{"product_id":"badcoselft_2607","title":"Bad Company - Self-Titled (Domestic Vinyl) - Hot Stamper (With Issues)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e*NOTE:\u003c\/strong\u003e There is a stitch that plays lightly and intermittently for approx. the first 60 seconds of track 1 on side 2, \"Bad Company.\" There is also a mark that plays 6 times at a moderate level at the start of track 2, \"The Way I Choose.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePractically every side two of this album has some surface noise in the left channel. Since it occurs on so many copies, we suspect an acetate issue as opposed to a vinyl issue, which means it was probably there on the copy you might have cracked open yourself in 1974.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis vintage Swan Song pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records can barely BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn't showing signs of coming back. If you love hearing INTO a recording, actually being able to \"see\" the performers, and feeling as if you are sitting in the studio with the band, this is the record for you. It's what vintage all analog recordings are known for -- \u003ci\u003ethis sound\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIf you exclusively play modern repressings of vintage recordings, I can say without fear of contradiction that you have never heard this kind of sound on vinyl. Old records have it -- not often, and certainly not always -- but maybe one out of a hundred new records do, and those are some pretty long odds.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eWhat The Best Sides Of Bad Company Have To Offer Is Not Hard To Hear\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe most Tubey Magic, without which you have \u003ci\u003ealmost\u003c\/i\u003e 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 \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%221974%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e1974\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eNatural tonality in the midrange -- with all the instruments having the correct timbre\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTransparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional studio space\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNo doubt there's more but we hope that should do for now. \u003ci\u003ePlaying the record is the only way to hear all of the qualities we discuss above,\u003c\/i\u003e and playing the best pressings against a pile of other copies under rigorously controlled conditions is the only way to find a pressing that sounds as good as this one does.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eEnergy Deficits\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMost copies only hint at the magic found on a Hot Stamper pressing. Drop the needle on your typical domestic pressing and the sound is just boring -- too clean, too dry and way too flat.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhere is the energy? These songs sound great on Classic Rock radio but too many copies lack the grungy energy that we know is actually there.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eWhat We're Listening For On Bad Company's Debut\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eEnergy\u003c\/strong\u003e for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThen: \u003cstrong\u003epresence and immediacy\u003c\/strong\u003e. The vocals aren't \"back there\" somewhere, lost in the mix. They're front and center where any recording engineer worth his salt would put them.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eThe Big Sound\u003c\/strong\u003e comes next -- wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThen \u003cstrong\u003etransient information\u003c\/strong\u003e -- fast, clear, sharp attacks, not the smear and thickness so common to these LPs.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eTight punchy bass\u003c\/strong\u003e -- which ties in with good transient information, also the issue of frequency extension further down.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eNext: \u003cstrong\u003etransparency\u003c\/strong\u003e -- the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the instruments.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eExtend the top and bottom\u003c\/strong\u003e and \u003ci\u003evoila\u003c\/i\u003e, you have The Real Thing -- an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eEngineering\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis album was one of \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22ron-nevison%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eRon Nevison\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e's early engineering jobs. The year before (1973) he had been behind the board at Ronnie Lane's Mobile Studio for Quadrophenia, one of the best sounding Who albums we know of, and a longtime member of our \u003ca href=\"http:\/\/better-records.com\/pages\/top-100\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eTop 100\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e (as is this album).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe also knocked it out of the park on Bad Company's follow-up release, 1975's Straight Shooter. In 1977 he worked on the sprawling mess that turned into Physical Graffiti.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIf you have top quality copies of any of them you should be able to recognize the qualities they all seem to have in common. This guy definitely knew how to get The Big Rock Sound onto analog tape.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOur job here at Better Records is simply to find you the very special pressings that actually reproduce all the energy and rock n' roll firepower that Nevison captured on his tapes all those years ago. It ain't easy but we don't mind doing it -- these are clearly some of the Greatest Rock Albums of the 70s (or any other decade you care to name) and we just never get tired of playing them.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNevison went on to do many of the biggest selling rock albums of the 80s, but \"the 80s sound\" has never held much appeal for us. This explains why you find so few recordings from the era on our site -- silk purses, sow's ears and all that.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eVinyl Condition\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMint Minus Minus is about as quiet as any vintage pressing will play, and since only the right vintage pressings 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 listed on the site are seriously reduced prices or traded back in to the local record stores we shop at.)\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThose of you looking for quiet vinyl will have to settle for the sound of other pressings and Heavy Vinyl reissues, purchased elsewhere of course as we have no interest in selling records that don't have the vintage analog magic of these wonderful recordings.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIf 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.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eA Must Own Rock Record\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis is a recording that should be part of any serious rock collection. Others that belong in that category can be found \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22core-rock-collection%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ehere\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Bad Company","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":52126745690408,"sku":"badcoselft","price":49.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0257\/3415\/2295\/files\/badcoselft.jpg?v=1743525048","url":"https:\/\/better-records.com\/products\/badcoselft_2607","provider":"Better Records","version":"1.0","type":"link"}