Artykuł everclear<br />So much for the afterglow pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

At first glance it appears that in his album, „Stone Soul“, the Cuban percussionist Mongo Santamaria just took a handful of popular songs from pop and soul and ‚translated‘ them into his own musical language. So far so good: but the enthusiasm and joy with which the band performs is anything but ordinary. Once the threshold for a potent Latin combo has been overcome with meaty winds („See Saw“), Sonny Fortune on the alto sax storms ahead along rhythm & blues tracks and breaks out with hectic cleft licks on his own headstrong path. Incited by crisp percussion, one can experience how traditional music is combined with a musician’s own ideas to create completely new music.

Artykuł Mongo Santamaria<br />Stone Soul pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

In the layers and harmonies achieved partly by overdubbing, and which alternate between cowshed, barbershop and the Beatles, Nilsson manages to make his bitter words somewhat easier to digest. He relates the bizarre chronicle of a couple who have a dull relationship and who morbidly look forward to passing away in an old people’s home („Love Story“), or he swears his undying love to a certain Caroline in springtime, or he is transported back in time in his mind’s eye to an idyllic little town in the countryside („Dayton, Ohio 1903“).

A weighty musical background would lend nothing to these highly sophisticated songs. Piano chords, a little bit of electric harpsichord, and a tinkle on the organ keys here and there suffice to dally in an old-fashioned manner – with a sarcastic smile or even a nasty grin – in the desolation of reality, without getting the blues.

Musicians:

Harry Nilsson (vocals, keyboards, percussion)
Randy Newman (piano)

Artykuł Nilsson sings Newman pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

This wonderful album is highly recommended for each and every number, but if you want a tip for a very special track, then just listen to the ragtime piano rolls in Bo Diddley’s „Ditty Wah Ditty“.

Musicians:
Ry Cooder, guitar, mandolin, bass, vocals
Ronnie Barron, piano, organ
Earl Hines, piano (B4)
Plas Johnson, alto saxophone
Oscar Brashear, cornet
Red Callender, bass
John Duke, bass
Russ Titelman, electric bass
Chris Ethridge, electric bass
Milt Hollad, drums, percussion
Jim Keltner, drums

Artykuł Ry Cooder<br />Paradise and Lunch pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

Commemorating Pearl’s 50th anniversary in collaboration with SME/Legacy Recordings, mastered from the original master tapes, cut at 45RPM, pressed on MoFi SuperVinyl at RTI, and limited to 10,000 copies, the iconic audiophile label’s UltraDisc One-Step reissue takes Joplin and Co.’s stupendous performance to newly transcendent levels. Boasting reference-setting fidelity that further magnifies the singer’s passion and producer Paul A. Rothchild’s clear production, this pressing benefits from jaw-dropping spaciousness, presence, fullness, detail, dynamics, and openness. The wider grooves allow more information to reach your ears, and MoFi SuperVinyl means the noise floor is as absolutely low as possible.

Visually, the lavish packaging and gorgeous presentation of the UD1S Pearl befit its select status. Housed in a deluxe box, it features special foil-stamped jackets and faithful-to-the-original graphics that illuminate the splendor of the recording. No expense has been spared. Aurally and visually, this UD1S collectible exists as a curatorial artifact meant to be preserved, touched, and examined. It is made for discerning listeners that prize sound quality and production, and who desire to fully immerse themselves in the art – and everything involved with the album, from the images to the finishes.

Indeed, Joplin’s husky, strong, and penetrating singing has never sounded more vibrant or made deeper connections. Warm, organic, and free of any artificial ceilings, this version lets you step into Sunset Sound Recorders with the performers, such is the degree of realism and authenticity. And few, if any words, describe Joplin better than „authentic.“ Her spirit comes to life on this reissue in sublime fashion. Like its headliner, this pressing leaves it all on the floor.

While Joplin’s electrifying vocal prowess is universally lauded – she’s deservingly recognized as the greatest white female blues singer the world has ever seen – her mix of compassion, confidence, and charm play as large a role in attracting listeners and keeping them ensnared more than four decades after her tragic death. And on Pearl, she burrows into deeper stylistic veins, teasing out sides of her persona and craft she’d never previously displayed. Her signature desperation, sadness, and vulnerability remain – the harrowing, lonely wail that begins her soul-ravishing take on Jerry Ragovoy’s „Cry Baby,“ underlined with a Wall of Sound-like piano accompaniment, could only come from a person severely scarred by loss and disappointment – yet Joplin also reveals a sense of humor and beatnik innocence that helped propel the album to the top of the charts for nine straight weeks.

Playfully introduced as „a song of great social and political import,“ the a capella „Mercedes Benz“ reflects Joplin’s throaty timbre as well as her enhanced, sunnier mood. Similarly, her definitive read of Kris Kristofferson’s „Me and Bobby McGee“ signals a laidback demeanor and a move into country strains, with the delivery as natural, carefree, and loving as any in the rock canon. As she does throughout the record, Joplin invests her all in the narrative so that there’s no line between the performer and the song. She makes everything on Pearl feel autobiographical, and by extension, gut-wrenchingly honest and devastatingly intimate. Joplin achieved these feats often during her brief career, yet there are differences on Pearl, chiefly among them her balance of impeccable timing and raw emotion. Heart-aching anthems such as „A Woman Left Lonely“ offer both grit and control, subtlety and attack, resulting in cathartic releases distinguished with originality, personality, and instinctual passion.

Pearl remains Joplin’s finest hour, with credit also owed to the Full Tilt Boogie Band – the only group she ever considered to be her own – as well as the Doors alum that sat behind the boards. Joplin and Rothchild both admitted to sharing a common bond and understanding, with the latter inheriting the role of teacher and Joplin, a willing student ready to discover how she could use her voice in new, more expressive ways. The fruits of the pair’s labors fill Pearl, be it the guardedly optimistic „Get It While You Can“ or assertive, fleet-footed „Move Over.“

Experienced in the new light brought to fore by this definitive Mobile Fidelity UD1S box set, Joplin’s swan song is no longer about a masterpiece that its creator never lived to see finished. Rather, it’s about a once-in-a-lifetime vocalist realizing mammoth potential and wringing passion out of every note. It’s not a tragedy, but a triumph. Get it while you can.

More About Mobile Fidelity UltraDisc One-Step and Why It Is Superior
Instead of utilizing the industry-standard three-step lacquer process, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab’s new UltraDisc One-Step (UD1S) uses only one step, bypassing two processes of generational loss. While three-step processing is designed for optimum yield and efficiency, UD1S is created for the ultimate in sound quality. Just as Mobile Fidelity pioneered the UHQR (Ultra High-Quality Record) with JVC in the 1980s, UD1S again represents another state-of-the-art advance in the record-manufacturing process. MFSL engineers begin with the original master tapes and meticulously cut a set of lacquers. These lacquers are used to create a very fragile, pristine UD1S stamper called a „convert.“ Delicate „converts“ are then formed into the actual record stampers, producing a final product that literally and figuratively brings you closer to the music. By skipping the additional steps of pulling another positive and an additional negative, as done in the three-step process used in standard pressings, UD1S produces a final LP with the lowest noise floor possible today. The removal of the additional two steps of generational loss in the plating process reveals tremendous amounts of extra musical detail and dynamics, which are otherwise lost due to the standard copying process. The exclusive nature of these very limited pressings guarantees that every UD1S pressing serves as an immaculate replica of the lacquer sourced directly from the original master tape. Every conceivable aspect of vinyl production is optimized to produce the most perfect record album available today.

MoFi SuperVinyl
Developed by NEOTECH and RTI, MoFi SuperVinyl is the most exacting-to-specification vinyl compound ever devised. Analog lovers have never seen (or heard) anything like it. Extraordinarily expensive and extremely painstaking to produce, the special proprietary compound addresses two specific areas of improvement: noise floor reduction and enhanced groove definition. The vinyl composition features a new carbonless dye (hold the disc up to the light and see) and produces the world’s quietest surfaces. This high-definition formula also allows for the creation of cleaner grooves that are indistinguishable from the original lacquer. MoFi SuperVinyl provides the closest approximation of what the label’s engineers hear in the mastering lab.

Artykuł Janis Joplin <br /> Pearl <br /> ULTRADISC ONE STEP LP pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

200g Vinyl LP Pressed at Quality Record Pressings!

Mastered by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio from the Original Master Tapes or Best Sources Available!

A musical legacy that began in Hawthorne, California and went on to conquer the world. Analogue Productions presents the ultimate pressings of 14 essential Beach Boys albums! Mastered by Kevin Gray, most from the original master tapes,
and plated and pressed by Quality Record Pressings, the finest LP pressing facility in the world, these are awesome recordings to experience. And the look of each album befits its sonic superiority! Presented in „old school“ Stoughton
tip-on jackets, these time honored favorites shine brighter than the originals!

Apart from Surfin‘ Safari, which was mono only, the Beach Boys did turn in stereo masters on all of their early albums up until 1965. The Beach Boys Today! was the first LP for which they only delivered a mono master.

The stereo editions of Surfin‘ USA, Surfer Girl, Little Deuce Coupe, Shut Down Vol. 2, All Summer Long, Beach Boys Christmas Album and Beach Boys Concert were all mixed in stereo by their own preferred engineer, Chuck Britz, ostensibly
under the group’s supervision.

„Brian may or may not have been present for those mixing sessions — evidence suggests that he trusted Chuck’s skills enough to let him prepare those mixes on his own — but the group held onto their multitrack tapes and delivered stereo
masters to Capitol, rather than allowing Capitol to prepare their own stereo versions. Later, when Brian was only delivering mono masters, Capitol would prepare the Duophonic pseudo stereo editions for the stereo market,“ says
Alan Boyd, producer and Beach Boys‘ archivist.

All of the newer stereo mixes on these remastered albums (The Beach Boys Today!, Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!), The Beach Boys‘ Party, Pet Sounds and Smiley Smile) were all done by Mark Linett on behalf of the Beach Boys.

Shut Down Volume 2 is the fifth studio album by the Beach Boys, and the first of four they would release in 1964. Shut Down Volume 2 reached number 13 in the US charts during a chart stay of 38 weeks. The „Volume 2“ in the album title refers
to a multi-artist album featuring and named for the Beach Boys‘ song „Shut Down,“ released eight months earlier by the band’s label.

„The first Shut Down was a hugely successful Capitol Records Various Artists compilation LP that had included a pair of Beach Boys tracks. Whereas their previous album Little Deuce Coupe had been a full-on car themed concept album,
the Beach Boys‘ Shut Down Volume 2 was pretty much evenly split between songs with car themes and various high school and summertime-themed tunes. The album sought to further the Beach Boys beyond its ironic sea-and-sun fetish (none but
Dennis Wilson ever surfed) into the burgeoning hot-rod subculture…the high points remain nothing short of spectacular, including the Mike Love-propelled ‚Fun, Fun, Fun,‘ Wilson’s knowing nod to Phil Spector, ‚Don’t Worry Baby,‘ and the (hit) ‚The Warmth of the Sun.'“ -Amazon.com

Artykuł The Beach Boys <br />Shut Down Volume 2 (stereo)<br />200g Vinyl pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

Lavish Packaging Includes Opulent Box, Foil-Stamped Jackets, and SuperVinyl LPs: Deluxe Audiophile Pressing Strictly Limited to 9,000 Hand-Numbered Copies

Ranked #16 on Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, Includes „Tangled Up in Blue“ and „Simple Twist of Fate“: Dylan Pours Out Scarred Emotion, Opens His Veins, and Bleeds

Bob Dylan was at several crossroads in the mid 1970s. Artistically, he was largely written off as being past his prime. Emotionally, he was suffering through a painful divorce from his then-wife Sara Lowndes. Creatively, he appeared at a stalemate, his previous decade’s unprecedented run of transformational brilliance finished. Then came Blood on the Tracks. A start-to-finish cycle that documents a lover’s pursuit of, entanglement with, and loss of a woman, the bracingly intimate 1975 effort remains one of the most encompassing break-up albums ever made and ranks as the most personal statement of the Bard’s career.

Presenting the record’s acoustic and band-supported songs with the utmost transparency, dynamics, presence, immediacy, spaciousness, and imaging, Mobile Fidelity’s opulent UD1S (UltraDisc One-Step) box set makes Blood on the Tracks reach three-dimensional sonic and emotional heights never before attained. Strictly limited to 9,000 numbered copies and pressed at RTI on SuperVinyl, this ultra-hi-fi collector’s edition shines a high-powered light on the fluid vocal phrasing, timbral shifts, functional rhythms, and inward-looking strumming crucial to the album’s aura. You’ll enjoy deep-black backgrounds, boundless soundstaging, pointillist details, staggering dynamics, and arguably, the most lifelike tonalities and nuances ever committed to vinyl. Every note, breath, and movement is reproduced with exquisite accuracy, wowing clarity, and impeccable balance.

The lavish packaging and beautiful presentation of Mobile Fidelity’s Blood on the Tracks UD1S pressing befit its extremely select status. Housed in a deluxe box, the collectible version contains special foil-stamped jackets and faithful-to-the-original graphics that illuminate the splendor of the recording. Aurally and visually, it exists a curatorial artifact meant to be preserved, poured over, touched, and examined. It is made for discerning listeners that prize sound quality and creativity, and who desire to fully immerse themselves in the art – and everything involved with the album, from the images to the textures and liner notes.

Ranked 16 on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, and replete with existential thought, piercing directness, raw singing, and majestic arrangements, Blood on the Tracks remains a soul-exposing confessional. To hear it is to experience the agony, frustration, trauma, highs, lows, confusion, sadness, and, ultimately, requisite redemption associated with intimate relationships gone astray. Dylan maintains it’s a work of fiction, but the evident close-vested autobiographical premise is what helps make it universal: It’s the icon singing through tears, going out of his mind, battling hallowing emptiness, firing shots across the bow, and accepting culpability. Blood on the Tracks serves, in short, as a consummate expression of love’s darker sides and the consequences of what happens when dreams unravel.

For all the melancholic pain, unresolved questions, shattered memories, wasted times, unrequited dialogs, and weary regret within, Blood on the Tracks remains as daring as it is reflective. Rather than follow for a monotone caustic vibe, Dylan’s songs burrow into the subconscious for the manners in which they are even-keeled, mellow, and occasionally, even peaceful. Dignity, honor, poignancy, and fairness – all traits uncommon in any situation in which partners dissolve histories, change hearts, and attribute blame – instill the record with equilibrium on par with the consistency of the flowing melodies.

Throughout, tunes come on and proceed as if they could continue forever, Dylan spinning poetic verses and conversations amidst finely tied knots of acoustic notes, chords, and fills, the deceivingly simple architecture conjuring the intertwined refractions of a bezeled jewel, various angles, colors, and textures conjoining into a gorgeously inseparable whole. Backed by Tony Brown’s flexible albeit subtle bass, Buddy Cage’s country-streaked pedal-steel guitar, and Paul Griffin’s soul-baring organ – an instrument used to shadow, tuckpoint, and illuminate here as effectively as any time in rock history – Dylan pours out scarred emotion, open his veins, and bleeds.

More About Mobile Fidelity UltraDisc One-Step and Why It Is Superior:
Instead of utilizing the industry-standard three-step lacquer process, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab’s new UltraDisc One-Step (UD1S) uses only one step, bypassing two processes of generational loss. While three-step processing is designed for optimum yield and efficiency, UD1S is created for the ultimate in sound quality. Just as Mobile Fidelity pioneered the UHQR (Ultra High-Quality Record) with JVC in the 1980s, UD1S again represents another state-of-the-art advance in the record-manufacturing process. MFSL engineers begin with the original master tapes and meticulously cut a set of lacquers. These lacquers are used to create a very fragile, pristine UD1S stamper called a „convert.“ Delicate „converts“ are then formed into the actual record stampers, producing a final product that literally and figuratively brings you closer to the music. By skipping the additional steps of pulling another positive and an additional negative, as done in the three-step process used in standard pressings, UD1S produces a final LP with the lowest noise floor possible today. The removal of the additional two steps of generational loss in the plating process reveals tremendous amounts of extra musical detail and dynamics, which are otherwise lost due to the standard copying process. The exclusive nature of these very limited pressings guarantees that every UD1S pressing serves as an immaculate replica of the lacquer sourced directly from the original master tape. Every conceivable aspect of vinyl production is optimized to produce the most perfect record album available today.

MoFi SuperVinyl: The World’s Quietest Surfaces and Cleanest Grooves:
Developed by NEOTECH and RTI, MoFi SuperVinyl is the most exacting-to-specification vinyl compound ever created. Analog lovers have never seen (or heard) anything like it. Extraordinarily expensive and extremely painstaking to produce, the special proprietary compound addresses two specific areas of improvement: noise floor reduction and enhanced groove definition. The vinyl composition features a new carbonless dye (hold the disc up to the light and see) and produces the world’s quietest surfaces. This high-definition formula also allows for the creation of cleaner grooves that are indistinguishable from the original lacquer. MoFi SuperVinyl provides the closest approximation of what the label’s engineers hear in the mastering lab.

Artykuł Bob Dylan <br />Blood On the Tracks pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

Dr. John’s Gumbo is the fifth album by New Orleans singer and pianist Dr. John, a tribute to the music of his native city. The album is a collection of covers of New Orleans classics, played by a major figure in the city’s music.

In May of 2012, Dr. John’s Gumbo was listed in the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

Dr John’s Gumbo was released in 1972 and is in many ways a tribute by Dr. John, aka the Night Tripper, to his hometown New Orleans. It features excellent interpretations of New Orleans traditionals („Iko Iko“, „Tipitina“, „Junko Partner“ and „Stack-O-Lee“) and contemporary R&B written or played by the likes of Huey Piano Smith („Blow Wind Blow“ and „Huey Smith Medley“) Earl King and Earl Gaines („Big Chief“, „Let The Good Times Roll“ and „Lonely Lonely Nights“).

Dr. John delivers a strong set of infectious songs drenched in good vibes and spiced with a pinch of voodoo. His eccentric (stage) appearance adds unique color to his stature as master of the ivories and as an entertainer.

This great album receives the full Analogue Productions reissue treatment starting with Kevin Gray’s remaster from the original analogue tapes. Analogue Productions backs that up with 200-gram plating and pressing on super-silent vinyl by Quality Record Pressings. Finally it’s all housed in a tip-on gatefold jacket from Stoughton Printing. Deluxe all the way; you’ll be ecstatic with the results!

Analogue Productions uses the original tapes and works with only the best mastering studios. Albums are plated and pressed at the world’s best pressing plant on virgin vinyl with unmatched quality, as AP uses meticulous test pressing evaluation and quality control. Analogue uses the highest-quality jackets and rice paper inner sleeves and issues Limited Edition albums, meaning less than 1,000 records per stamper, released in limited quantities.

Artykuł Doctor John <br /> Dr. John’s Gumbo <br /> 200g Vinyl LP pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

Two years earlier Russell had already played on hundreds of songs as one of the top studio musicians in Los Angeles. The Oklahoma-born pianist, guitarist, songwriter and bandleader led Joe Cocker’s band Mad Dogs & Englishmen, appeared at George Harrison’s 1971 Concert for Bangladesh in New York City, and composed numerous hits of his own. He was in Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound Orchestra, and played sessions for Frank Sinatra, Sam Cooke, Aretha Franklin, the Ventures and the Monkees, among many others.

But it was the top-rated Carney, reissued here on an audibly exquisite 200-gram LP from Analogue Productions, that put Russell into the league of extraordinary musicians. Soulful roots-rock yields to dizzying psychedelia on this, Russell’s most famous album. His all-time biggest hit, „Tight Rope,“ leads to „Out in the Woods,“ „Cajun Love Song,“ „This Masquerade,“ and more! No link in the reissue chain was sacrificed, making this outstanding reissue a true audiophile masterpiece. Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio remastered the album from the original master tapes; plating and pressing took place at Quality Record Pressings, makers of the world’s finest-sounding LPs. Lastly, as benefits a stellar reissue, we packaged our version in a heavyweight old-style tip-on jacket from Stoughton Printing.

Russell wrote scores of hits for others, among them „Superstar,“ (written with Bonnie Bramlett) for the Carpenters, „Delta Lady“ for Joe Cocker and „This Masquerade,“ for George Benson. His own version of „This Masquerade“ is featured on Carney. More than 100 acts recorded „A Song for You,“ which Russell said he wrote in 10 minutes. Ray Charles‘ recording of the song in 1993 received a Grammy Award.

Sadly, Russell’s life as a musical muse and performer ended with his death at 74 on Nov. 13, 2016, at his home in Nashville. He will be forever remembered for making a broad, sophisticated palette of American music sound down-home and natural.

Artykuł Leon Russell <br />Carney <br /> 200-gram LP pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.

Bend Like Steel is Lieberman’s most personal record to date, and she stated, „The more I said, the more I felt I had to say.“ The songs were arranged by Lieberman and feature her on guitar and piano with guest artists that include guitarist Lyle Workman (Sting, Beck) and mastered by Gavin Lurssen (Alison Kraus/Robert Plant).

Lieberman’s early music history formed in California in the seventies on the Sunset Strip and the West Coast club scene circuit that included singer-songwriters such as Joni Mitchell, Jackson Browne and the Eagles. As one of Capitol Records‘ premier artists, she worked with some of the leading studio musicians – a young Larry Carlton, members of the L.A. Express, Sneaky Pete and pianist Joe Sample. She toured the U.S. and Europe with Randy Newman, Billy Joel, Leonard Cohen, John Sebastian and Rick Nelson, to name a few.

Lieberman was nominated for the Golden Note Award for excellence with A Thousand Dreams on Pope Music, and two CDs followed – Home Of Whispers and Gone Is The Girl, which featured her stunning songs, warm vocals and rich orchestrations.

„…this set, though delicate as gossamer, is heart-ripped-open raw. Closely mic’d to perfection, the anguished interpretation of Simon and Garfunkel’s normally jolly ‚Cecilia‘ will turn your head around.“ Hi-Fi News Album Of The Month – Ken Kessler, Hi-Fi News

„Bend Like Steel is some of the best work you’ve done. It’s tied in my estimation with Home Of Whispers, and you known in what high esteem I hold that CD. Beautiful, beautiful work. And your voice has never sounded better.“ – Rich Warren, WFMT Midnight Special, Chicago

Musicians:
Lori Lieberman, acoustic guitar, piano, vocals
Stefanie Fife, cello
Eugene Ruffolo, acoustic guitar, background vocals
Monty Byrom, vocals (Mr. And Mrs. Make-Believe)
Trey Henry, acoustic bass
Brian Kilgore, percussion
Lyle Workman, electric guitars

Artykuł Lori Lieberman <br />Bend Like Steel pochodzi z serwisu Cleartone.