sterling

Paul Simon – Graceland

More Paul Simon

Hot Stamper Pressings of Graceland Available Now


  • With two outstanding Double Plus (A++) sides, you’ll have a hard time finding a copy that sounds remotely as good as this vintage pressing – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Richer and smoother, two important qualities all the best pressings must have, yet still clear and resolving – this is the sound you want for Graceland
  • Guaranteed to trounce the well-reviewed but nevertheless awful Heavy Vinyl LP in every way, or your money back and the shipping is on us
  • There’s a delicate, extended top end on this pressing that simply does not exist on the new reissue
  • 5 stars: “An enormously successful record, Graceland became the standard against which subsequent musical experiments by major artists were measured.”

(more…)

Talking Heads – The Name of this Band is Talking Heads

More of the Music of The Talking Heads

  • The band’s 1982 double LP live album is back on the site for the first time in years, here with INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them on all FOUR sides
  • These are just a few of the things we had to say about this killer copy in our notes: “vox jumping out of the speakers”…”big and rich and punchy”…”fully extended from top to bottom”…”good space and depth”
  • Stunning sound for one of the best live bands of the era – the sonics are lively, incredibly present, rich and full
  • Byrne’s vocals sound just right and the clarity is excellent – when the music is this immediate and three-dimensional, it takes the enjoyment to a whole new level
  • 4 1/2 stars: “The excitement of this material is palpable, and the muscular band rips into these tunes with more power than the originals in most cases… arguably one of their finest releases.”

We recently had a big shootout for this live double album and were very impressed with how good some of this material can sound, particularly on the first side which was recorded before the band got huge and started playing bigger venues. A lot of copies we played were too thick and compressed to break through the challenges that live recordings face, but this one really nailed it. (more…)

Before and After Science – Rules Are Made to Be Broken

Hot Stamper Pressings of Art Rock Recordings Available Now

The domestic pressings of Before And After Science are typically grainy, low-rez and hard sounding — they’re simply not competitive with the smoother British Polydors.

But our best Hot Stamper pressing isn’t an import; it was made right here in the good old US of A.

Say what? Yes, it’s true. We were SHOCKED to find such hot stamper sound lurking in the grooves of a domestic Eno LP. It’s the One and Only.

In thirty plus years of record playing I can’t think of any domestic Eno LP that ever sounded this good.

Now hold on just a minute. The British pressings of Eno’s albums are always the best, aren’t they?

For the first three albums, absolutely. But rules were made to be broken. This pressing has the knockout sound we associate with the best British originals of Eno’s albums, not the flat, cardboardy qualities of the typical domestic reissue.

Kinda Blind Testing

Since the person listening and making notes during the shootouts has no idea what the label or the pressing of the record is that he is evaluating — this is after all a quasi-scientific enterprise, with blind testing being the order of the day — when that domestic later label showed up at the top of the heap, our jaws hit the floor.

(more…)

If This Guy Isn’t on the Payroll…

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of The Cars Available Now

He sure ought to be!

Based on what I’ve just read, if Rhino Records is looking for a cheerleader, they could hardly do better than Mr. Youman.

I stumbled upon this fellow’s review of The Cars first album on Positive Feedback just a few days ago.

Not sure I would even call it a review. It comes across to me as more of a PR release.

I don’t think Positive Feedback cares either way. They need content, and apparently they consider this content.

The New Rhino High Fidelity Series – The Cars And John Coltrane Kick It Off in Grand Style!

One thing I have noticed about PF is that they do not seem to employ editors of any kind. My friend Robert Pincus writes for them — here is his review of a Dillards album that no one would be likely to buy from us at our prices but is probably worth picking up for the five or ten dollars a record store might charge. There are plenty of typos throughout his reviews and others I have read.

You’re on your own with PF. And they are good with however many exclamation marks you may want to use. Four in one paragraph? Bring it on they say!

The following paragraph from Youman’s review contains a ridiculous mistake that any knowledgeable editor should have noticed. Can you spot it? If so, email me at tom@better-records.com

Mastered by George Marino, the 1978 original would seem hard to beat, as the level of detail and attack is quite impressive. It absolutely rocks, and I would be very happy if this was my one and only copy. The 1980 Nautilus, which was half speed mastered by Jack Hunt, is surprisingly very much like the original with some minimal improvement in transparency and dynamic punch. Most would be hard pressed to hear the difference. Of course, the super quiet Japanese vinyl might be contributing to this. We also have the 2009 Mofi, which was half speed mastered by Shawn Britton. In my system, I found it to be dark and somewhat veiled. Bass was just too prominent to my ears. It was almost impossible to sit through the entire Mofi after hearing the OG and the Nautilus. I am a huge Mofi fan, so this was very disappointing.

When someone as clearly lacking in critical listening skills as this fellow has the temerity to compare “the” original and the Nautilus remaster (reviewed here) and declare “Most would be hard pressed to hear the difference,” it rubs me the wrong way.

I want to sit such a person down and say that it’s unlikely that anyone with two working ears and a halfway-decent stereo would not hear the difference.

You can hardly hear it, that seems clear, but why insult others of a Cars-loving persuasion?

The reference to Giant Steps below is yet more evidence of this fellow’s inability to recognize a bad record when he hears it:

Let’s return to that Rhino catalog and all that it could possibly offer to the audiophile enthusiast. We need to send our wish lists and raise our hands if not bring out the megaphones!  Of course we have the Led Zeppelin catalog, but that has been debated ad nauseum on several internet websites and forums. It seems that those in control will not allow it. Can you imagine a Kevin Gray mastering for Led Zeppelin II? There have been several very good reissues for the Black Sabbath catalog, but the original UK pressings are still the ones to beat based on my own comparisons with various other collectors. Lets [sic] get those original analog UK tapes and hand them over to Kevin!  I also have a copy of the 45 RPM John Coltrane, Giant Steps released by Rhino in 2008. Some argue that this is best pressing ever and by a wide margin! One of the top ten jazz releases of all time as ranked by many jazz experts. Bernie Grundman did a fantastic job on that reissue but there was only a limited production of 2500 copies. Lets [sic] take another shot at those tapes as part of the new Rhino High Fidelity series!

We make the case that Bernie’s recutting of Giant Steps for Rhino is possibly the worst sounding version of the album ever, and perhaps by a wide margin! He already had his shot, the patient did not survive the operation, what good would it do to put another bullet in the corpse?

Jazz experts may rank it one of the top releases of all time — I certainly would — but it is unlikely they have ever heard Rhino’s bloated, thick, dull, lifeless and altogether unsatisfactory pressing of the album. We gave it an a F and felt that we were being too kind. There is some consolation to be had though: The limited production meant that only 2500 people had to suffer through it upon release. (According to Discogs, these days the average price paid for a copy is $225. We may charge a lot for records, but we charge a lot for good sounding records, not bad sounding records, and that should count for something, shouldn’t it?)

And Kevin Gray already ruined the album once for Rhino, so why would anyone want to hand him the tapes to do it again? Is he now a better mastering engineer than he was in the mid-2000s? What evidence to support this proposition could you possibly supply to those of us who question his competence? The shockingly bad sounding records he’s cut recently — Stand Up, Moondance and Rickie Lee Jones are three that spring to mind — make a mockery of the very idea that this guy knows what he is doing.

More comments from the above paragraph of the exploding head variety:

There have been several very good reissues for the Black Sabbath catalog…

Have there? Would someone please name one? We would love to hear it.

but the original UK pressings are still the ones to beat based on my own comparisons with various other collectors.

Then you need to get out more. The UK pressings we have played are not competitive in the least with the best domestic originals. Maybe there are some new reissues that are comparable to the UK pressings, but that is clearly setting the bar much too low. For our last shootout, we noted:

(more…)

Nora Jones – Come Away With Me

More Nora Jones

More Pop and Jazz Vocal Recordings

  • A vintage import copy of Jones’s debut album boasting outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound throughout
  • The reproduction of Nora’s voice is exactly what you would expect from a Hot Stamper – she sounds rich, smooth, tonally correct and above all real
  • 4 stars: “There’s a touch of Rickie Lee Jones in Jones’ voice, a touch of Bonnie Raitt in the arrangements; her youth and her piano skills could lead one to call her an Alicia Keys for grown-ups.”
  • We have a section for records, like this one, that sound their best on imported vinyl, and it can be found here

(more…)

A Simple Listening Test Makes It Easy to Judge Pressings of Scheherazade

Hot Stamper Orchestral Pressings Available Now

The Classic reissue of LSC 2446, as well as the Analogue Productions version from 2013 (the original 33 is the only one I have played, mastered by Ryan Smith at Sterling), are both disasters for many reasons, but they do have one specific failing that is easy to recognize.

Both pressings are worth further discussion and analysis because they provide an easy test that can show you how wrong they are.

When reading the commentary below, keep in mind that what is bad about the Classic Records reissue from 1995 is what is bad about the Analogue Productions remaster put out many years later.

As I noted for some of the Classic Heifetz titles a while back, for all I know the CDs for his Living Stereo recordings may have better sound. That’s probably the first place to go, considering Classic’s rather poor track record regarding the remastering of his music.

Case in point: The Living Stereo CDs I own (both the CD and the SACD) of Scheherazade are dramatically better than the awful Classic Records pressing of it.

Audiophiles who don’t notice what is wrong with the Classic pressing need to get hold of a nice RCA White Dog pressing to see just how poorly the Classic stacks up. (They could even find one that’s not so nice and listen through the surface noise. The difference would still be obvious.)

UPDATE 2025

It has been many years since a White Dog pressing won a shootout. In our last listing for a Hot Stamper White Dog pressing in 2024, we noted:

Now that we know which stampers have the potential to win our shootouts, the right Shaded Dog originals have lately been coming out on top, although the White Dog pressings can still sound quite good, just not as good.

No White Dog earned a higher grade than 2+, and none of the three WD pressings we had on hand earned 2+ on both sides.

Our notes for the various sides of the WD pressings read: “a bit brash, sometimes squawky, dry and bright,” and the like.

Those of you looking for the best sound should stick to the Shaded Dog label originals. They are rich and lush in a way that the WD reissues in our experience never are. I used to swear by the WD reissues, but I see now how wrong I was. My judgments were colored by a darker, less revealing stereo than the one we use now, and that makes all the difference in the world.

Back to LSC 2446

The solo violin in the left channel at the opening of the first movement should be all it takes to hear what is wrong with the modern remastered pressings.

Anyone has ever attended a classical music concert will have no trouble recognizing that the violin on any of the Heavy Vinyl pressings, including the Analogue Productions pressing, is completely wrong and sounds nothing like a violin in a concert hall would ever sound.

And I mean ever.

No matter where you might be sitting.

No matter how good or bad the hall’s acoustics.

The violin on these Heavy Vinyl pressings is dark, it’s veiled, and it’s overly rich, as well as lacking in overtones.

Solo violins in live performance never sound like that.

They are clear, clean and present. You have no trouble at all “seeing” them, no matter where you sit.

(more…)

Lee Hulko Cut All the Best Sounding Cat Stevens Albums, Regardless of Label

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Cat Stevens Available Now

UPDATE 2020

This commentary was written many years ago, circa 2005 I would guess.

Way back then, doing Hot Stamper shootouts was much more difficult than it is now. We didn’t have the right cleaning machine, and we hadn’t discovered the Prelude Record Cleaning System.

Is the Pink Label Island original pressing THE way to go? That’s what Harry Pearson — not to mention most audiophile record dealers — would have you believe.

But it’s just not true. And that’s good news for you, Dear (Record Loving Audiophile) Reader.

Hot Stamper Commentary for John Barleycorn

Since Barleycorn is a Lee Hulko cutting just like Tea here, the same insights, if you can call them that, apply.

Here’s what we wrote:

Lee Hulko, who cut all the Sterling originals, of which this is one, cut this record many times and most of them are wrong in some way. A very similar situation occurred with the early Cat Stevens stuff that he cut, like Tea & Teaser, where most copies don’t sound right but every once in a while you get a magical one.

Lee Hulko cut all the original versions of this album, on the same cutter, from the same tape, at the same time.

(more…)

We Love Dynamic Choruses, and These Are Amazing

More of the Music of The Cars

The hottest of the Hot Stampers did one easily recognizable thing better than the Also-Rans, and it was apparent pretty much from the get-go. The multi-multi-multi-tracked Power Pop Choruses on the best copies don’t strain (a very common problem), they are bigger and more powerful, they stretch from wall to wall, and the voices that make them up are separated much more than on other copies. 

I won’t say you can make out all the players — there are dozens of tracks overdubbed together don’t you know — but you can surely make out some of the voices. At least you can if you have the kind of high resolution front end that we do. Big speakers help a lot too, creating more space for each voice to occupy.

Some copies are huge; others, not so much. The effect of these size differentials is ENORMOUS. The power of the music ramps up like crazy — how could this recording possibly be this BIG and POWERFUL? How did it achieve this kind of scale? You may need twenty copies to find one like this, which begs the question: why don’t the other 19 sound the way this one does? The sound we heard has to be on the master tape in some sense, doesn’t it? Mastering clearly contributes to the sound, but can it really be a factor of this magnitude?

My intuition says no. More likely it’s the mastering of the other copies that is one of the many factors holding them back, along with worn stampers, bad stampers, bad metal mothers, bad plating, bad vinyl, bad needles and all the rest — all of the above and more contributing to the fact that the average copy of this album is just plain average.

More Hot Stamper pressings with huge choruses

(more…)

Cat Stevens – Tea For The Tillerman on the A&M Brown Label

More of the Music of Cat Stevens

More Reviews and Commentaries for Tea for the Tillerman

  • This superb Brown Label A&M pressing of TFTT – The Pinnacle of British Folk Rock from 1970 – earned solid Double Plus (A++) grades on both sides – reasonably quiet vinyl too
  • It was mastered by the same guy who cut the British pressings – Lee Hulko – and we guarantee the sound will hold its own against any copy you’ve ever played
  • The emotional power of the songs is communicated completely – we can assure you the experience will be like playing the album for the first time (so this is your chance!)
  • 5 Stars on Allmusic, a stunning Demo Disc, and a permanent member of the Better Records Top 100

Hearing this Hot Stamper is a PRIVILEGE that affords the listener insight into Cat Stevens’ music that is simply not possible any other way. The emotional power of these songs is communicated so completely through our better copies that we can assure you the experience will be like playing the album for the first time.

This is, I hope it goes without saying, one of the greatest Folk Rock records of all time, the kind of music that belongs in any collection. I’ve been playing this album for 40 years and I can honestly say I’ve never once tired of hearing it. I do get tired of hearing bad copies.

Cat’s mixes are full of subtle elements that may require many listening sessions over the course of years, even decades, to recognize and appreciate. Consider them an extra reward for having played the record so many times. I’ve played hundreds of copies over the last thirty plus years and never tired of it once. As every music lover knows, the best albums only get better with time.

(more…)

The Cars – Panorama

More of The Cars

  • Panorama makes its Hot Stamper debut here with outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish
  • The sound here is rich and full-bodied with much less grain and much more Tubey Magic than most of the other copies we played
  • A tough title to find these days — it took us years to get this shootout going
  • “While it’s true that Panorama may be the work of a band in transition, taking baby steps in new directions, it’s also the work of a band that couldn’t help but make great music regardless. . . The production, too, is just as striking as it is on previous efforts, as are the performances.”

(more…)