Blue Note Sound Quality

porcy62 · November 15, 2007

True, but thell me one good reason because I should buy the fortieth copy of Soul Station , without any psychiatrist's explanation, though I need a psychiatric help, but for more serious reasons.
Who is telling you to buy the 40th copy of Soul Station? Nobody. If you're happy with the copy you now have, so be it. No one has to buy any of these new vinyl reissues. But they are there if someone wants them. They may well be the "best" version available - and on vinyl - and if you don't already have a copy or want a (arguably) superior copy then go for it. On the one hand you rave about the test pressing that you heard, but on the other you dismiss the value/purpose of the entire reissue series.

And wtf does any of this have to do with Stephen Biko? Gawd, the melodrama!

Sorry for Biko's reference, I was a bit drunk and depressed and as for italians, melodramma is in our DNA, we invented it.

Yes, the TP sounds great and I am not obliged to buy and these reissue are an occasion to upgrade or have at least a good sounding BN title on vinyl. Nothing wrong about it. And as Claude has pointed out about digital reissues, the new Hoffman serie is actually the best option for a new good sounding BN, vinyl or cd, since a long time.

As you said if you haven't yet an early original or a Mosaic or japanese pressing this is way.

Sorry for the ranting, you are right and I am only depressed about what's going on in the world.

porcy62 · November 15, 2007

The big difference between the popular OJC (Riverside, Prestige, contemporary, ...) material and the Blue Note material is that, as far as digital reissues go, the Blue Notes were often unsatisfactory soundwise. First a dull Ron McMaster remaster, then a botched RVG reissue. Blue Notes were almost never reissued on XRCD, SACD or other audiophile formats. Just a handful of MFSL and DAD reissues. So this 45rpm series would be for many fans the first occasion to hear the music in top quality (judging from the 45rpm OJC series). There were the Classic Records LPs of course, but most of them are now OOP, and I don't know how good they sound.

But I would have preferred high quality remasters in a modern format (SACD, DVD-A, hi-rez downloads, ...)

As far as the OJC stuff goes, there are already good CD reissues available (often the cheap OJC CD itself), so the 45rpm sets are not that essential.

Thanks for the explanation, I got it and it convinced me. Generally speaking the Classics I have are ok so are the Mosaic, the 45rpm sounds better. IMHO.

One of the objection of this series would be that they could reissue at 33rpm with Hoffman mastering. The OJC (Analogue Production, Hoffman/Grey mastering) 33 rpm vinyl I have sound pretty good. Maybe they aren't the "truth" but I think that would satisfy most of the people at half the price.

Edited November 15, 2007 by porcy62