{"product_id":"mccarmccar_2604_6x__","title":"McCartney, Paul - McCartney - White Hot Stamper (With Issues)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e*NOTE:\u003c\/strong\u003e There is a mark that plays 25 times lightly at the end of track 3 on side 2, \"Teddy Boy.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe best tracks here have the quality of live music in a way that not one out of a hundred rock records do. The music jumps right out of the speakers and fills up the listening room.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe album sounds like it's recorded live in the studio, but of course that's impossible, because Paul plays practically all the instruments himself. It just goes to show how good a multi-track studio recording can sound when done well.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eWhat The Best Sides Of McCartney 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:%221970%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e1970\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\u003eImport or Domestic?\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn our experience, the real McCartney Magic is only found on the better domestic Apple pressings. We've never heard an import that did much for us, and the later CBS issues are hardly worth the vinyl they're pressed on.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis album, like Unplugged and Band on the Run (and not a whole lot else), is superb from start to finish. At the end of side two, you want \u003cu\u003emore\u003c\/u\u003e. I wish I could say that about the rest of his discography.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eWhat We're Listening For On McCartney's Masterpiece\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\u003eAlways A Struggle\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt's practically impossible to find clean copies of this album that sound good. We went through a big pile of our best copies and eventually found the sound (and surfaces) that we were looking for. I can't tell you how many copies we had to toss because they were noisy, had marks that played, weak sonics, or suffered from all three shortcomings.\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 later 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 that is a key part of the appeal 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\u003eThis Guy Liked It a Lot Too\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"I loved that record because it was so simple. And there was so much to see and to hear. It was just Paul. There was no adornment at all ... There was no attempt made to compete with the things he had already done. And so out he stepped from the shadow of the Beatles.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNeil Young inducting Paul McCartney into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eTrack Commentary\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe \u003cstrong\u003eTracklist\u003c\/strong\u003e tab above will take you to a select song breakdown for each side, with plenty of What to Listen For advice.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOther records with track breakdowns can be found \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22track-commentary%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ehere\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eA Must Own Pop Record\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe consider Paul McCartney's debut his \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22pop-masterpiece%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMasterpiece\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e. It's a recording that should be part of any serious popular music collection.\u003c\/p\u003e \n\u003cp\u003eOthers that belong in that category can be found \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22core-pop-collection%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ehere\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"McCartney, Paul","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51635671236904,"sku":"mccarmccar","price":799.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0257\/3415\/2295\/files\/xxx_bb1deaa1-c34a-4987-a4b9-e9ed044f8252.jpg?v=1703790999","url":"https:\/\/better-records.com\/products\/mccarmccar_2604_6x__","provider":"Better Records","version":"1.0","type":"link"}