This year's RSD offerings are among the best ever, especially in the jazz category. This is by no means "complete" coverage of what's available. For instance, there's a four LP Sonny Rollins set Freedom Weaver: The 1959 European Tour Recordings from Resonance that looks really interesting but that one didn't show up. The Record Store Day website has a full listing of what's going to be available. (Following posting this story the... Read More

April is Jazz Appreciation month so Rhino High Fidelity dispenses with the "one jazz one rock" formula and releases two jazz titles. Miles' Tutu and Coltrane's Olé. Copies in-house, reviews will shortly post. Read More

Last year, when record club Vinyl Me, Please announced their 11LP box set of Miles Davis’ electric period studio albums, I almost immediately preordered it. For hardcore fans, it seemed (and turned out to be) essential: a lavish box set of the albums from In A Silent Way through Get Up With It, cut by Ryan Smith and Joe Nino-Hernes from flat tape copies of the original masters and packaged in laminated tip-on jackets, it’s the perfect document of Miles’ most... Read More

Had it not been for Paul McCartney’s drug bust, all four Beatles might have been together in the studio for the first time since the group broke up, recording engineer Bill Schnee recounts in this interview, referring to his time recording Ringo the Beatles drummer’s third solo album and first rocker following albums of standards (Sentimental Journey) and C&W (Beaucoups of Blues).If you’re familiar with Ringo you know it’s a spectacularly large, generous sounding... Read More

The organizers of the Southwest Audio Fest in Dallas must have felt like Hannibal Smith, who used to say, "I love it when a plan comes together." Gary Gill and Lou Hinkley took a chance by selecting as the show venue the upscale Hilton Anatole and it definitely paid off. Upon entering the lobby, I quickly sensed I was in for a memorable show experience. The hotel's sheer size and impressive facilities could rival a Las Vegas resort. In addition to the... Read More

Acoustic Sounds just announced a fifteen Pablo titles reissue series, cut from the original master tapes and pressed at Quality Record Pressings. Mastering engineers include Doug Sax, Kevin Gray and Stan Ricker (obviously these are from existing metal parts). Pablo Records was the great producer Norman Granz's "swan song". Granz (1918-2001) created Clef, Norgran, Verve and finally Pablo. He was also Ella Fitzgerald's manager for decades until her... Read More

In a web exclusive, we break down the stats behind this momentous release, which represents a game changer in the remastering of recordings from analogue's final golden age.

The Electric Recording Company yesterday (March 22nd) announced that it now has a licensing deal to issue records from the DECCA catalog. This is good news for those who can afford these limited edition records cut directly from the analog masters using ERC's restored 1965 Ortofon/Lyrec cutting system, with no added equalization, compression or other signal processing. All sleeve and artwork letter-pressed and hand made.This first title, Mendelssohn in Scotland... Read More

LOS ANGELES - Parlophone Records proudly announces David Bowie’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Star!, a 5CD/Blu-Ray Audio set that explores Bowie’s journey from February 1971 through the creation of the Ziggy Stardust character, the recording of the iconic The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars album, and captures the international mania that surrounded the Ziggy phenomenon in the form of UK radio sessions and TV performances, as well as live tracks from Ziggy... Read More

Blue Note Records has announced the next run of titles in the Classic Vinyl Reissue Series, which presents affordable 180g all-analog vinyl reissues in standard packaging that are mastered by Kevin Gray from the original master tapes and manufactured at Optimal. Curated by Don Was and Cem Kurosman, the series continues its exploration of the extensive Blue Note catalog with titles that span the many eras and styles of the legendary label’s 85-year history. The newly... Read More

Heritage Auctions now does record albums. That's cool. But what they are doing in this area is anything but!For instance they are auctioning an "early pressing" of Jimi Hendrix's Are You Experienced? Fair enough! But it's a sealed copy so they don't know if it's a more collectible "Tri-color steamboat" original, or an orange Warner-Reprise or a later Warner Communications copy, or where it was pressed OR ANYTHING. You... Read More

Before packing up the NAIA and returning it to The Sound Organization, I decided to produce a short video "overview" to supplement the long written review published the other day. Read More

Los Angeles – March 21, 2023 – Since launching in 2020, Verve/UMe’s Acoustic Sounds series has delivered best-in-class, all-analog, audiophile-grade pressings of some of the most legendary jazz records from their extensive and eclectic catalog, each mastered from the original tapes and produced with the utmost care. The slate of releases for 2024 is no exception, with a slew of classic records from the likes of Ben Webster, Billie Holiday, Chet Baker, Diana Krall,... Read More

The Impex 1Step Getz/Gilberto review included 30 second hi-res "snippets" of seven different pressings: an early original, the 1994 Mobile-Fidelity, the Speakers Corner mastered by Kevin Gray, two George Marino mastered versions (45rpm released 2011 and the 33 1/3 issued in 2020), the Supersense lacquer and of course Impex's 1Step double 45.And here's which was which:1. MOFI2. Speaker’s Corner3. OG4. Impex 5) AP 45 6) lacquer 7) AP 33And there you... Read More

Neil with Crazy Horse (Billy Talbot, Ralph Molina, Micah Nelson and Nils Lofgren) recorded a bunch of old tunes last year giving them new song titles and performing them in an old guy's slop-fun way (at least based on the stream I was given access to). The appropriate album title is FU##IN' 'UP".Excerpts provided from Neil's sleeve notes:“Why do these old songs live so vividly now? They do to me.”“In the spirit it’s offered…made this for the... Read More

Thanks to everyone who listened to the Blackbird/SAT files and weighed in on which they thought sounded better. If you read through all of the comments you found that opinions varied, which is to be expected. That one arm costs around $3500 and the other more than $50,000 tells you how fine (and surprising) is the Blackbird's performance. Over the next few weeks three more arms will be put to a similar test—two are from Pro-Ject and one is from Ortofon. So stay... Read More