Vinyl Reissues - Sorting the Wheat From the Chaff (contd.)

Answered my own question. This arrived this morning - excellent compared to my old copy.

Highly recommended.

Added - spoke too soon, there is significant none-fill on side two.

‘troll

Thanks Kev, very informative as always!

So i am not wrong about the Rouse record. Well, I am happy to have it because of the music. I have 2 more records for which I have to switch off my critical quality hearing and just listen to the music.

As for 100% analogue, that might also come down to a lot of personal preference, gut feel and itches. I can understand why some won’t care and others do. For me, I am more comfortable with at least knowing the source and general consensus on quality. If the company is clear about the who and what of their pressing, and the result is aiming for high quality, I could be ok with semi-digital sources. In the end, I am now content with purchasing the best I am willing to spend, also keeping my still small collection to only records I am very happy with. Also reducing the need for a 2nd appartment, a need some of us might have :sunglasses:

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If I have to compare two pretty similar releases First Light (PP) and Red Clay (ORG), the latter sounds perfect to me, also having no surface noise whatsoever. The PP First Light sounds a bit too clean for my taste, missing the fatter (…) sound I like about Red Clay, also closer to digital sources I am familiar with. Not bad, absolutely not, just feels lacking a bit, but I am aware that I am an absolute fan of the material on Red Clay anyway, so that might be distracting as well. Also, side B: very noisy, lot’s of surface noise, not going away after cleaning.

My P8 vs Nd5xs2? Oh boy, day and night. The P8 was closer to the other streamer I had, but very far away from the nd5xs2. I am no hifi critic and no native speaker, so I won’t try to put it into words. A situation that occurred here was that my wife was with our noisy kids in another room and asked me what was going wrong with the stereo in our living room. Turned out I was playing records all day and switched to the streamer… Now, into 50 hours of listening, things have changed a bit, the highs are a bit less floating around (an experience I actually enjoyed) and everything is as tight as I would hope!

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Good news!
I agree Rex, some PP I have or had sound a bit too clean or lacking some analog magic.
What is ORG?

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ORG Music, an American reissue label - jazz, rock, punk, blues, folk, etc. About 400 titles in their catalogue. Distributed in Europe and the UK by Proper Music.

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That’s the one. Soso sleeves but very good pressings of Hubbard records.

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I bought the Legacy release that came out earlier this year. It seems pretty good to me.

There are two ORG reissue companies not to be confused with each but trying to achieve the same thing.

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Who’ve done some excellent Jazz reissues using mastering engineers like Bernie Grundman I have a couple excellent quality.

I have a Chet Baker reissue by this org company also cut by Bernie Grundman and Chris Bellman not as good quality packaging but sounds excellent.

The Mofi Silver Series can be a bit hit and miss but are cheaper than the other Mofi series.

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Thanks HH. That’s a timely comment as I was looking at that yesterday in HMV Tunbridge Wells and wondering if it might be the answer.

Hi @TheKevster
I believe PP used to be an all analogue label and their marketing info used to state as such. In the last few years though I noticed that they revised it to “the best possible sources”.

In the case of SC whilst they do claim to only cut pure analogue, I learned (again a few years back) that they dont always cut from the original master.
I was having a toss up between getting the SC Harry Bellafonte At Carnegie Hall or the then new AP cut. I emailed SC to enquire who replied that theirs was “sourced from the original master”. Not entirely satisfied with that answer I had another couple of email exchanges in which SC clarified that they cut the Harry Belafonte off a tape transfer from the original master to fresh tape stock. I.e a next generation copy.
That said I cant recall ever being dissatisfied with anything PP or SC
:heart:

That is true Dread, as their catalogue has grown over the years, they have been forced to resort to other methods in the cases (especially with some 1970s jazz issued on obscure labels) where the original tapes have been lost, wiped or are in unsalvageable condition. Personally, as I’ve said many times before, as long as the results are good, I don’t get hung up on the source, especially of it’s the difference betweenn paying under £30 for a PP or three or four figures for a minty original (if you can find one).

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Totally agree
As an example I often cite, that amuses me greatly, is when fundamentalist Analogue die hards over on places like Hoffman rave about a particular re issue record then ask/speculate whether or not its sourced digitally. My answer is if you cant tell with your own ears (they evidently cant) then does it really matter? I say not.
The closest I got to an answer was from Hoffman himself who said mastering from the original tape “keeps up credibility” whatever that means, I pressed for a clarification but unsurprisingly didnt get one.
:heart:

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I don’t agree here, sorry. Some lps are very quiet, clean, dynamic, but sound digital.
If an lp sounds digital, i personally don’t want to keep it. Why buy it, pay maybe 40 or 50 euros on it, bother to clean it …as you can have the same sound with a digital hires download , pay much less, and don’t bother with all the fuss.
I don’t buy vinyls to collect covers .

Part of my point above is that I believe given a good quality mastering most people cant tell the difference, analogue v digital, so if a record is quiet, clean & dynamic as you say, then what is it about the sound that you identify as “digital”? Or how would you describe “digital” sound? Can you honestly identify a high quality digital transfer to vinyl on a blind listen.

On your other point, yes I could have a digital download, but I like to own my music in a tangible format, and perhaps more importantly I would have to spend a considerable amount of money to even equal the SQ of a record mastered from a HiRes file played back on my top flight LP12 set up.

As Kevster pointed out digital technology and mastering has moved on a lot, to dismiss out of hand anything digitally transferred to vinyl these days is frankly a bit narrow minded and silly imo.

Btw not trying to be funny but the plural of vinyl is vinyl :wink:

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If an lp is a digital transfer, even if well done, I can very often identify it. Other can also, as recently Rex Manning.
I don’t see any narrow mind in that. I just can discern, generally, an lp which sounds like a cd and an lp which sounds as an lp.

Then respectfully, I refer you back to my previous comment, please try to convincingly answer…
Part of my point above is that I believe given a good quality mastering most people cant tell the difference, analogue v digital, so if a record is quiet, clean & dynamic as you say, then what is it about the sound that you identify as “digital”? Or how would you describe “digital” sound? Can you honestly identify a high quality digital transfer to vinyl on a blind listen.

:heart:

It’s not my experience, sorry.

Sorry FR that doesnt wash, either you can convincingly answer and share the benefit of your experience, or you cant…
:heart:

I don’t want to. It will be a non ending debate….
All I can say is that I sold quite all the Pure Pleasure, Speakers Corners and Classic records I had . Not so many, maybe 15. But was disappointed by the sound. They claim it’s pure analog, but I doubt strongly.
Maybe I was not lucky.