Tower of Power
Back To Oakland

*NOTE: There is a stitch that plays 20 times at a light to moderate level at the start of track 1 on side 2, "Time Will Tell."

We love this funky music and have long been delighted with how wonderful the best pressings can sound. This may be Tower of Power’s best; certainly it’s one of their most consistent and well-recorded.

A Big Group Of Musicians Needs This Kind Of Space

One of the qualities that we don't talk about on the site nearly enough is the SIZE of the record's presentation. Some copies of the album just sound small -- they don't extend all the way to the outside edges of the speakers, and they don't seem to take up all the space from the floor to the ceiling. In addition, the sound can often be recessed, with a lack of presence and immediacy in the center.

Other copies -- my notes for these copies often read "BIG and BOLD" -- create a huge soundfield, with the music positively jumping out of the speakers. They're not brighter, they're not more aggressive, they're not hyped-up in any way, they're just bigger and clearer.

And most of the time those very special pressings are just plain more involving. When you hear a copy that does all that -- a copy like this one -- it's an entirely different listening experience.

Sonic Issues

The biggest problems we found in our shootout were:

• Some edge to the horn sound (the kind of "detail" that some audiophiles might prefer but that to our ears would be a source of listener fatigue in the long run).
• Stuck-in-the-speakers low-resolution sound, by far the most typical, wherein the ambience and spaciousness of the studio are noticeably compromised.
• And lack of bass, which either takes the rhythmic quality out of the music, the drive so to speak, or makes the horns sound thin, which is a not a sound we tend to like, on this album or any other, although most of the audiophiles that I've met seem not to mind it all that much.

The Wrong Kind of Clarity

Much of what passes for clarity in some systems is just a lack of lower mids and thin bass response -- woofers too small, not enough of them, the same old story. There are many commentaries on the site concerning this very issue and I recommend you check a few out when you have the time.

Music like this needs full-bodied sound to do what it's trying to do; you need to be able to move lots of air in your listening room to bring this music to life. You can be sure this band full of horn players was moving huge amounts of air in the studio. Would have loved to been there!

The Sheffield Record -- So Dry

Some of you no doubt know that there is a Direct to Disc on Sheffield by this band. I can tell you without question that this particular LP is clearly better sounding than that one, which tends to be annoyingly dry. This band's recordings as a rule tend to be on the dry side, with little in the way of studio echo or ambience. The Sheffield is even more dryly recorded than their other albums, at least on the copies that I have played.

Vinyl Condition

Mint Minus Minus and maybe a bit better 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.)

Those 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 originals.

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 Must Own Record

We consider this recording a Masterpiece that belongs in any serious soul collection. Others that belong in that category can be found here.

Side One

• Oakland Stroke
• Don't Change Horses (In the Middle of a Stream)
• Just When We Start Makin' It
• Can't You See (You Doin' Me Wrong)
• Squib Cakes

Side Two

• Time Will Tell
• Man From the Past
• Love's Been Gone So Long
• I Got the Chop
• Below Us, All the City Lights
• Oakland Stroke

AMG 4 1/2 Star Review

Tower of Power followed their self-titled gold album with an even better album that didn't enjoy similar sales success. Back to Oakland had tougher, funkier and better-produced cuts, stronger vocals from Lenny Williams (who was more comfortable as their lead singer), and included an excellent ballad in "Time Will Tell," and a rousing tempo in "Don't Change Horses (In the Middle of a Stream)." The Tower of Power horn section reaffirmed its reputation in both soul and pop circles, and the album included a powerhouse instrumental.