Listening to Now in MONO. Blasphemy!

Indeed he does. Anyone wanting to hear the original 45's at their finest in mono, should check out RCA's Gold Standard series. Some of those Elvis, Sedaka, Sam Cooke reissue pressings have a fuller, nicer sound than many of the originals did. Presumably they were cut from the 1st gen mono masters, but without the compression added to the 45 and Lp editions.

Sedaka in stereo has been strange at times, though. I always thought most were a bit rough in the upper mids and harsh and sibilant in the highs, resulting in a sound you really have to tweak at home to tolerate. Back in the '80s Ron Furmanek remixed a few tracks in stereo for comps, and the difference was startling.

Recently picked up several nice mono's, but one unexpected dud. Landed a promo pressing of the Buckinghams' TIME & CHARGES ('67), which had a mono cover, demo sticker, and red mono label, but was in fact, in stereo. Shades of Mercury! Not only a hidden stereo pressing, but a mono label, too. I have a true mono pressing up north, but for five bucks, figured it wouldn't hurt to have another one. Alas!

On the other hand, forgot I had the Carnegie Hall 10-inch on Birdland, the Parker & Dizzy Gillespie '47 concert. This one, in the past few years, has gone at auction anywhere from $100 to $500 (!), although I suspect it's not as rare as claimed. Found a copy for a buck last year at a Virginia thrift (along with European 10-inchers from Billie Holiday, Duke Ellington, more Diz, a few red wax Brubeck's on Fantasy). Amazing how nice those old pressings sound, and most of the surface noise for the older material is from the source, not the pressing.

ED

The Bluebird Recordings 1937 & 1938 - Sonny Boy Williamson


The Bluebird Recordings 1938 - Sonny Boy Williamson

These recordings are the real deal. Fantastic stuff! This is the ORIGINAL Sonny Boy, not the guy from the 60's who took his name.

Bio of John Lee (Sonny Boy I) Williamson: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonny_Boy_Williamson_I

Although many mono mixes have been rereleased on CD, LP and SACD, it was rare for a mono mix to be rereleased in the 80's. Still, here's a CBS Mastersound 1/2 speed master of "Roger the Engineer," a classic 60's Yardbirds LP in Mono:

Is it REALLY BLASPHEMY to listen to the SACD mono layer of this first? Then, I guess I'm a blaspheming *****!



Greatest Hits - Sylvester Stewart & the Woodstock Showstoppers 4.0/1.0 SACD

Last night I listened to The Beach Boys, Pet Sounds in MONO.....well for about 3 minutes (which translates to about 6 BB songs)...then I switched over to stereo and was much more pleased.

Pops live in '59 in a rare, filmed concert on DVD.


I picked up this postcard at Satchmo's house in Corona, Queens. He's touting his favorite laxative: Swiss Kriss.

Getting in the spirit of the season. Mine came in green vinyl. They came as a surprise of red or green. I haven't seen the red yet. Wonder if the label is red or green like mine?



Finally decided to set aside an evening to relax to my Black Friday budget killer. My LRS had 2 sets of this and I snagged one. Beautiful vinyl and artwork. I really wish that they would stop using those horrible paper 10" inner sleeves though. I have a stock of good ones thankfully that will be replacing them after each side is played.

The 1966 Live Recordings - Bob Dylan 36 CD's, 30 of them are Mono. 31 of them were either recorded live by Columbia, or are soundboard recordings. The other 5 are audience tapes. The box is in chronological order, but the 5 audience tape CD's are out of that order and are discs 32 - 36, sort of bonus CD's.

Although not 2017 or even 1966 studio quality, I was surprised that the fidelity was as good as it is. I have not listened to the audience tape CD's yet, although there are a few tracks from audience tapes on a few other discs, to fill in missing tracks from CBS or soundboard.

Half the discs are acoustic, while the other half are electrified. The Band are playing behind Zim on the electric tracks. It is the usual 5 guys, but with Mickey Jones on drums in lieu of Levon Helm.

The performances vary, though most are very good. This set is for hard core Zim fans like me. Although there are 36 discs, the vast majority of the tracks are the same two sets.

The book is 20 pages and CD size.

Got it for Valentine's and have listened to 18 CD's in order.

Quad Linda said:

Although many mono mixes have been rereleased on CD, LP and SACD, it was rare for a mono mix to be rereleased in the 80's. Still, here's a CBS Mastersound 1/2 speed master of "Roger the Engineer," a classic 60's Yardbirds LP:

View attachment 20771

Click to expand...

wow, never knew that, that is super cool, the hunt begins

The Doors 50th Anniversary Edition 3 CD/1 LP Mono mix on both CD & LP

The Oily Years - Pink Floyd 11 CD/9 DVD/8 Blu-Ray/5 45's Mucho mono on CD and 45's. Still listening. Will be for weeks to come.
This must have been back when they were a greaser band. Hey, which one's Pachuco?

Still listening to The 1966 Live Recordings - The Zim 36 CD (only 5 are 2ch) Almost done - have listened to 33 CD's.

Beatles, Sgt. Pepper, Japanese Mono box set, not SHM CD, in fact I think it's the US box set except with Japanese OBI strip and inner booklet. My 50 year box set is lost in space somewhere, oh well. I will admit this Mono RBCD does sound really big and full at 60db.

Quad Linda said:

Is it REALLY BLASPHEMY to listen to the SACD mono layer of this first? Then, I guess I'm a blaspheming *****!

View attachment 22381

Greatest Hits - Sylvester Stewart & the Woodstock Showstoppers 4.0/1.0 SACD

Click to expand...

I made a point of playing a little of both for my brother and his wife when they visited The Lair recently. It's curious that, despite the fact most of Sly's 45's were hits and are still commonly available in original pressings, the mono mixes are likely even less known to the public than the quad versions (or quad Lp, which isn't exactly hard to find, either).

ED

Eagerly awaiting this one:
A Little Magic, A Little Kindness - The Complete MONO Albums Collection (More than a New Discovery aka First Songs, plus Eli & 13th Confession) - Laura Nyro 2 CD drops on 7/7/17. I've owned three copies of First Songs: LP, CD & UK CD (More Than), and owned Eli on 2 LP's, CD, expanded CD & SACD 4.0. Nothing new here, BUT I'm still excited to hear these great old friends in mono.

Currently istening to:
Sgt. Pepper in mono, which I've owned in mono in UK LP Box and Japan CD Box.

Fresh Cream, mono UK album, mono singles, 2 French EP's. US mono album w/bonus tracks on Blu-Ray-A. All from the Fresh Cream Box.

Phil Ochs mono CD's I've recently acquired and played:
2 CD Live in Montreal 1966 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for Ochs fans! Montreal & Live at Last! issued by Michael Ochs.
CD Live at Last! 1973
CD A Hero of the Game 1965 radio broadcast

11 Beach Boys SACD's in mono
I bought all but Pet Sounds, owning a DVD-A, 2 box sets and an expanded CD already.

Fun, Fun, Fun

Rolling Stones in Mono :banana:

Quad Linda said:

Is it REALLY BLASPHEMY to listen to the SACD mono layer of this first? Then, I guess I'm a blaspheming *****!

View attachment 22381

Greatest Hits - Sylvester Stewart & the Woodstock Showstoppers 4.0/1.0 SACD

Click to expand...

I heard the mono version first - only because I played the CD layer in my car on the way home after picking it up at the post office. Only listened to the Quad version since.

Snood said:

Rolling Stones in Mono :banana:

Click to expand...

Snood/dood...I know what I said the other day...but are the Stones in mono a treat to listen to? Do I need to reconsider??

Johnny Rivers' REALIZATION
The Best of the Seekers (Capitol)
And some old Hendrix 45's, to remind of how well they were mixed relative to the stereo Lp versions, which are times not very good.

Circular Vibes said:

View attachment 18526

Click to expand...

Circular Vibes said:

After listening to Yes - Relayer loud, then accidentally listening to Gentle Giant - The Power And The Glory louder than I should have :upthumb, I need to come down with an old love of mine. I used to have it in stereo a few apartments ago, but I re-found it recently in glorious mono on a U.S. pressing in sweet shape at Value Village and couldn't say no. I can say that the mono has all the fullness of sound the stereo had, just less filling.

Click to expand...

If you want the best mono sound for Sedaka, track down the RCA reissue singles, some of which actually sound better than the original 45's, believe it nor not.

RCA's hits compilations had their problems sometimes. ELVIS' GOLDEN RECORDS, from '58, sounds pinched compared to mint copies of the 45's; same with THE BEST OF SAM COOKE ('62), at least the original pressing. The sound of Sedaka in stereo back in the day was sometimes brittle, though well separated; the mono on this original edition of the Lp (it was later repackaged in stereo in the '70s, with a laughable photo of poor Neil) really doesn't do them justice (the stereo was worse, though).

ED

GOS said:

Snood/dood...I know what I said the other day...but are the Stones in mono a treat to listen to? Do I need to reconsider??

Click to expand...

Yes and Yes.....you know where :banana:

Satanic Majestic especially.......

Not everything on there is great, but alot is......

There are some stereo fold downs...but you can go on line to get an album by album rundown

Def not as great as Beatles in Mono.....but gooooood to very good.:banana:

You know??? I think that MONO is closer to MCH than
STEREO is...

Think about it...


Mono is ONE BIG BALL and you have to be VERYYYYY Careful whn doing it (it's VERY Fragile ,as is MCH)