, I’m sure you have listened to plenty of records, but the trick is to listen to plenty of the same title, by the score. That’s when you hear how different they all sound. If anyone was doing this kind of thing twenty years ago when I started doing it, I have yet to find any evidence of it.

And of course no one is really doing it at any kind of serious scale at the present time other than us. That’s because it’s hard and time consuming.

And that was the end of that.

Phil thinks he knows a lot about records, and he does know a lot about records, he’s mastered some great ones. (Oddly enough, on Discogs he is not credited with mastering Zuma, but is credited with Comes a Time.)

What he can’t do is hand you a record that has the stamper numbers he thinks are the best ones and say with certainty that the record he gives you will sound better than other copies.

We can do that, and anyone who does careful shootouts with lots of copies, properly cleaned, using the highest quality playback equipment, following a rigorous scientific approach, who has well-trained hearing, can do that.

But if you haven’t cleaned the record and played it against other pressings, you really can’t know what it sounds like.

I will leave you, dear reader, with another thought from Mr Feynman.

“Science is the belief in the ignorance of the experts.”

And a nice commentary that we wrote about that very subject:

(more…)

What Are the Best Stampers for Led Zeppelin’s Albums?

More of the Music of Led Zeppelin

More Vinyl Arcana to Help You Find Better Records

As if we would tell you!

This is a reworked excerpt from a much longer piece entitled record collecting for audiophiles – the limits of expert advice

In it we discussed the various stampers for some of Led Zeppelin’s albums and what role they play in our Hot Stamper shootouts.

Please to enjoy.

There is no way to know whether a record is any good without playing it, early stamper, late stamper or any other stamper. First pressings (A, 1A, A1) don’t always win shootouts. If they did we would simply buy only first pressings with those early stampers and only sell copies with those early stampers, since they are the best.

But this ignores the inconvenient fact that a great many other things go into the production of a record that have nothing to do with how early the stamper is.

A single copy of an album with stampers numbered (or lettered) A, when compared to B, when compared to C, has no definitive meaning for stampers A, B, C, or any others, because of the tremendous variation in the sound of all the pressings with A, B,C and other stampers.

Example Number One

There is a hot stamper for a certain Zep album that always wins the shootouts, [redacted].

It beats the hell out of the early stampers, A and B. In fact, we don’t even go after A and B anymore because they are expensive and rarely sound good enough to recoup our investment of all the time and money we would spend buying, cleaning and auditioning them in a shootout.

A and B can be good, but why pay top dollar for them when they have never been any better than “good?”

We’re looking for “great” so that we can charge a premium price for them. This accomplishes three things that are obviously or great importance to any business:

  1. It pleases the hell out of our customers.
  2. It pays the bills, and
  3. It lets us pay our staff good wages and bonuses for their hard work, skill and knowledge.

A good staff is essential to any business. No business can be successful without a highly skilled staff that does the work from day to day.

It is hard to imagine that any other retail record business could possibly have a staff with more than a small fraction of the talent of ours. The key members responsible for shootouts know something that few (if any) audiophiles on the face of the earth can rightfully claim to know: the sound of thousands upon thousands of pressings.

Most of our staff of ten (probably more by now) has been with us for a very long time. They run the business now that I have retired and they are doing an amazing job. Without them there would be no Hot Stampers.

Back to Zeppelin

As we say, on a certain title, A and B can be good. Some of the hottest stampers for other Zeps, the stampers that win shootouts, are D, E and F.

But that doesn’t mean we don’t buy A, B and C on those titles because they can still be pretty good, say Two Pluses. When you’ve played these kinds of records by the dozens over the course of twenty odd years you learn things empirically that no one who hasn’t done this kind of work can know.

That is why we do things the way we do them: because it works. Customers are very happy these days, and what could be more important than that?

The trick is to listen to plenty of copies of the same title, the more the better. That’s when you hear how different they all sound.

If anyone was doing this kind of thing in a serious way twenty years ago when I started (with the exception of my friend, Robert Pincus, who coined the term “Hot Stampers” in the first place), I have yet to find any evidence of it.

And no one is really doing it at scale other than us. Because it’s expensive, hard and time consuming.

Some of our customers have done the work. They’ve undertaken their own multi-pressing shootouts, and kudos to them for rolling up their sleeves and doing what the vast majority of audiophiles cannot be bothered to do.

That’s how we learned everything we know about records, and anyone who follows our approach will learn more from doing their own shootouts, for themselves, on their own time, on their own stereos, than they will from all the reviews, all the blogs and all the youtube channels combined.

Further Reading