The Monkees
Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones, Ltd.

We've been trying to find good sound on Monkees' albums for over thirty years, with very little to show for our efforts -- until now, of course. It seems the fourth album is practically the only one with potential.

One of the problems holding us back from discovering the best sounding pressings of The Monkees' albums is the fact that 90+% of the copies we come across are beat to death. The average Rolling Stones record from the 60s is in better shape.

We will, of course, keep looking, but it's highly doubtful that any copy of the first two albums -- you know, the ones that were at the top of the charts for so long they outsold The Beatles in 1967 -- will ever make it to the site. Doubtful, but hope springs eternal in the record biz. You never know what gems you'll discover until they somehow find themselves on your turntable.

What The Best Sides Of Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, Ltd. Have To Offer Is Not Hard To Hear

• The biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space
• The most Tubey Magic, without which you have almost nothing. CDs give you clean and clear. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes in 1967
• Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low
• Natural tonality in the midrange -- with all the vocals, jangly guitars, and other instruments having the correct timbre
• Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional studio space

No doubt there's more but we hope that should do for now. Playing the record is, of course, the only way to hear all of the above.

What We're Listening For On Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, Ltd.

Less grit -- smoother and sweeter sound, something that is not easy to come by on any Monkees album, including this one.

A bigger presentation -- more size, more space, more room for all the instruments and voices to occupy. The bigger the speakers you have to play this record, the better.

More bass and tighter bass -- this is fundamentally a pure rock record. It needs weight down low to rock the way the engineers wanted it to.

Present, breathy vocals -- a veiled midrange is the rule, not the exception.

Good top-end extension to reproduce the harmonics of the instruments and details of the recording, including the studio ambiance.

Last but not least, balance -- all the elements from top to bottom should be heard in harmony with each other. Take our word for it, assuming you haven't played a pile of these yourself, balance is not that easy to find.

Our best copies will have it though, of that there is no doubt.

Vinyl Condition

Mint Minus Minus is about as quiet as any original pressing will play, and since only the right originals have any hope of sounding good on this album, that will most often be the playing condition of the copies we sell. (The copies that are even a bit noisier get traded back in to the local record stores we shop at.)

Those of you looking for quiet vinyl will have to settle for the sound of imports, later pressings and Heavy Vinyl reissues, purchased elsewhere of course as we have no interest in selling records that don't sound good.

If you want to make the trade-off between bad sound and quiet surfaces with whatever Heavy Vinyl pressing might be available, well, that's certainly your prerogative, but we can't imagine losing what's good about this music -- the size, the energy, the presence, the clarity, the weight -- just to hear it with less background noise.

A Tough Record to Play

All Monkees albums rank high on our difficulty of reproduction scale. Do not attempt to play them using anything other than the highest quality equipment.

Unless your system is firing on all cylinders, even our hottest Hot Stamper copies -- the Super Hot and White Hot pressings with the biggest, most dynamic, clearest, and least distorted sound -- can have problems . Your system should be thoroughly warmed up, your electricity should be clean and cooking, you've got to be using the right room treatments, and we also highly recommend using a demagnetizer such as the Walker Talisman on the record, your cables (power, interconnect and speaker) as well as the individual drivers of your speakers.

This is a record that's going to demand a lot from the listener, and we want to make sure that you feel you're up to the challenge. If you don't mind putting in a little hard work, here's a record that will reward your time and effort many times over, and probably teach you a thing or two about tweaking your gear in the process (especially your VTA adjustment, just to pick an obvious area most audiophiles neglect).

Side One

• Salesman
• She Hangs Out
• The Door Into Summer
• Love Is Only Sleeping
• Cuddly Toy
• Words

Side Two

• Hard to Believe
• What Am I Doing Hangin' 'Round?
• Peter Percival Patterson's Pet Pig Porky / Pleasant Valley Sunday
• Daily Nightly
• Don't Call on Me
• Star Collector

AMG 4 1/2 Star Review

After wresting control of the Monkees from Don Kirschner and recording the very good Headquarters album as a mostly self-contained unit, the bandmembers returned to using studio musicians to augment their sound as well as looking outside the group for the majority of the songs on their fourth album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd.

Whatever the reason for the decision, the resulting album is one of their best... To think that both this album and Headquarters came out the same year! Most bands would be lucky to have two albums this good come out their entire career.

Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd. is a must-have for any fan of smart, fun, and exciting 60s pop. It doesn't get much better than this.