steelgauch

The Uncanny Feeling of Being in the Room While the Band Is Playing

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Steely Dan Available Now

Years ago we did a shootout and found a copy that we described this way:

No other copy gave us the feeling we got from this pressing — the indescribable illusion of being in the room while the band is playing. This is what we refer to as Master Tape Sound. Once you’ve experienced it you’re never the same. Read some of our testimonials. People really go crazy over this kind of sound. Records like this are few and far between, but when you find one, the effect it can have on you may make you go a little overboard too.

You might even feel the need to write us a letter. It’s the kind of experience that compels you to find some way to share it with the world. The problem there is that those reading your letter don’t have a copy with the kind of sound you have, and they therefore can’t experience the music the way you can. If they haven’t heard it for themselves, it’s all just talk, the kind of crap you can read on any internet forum about any piece-of-junk record ever made.

That’s why we love to hear from people who’ve actually played the very same record we did. We know why they’ve flipped out. We flipped out too.

When you drop the needle on a record this good, you feel like you just threaded up the master tape and hit play. You quickly become so totally IMMERSED in the musical experience that you soon forget you’re listening to a record. You’re hearing the music exactly the way the musicians intended it to sound. You can’t ask for more than that. Records like that get the Triple Plus.

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Gaucho According to MCA Masterphile

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Steely Dan Available Now

The Masterphile Half-Speed is a pathetic shadow of the real thing, the real thing being an early Masterdisk pressing cut by Robert Ludwig.

We’ve played at least a hundred of the original pressings, and I would be surprised if every one of them did not sound better than this compressed, desiccated audiophile piece of trash.

With sound like that, the MCA Masterphile gets our vote for the worst version of the album ever made.

Of all the great albums Steely Dan released, and that means their seven original albums and nothing that came after, there are only three in our opinion that actually support their reputation as studio wizards and recording geniuses. Chronologically they are Pretzel Logic, Aja, and Gaucho.

Every sound captured on these albums is so carefully crafted and considered that it practically brings one to tears to contemplate what the defective DBX noise reduction system did to the work of genius that is Katy Lied, their best album and the worst sounding. (Those cymbal crashes can really mess with your mind if you let them. To get a better picture of the DBX sound just bang two trash can lids together as close to your head as possible.)

The first two albums can sound very good, as can Royal Scam, but none of those can compete with The Big Three mentioned above for sonics. A Hot Stamper copy of any of them would be a serious DEMO DISC on anyone’s system system.

Mistakes Were Made

If you are still buying these modern remastered pressings, making the same mistakes that I was making before I knew better, take the advice of some of our customers and stop throwing your money away on Heavy Vinyl and Half-Speed Mastered LPs.

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More Evidence of Ron McMaster’s Flat Out Incompetence

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Steely Dan Available Now

Reasonably good bass, we’ll give it that, but no top end and no Tubey Magic.

More of Ron McMaster’s handiwork. The result is a record that simply has no reason to exist.

The AVERAGE original pressing sitting in your local record store bin right now for probably all of ten bucks will MURDER this piece of crap. 

UPDATE 2025

It’s been a long time since anybody could buy a clean original of Gaucho for ten bucks! Fifty is the going price at our local stores these days. Worth every penny too.

As we noted for Ron’s remastered Band album:

When you see that little RM in the dead wax of one of these new Heavy Vinyl reissues, you know you’ve just flushed your money down the toilet. There should be a warning label on the jacket: Mastered by Ron McMaster.

It’s only a warning to those of us familiar with his work of course; the general public, and that includes the general audiophile public, probably won’t have much of a problem with the sound of this record, or anything else he does.

He still has the job, doesn’t he? What does that tell you?

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Steely Dan – Gaucho

More Steely Dan

  • This copy is guaranteed to handily beat any pressing of Gaucho you have ever played, especially the awful Ron McMaster Heavy Vinyl
  • This superb pressing has three-dimensional ambience, tubey richness, you-are-there immediacy, tight bass, clear guitar transients, silky highs, and truckloads of analog magic on every track
  • 4 stars in the AMG, 4 1/2 in Rolling Stone, and one of this exceptionally well recorded band’s Three Best Sounding Albums – a true Must Own
  • “Despite its coolness, the music is quite beautiful. With its crystalline keyboard textures and diaphanous group vocals, ”Gaucho” contains the sweetest music Steely Dan has ever made.” New York Times
  • The sound may be too heavily processed and glossy for some, but we find that on the best copies that sound works fine for this sophisticated music
  • If you’re a Steely Dan fan, and what audiophile wouldn’t be?, this title from 1980 is surely a Must Own

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Listening In Depth to Gaucho, The Band’s Last Good Album

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Steely Dan Available Now

Presenting another entry in our extensive listening in depth series with advice on what to listen for as you critically evaluate your copy of Gaucho.

Here are some albums currently on our site with similar track by track breakdowns.

Of all the great albums Steely Dan made, and that means their seven original albums and nothing that came after, there are only three in our opinion that actually support their reputation as studio wizards and recording geniuses.

Chronologically they are Pretzel Logic, Aja, and Gaucho. Every sound captured on these albums is so carefully crafted and considered that it practically brings one to tears to contemplate what the defective DBX noise reduction system did to the work of genius that is Katy Lied, their best album and the worst sounding. (Those cymbal crashes can really mess with your mind if you let them. To get a better picture of the DBX sound, just bang two trash can lids together as close to your head as possible.)

The first two albums can sound very good, as can Royal Scam, but none of those can compete with The Big Three mentioned above for sonics. A Hot Stamper copy of any of them would be a seriously good sounding record indeed.

Side One

Babylon Sisters

The tom intro is a great test for transparency. On most copies those opening drums are flat and lackluster. When it’s done right, you can hear the room around the drums, and that’s a mighty fine sounding room!

Also, pay attention to the bell in the left channel at the beginning of the song – if it’s sharp and doesn’t really sustain, you’re probably dealing with the typical extension-challenged copy. If it’s shimmery with a natural sounding decay you may very well be in store for some great sound.

On most copies the saxophone that intermittently pokes its head out will get smoothed over, losing its bite and getting lost in the mix. Much the same can be said for the background singers — they can easily sound veiled and get lost in the mix.

From the time they start singing “Babylon sisters” until they reach the final “shake it!” there should be a crescendo of volume and intensity.

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Letter of the Week – “Can only say that I now can enjoy three examples of my favourite music in a way that I have never experienced before.”

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Steely Dan Available Now

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased last year. (We are very far behind in posting your letters, trying to catch up.)

Hello Tom,

After your extensive explanations preceding my first purchase at Better Records, I would like to share my experience with the three records that have bought.

[Peter went on to describe the conidtion issues with our records and wanted us to know they were not as quiet as he was led to believe. We did our usual song and dance about old records and such, which apparently satisfied him as he has spent a great deal of money with us since then.]

The sound ratings. Here, I am fully convinced. All three records have fantastic sound, in all respects. I could try to describe what I am hearing, but you have already done that very eloquently in the explanation on you site. I really have nothing to add (or to deduct)

Can only say that I now can enjoy three examples of my favourite music in a way that I have never experienced before.

That is not completely true: I already own a pressing from “Gaucho” from the same series as your copy – it sounded way better than the European pressing that I also have. This made me believe that there ”might be something going on.”

However, be reassured: my copy of the RL mastered Gaucho is quite good but yours is better still!

A big thumbs-up to your ears and your hard work!

Due to financial constraints, I only bought “super hot” pressings – which in my opinion are already great sounding. I find it hard to believe that, apparently, there are also “white hot pressings” in existence …

The Cisco Aja

We also discussed the disappointing quality of the modern 180 gram reissues. For example: after the Gaucho I listened again to my Cisco reissue of “Aja.” In comparison, it sounds flat, dull, with muffled instruments, little soundstage depth and only half of the soundstage between my speakers occupied.

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