Anamanaguchi - Endless Fantasy (Special 2-LP Splatter Vinyl Pressing, 2013)

Ahh, here's an album you probably weren't expecting from me. This was another chance I took (I am new to Amazon online shopping, okay?! I had no idea what I was walking into with my purchases) and I am so glad I did. Amazon.ca also only had one copy left, and I snagged it before anyone else could. Anamanaguchi has slowly but surely made a name for themselves, starting in 2009 with their first EP, then creating a Scott Pilgrim video game soundtrack, then moving on to their first full-length LP, which is surprisingly phenomenal in quality and creativity. For chip tune lovers, please read on!

Let's break the album down, shall we? I think you know the drill by now:

• A1: Endless Fantasy (5.58)
• A2: Japan Air (4.23)
• A3: Echobo (3.13)
• A4: Planet (4.19)
• A5: Viridian Genesis (3.02)
• B1: John Hughes (3.26)
• B2: Akira (3.48)
• B3: Interlude (Gymnopedie No. 1) (1.09)
• B4: Prom Night (3.31)
• B5: SPF 420 (2.06)
• B6: Interlude (Total Tea Time) (0.59)
• B7: Meow (3.31)
• C1: Canal Paradise (4.33)
• C2: Snow Angels (4.38)
• C3: In The Basement (3.30)
• C4: U n Me (4.51)
• D1: Space Wax America (3.48)
• D2: EVERYTHING EXPLODES (2.43)
• D3: Interlude (STILL 'SPLODIN' THO) (1.06)
• D4: Pastel Flags (3.21)
• D5: Bosozoku GF (4.48)
• D6: (T-T)b (3.35)

So as you can probably see by the tracklist, this album is heavily inspired by video games of the 80s and 90s and Japanese pop culture. And yes, another 2-LP! All of them look gorgeous, by the way. And the sound is just ... awesome.

I seriously don't even have anything nit-picky to say about this record. For every audiophile and video gamer out there who loves music and collecting records, buy this record now. I kid you not, if you don't have this in your collection and you love some chip tune / rock-pop, you should. The sound quality is fantastic, and much better than I was expecting. Despite the fact that vinyl records are really only two channels, this album is full of dynamic. I cannot even begin to express how impressed I am with the sound quality.

So, points time! Conclusion for "Endless Fantasy":

• Sound Quality: 5 out of 5.
• Mastering: 5 out of 5.
• Overall: 5 out of 5.

Once again, the Discogs.com listing is here.

You can buy this record from Anamanaguchi's website.

ABBA - Gold: Greatest Hits (Re-Release; 1992, [Re] 2014)

Alright, ladies and gentlemen, as weird as this may sound ... I like ABBA. This album is what actually got me into ABBA in the first place, when my mother had bought this CD back in 2000-2002 (I cannot for the life of me remember when she had purchased it).

And I took a huge chance ordering this record.

First, let me just say that I actually cannot find the version I ordered from Amazon.ca. The above photo is from the Back To Black series as we previously talked about with the BTB re-release of Dire Straits' claim-to-fame record "Brothers In Arms", and the notes listed here on Discogs.com gives me clearer indication of when around this record was repressed and re-released. I won't go into too much detail on why I know I have some sort of uncharted copy, but regardless I think it's the same deal.

At least, the records feel like 180g ... but it could be less. (Also, the frustrating fact that it's brand new vinyl, which simply taking the vinyl out of the sleeve causes static electricity, kind of makes me wonder if it's not even virgin. My "Brothers In Arms" record still does that to this day.)

Okay, anyway. Let's break it down, shall we? Here's the tracklisting:

• A1: Dancing Queen
• A2: Knowing Me, Knowing You
• A3: Take A Chance On Me
• A4: Mamma Mia
• A5: Lay All Your Love On Me
• B1: Super Trouper
• B2: I Have A Dream
• B3: The Winner Takes It All
• B4: Money, Money, Money
• B5: S.O.S.
• C1: Chiquitita
• C2: Fernando
• C3: Voulez-Vous
• C4: Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)
• D1: Does Your Mother Know
• D2: One Of Us
• D3: The Name Of The Game
• D4: Thank You For The Music
• D5: Waterloo

[I am not including the times of the songs due to the length of the tracklist.]

Right, so. That's the tracklist. Pretty much it includes all of the bands' biggest hits of their career as musicians. We pretty much know all of these songs (probably by heart, for the die-hards) especially from Mamma Mia! The Musical, and the movie based on the same Broadway show. The band was highly successful in the 70s and the 80s but due to rising complications within the band, they disbanded in the early 80s. The entire band claimed, though at this time working on solo projects, they would come back together for another album, yet one never transpired. Apparently, with everything that happened during the band's peak times, I don't blame them for not getting back together. Agnetha had a pretty solid, though slightly unsuccessful, solo career and still records album today, and Frida (the other 'A' in ABBA, her real name being Anni-Frid) had only one solo hit. Benny & Bjorn continued to make smash hits for other artists and rose to fame once again with the revival of ABBA's music with Mamma Mia! The Musical. Frida supported the show financially.

Cool.

So! That being said, and I'm sure you ALL know of ABBA's history already, let's get to the actual grading of this re-release of ABBA's greatest hits.

I remember listening to this CD back when my mother bought it. I was blown away by the sounds the band was able to produce, the melodies, the sound effects, the percussion... It opened up a whole new world for me in music. I do remember, specifically, the sound quality, which was pretty damn sweet. Surprisingly enough, the vinyl is actually able to compare quite easily to the CD release, which is awesome. I love it when vinyl quality and CD quality matches.

Now, let me just say that audiophiles will argue endlessly on which audio medium has the best sound quality. Mind you, I'm kind of jumping right into the middle of this by creating this blog and I just want to say that I am stating my own opinions. In no way am I a master of determining audio quality. If I like what I hear, then I'll post about it. If I have issues with it, I'm going to say something about it. It's kind of like friends helping each other out when the help is necessary. A small community of record collectors, new or old, should at least have someone say something about vinyl quality, right?

Okay. Now that that's out of the way, I have to say the vinyl quality of "Gold: Greatest Hits" is pretty amazing. The only issue I have is the reverb on the tracks. The vocals sound almost oddly distant, like someone moved the microphone away from the gals and turned up the echo on the vocals in post-production. I've had similar experiences with vocal tracks before on cassette tapes in certain car stereos (and for some reason, Reba McEntire and LeAnn Rimes' vocals are the worst for 80s - 90s car stereos). I felt like I was back in my mom's old '84 or '86 (can't remember which year) Ford Grand Marquis. The reverb I speak of is quite noticeable, so if you're not a fan of that, beware.

I just can't remember if the original CD sounded the same way, too. And of course I don't even have it on me at this moment in time. Damn. (Though I do have the CD ripped to my iTunes Library -- not nearly as noticeable as the vinyl, but it could be just iTunes and the bitrate I'm playing the music at.)

Anyway, that's all I really have to say that's bad with this record. It is quite a fantastic record and the fact that it's a 2-LP makes me feel kind of special. Discogs.com does feature this album on just one LP, allegedly released in Colombia, which makes it look kind of cool.

So! Here come the points and the conclusion:

• Sound Quality: 4.75 out of 5.
• Mastering: 4.25 out of 5.
• I just personally feel that the record could have been mastered better, and the reverb issue could have easily been avoided.
• Overall: 4.75 out of 5.

Once again, the Discogs.com listing is here.
You can purchase this vinyl record from Amazon.ca & Amazon.com.

Adele - 21 (Original Press, 2011)

Ahh, who doesn't love a little Adele in their lives? This artist came up virtually out of nowhere when Rolling In The Deep was first released as a single in 2010, and the play counts on radio were unbelievably high. This album charted at #1 and stayed within the top 3 albums for 23 weeks. As of July 2014, the album has sold over 10 million copies. Bravo, Adele, and congratulations!

The greatest thing about this album: it's been pressed on vinyl. So let's review the sound quality, shall we?

When I first bought this record from a widely known record shop, I was pretty stoked on it. It took me a while to get into Adele, but when I did I fell pretty hard for her voice and the blues-y tracks she produced. Something about her voice, man, sends chills down my spine. I can also closely relate to her music, just like the other 10-million-plus people who have bought this album I'm sure.

Anyway! Let's break it down. The tracklisting is as follows:

• A1: Rolling In The Deep (3.49)
• A2: Rumour Has It (3.43)
• A3: Turning Tables (4.10)
• A4: Don't You Remember (4.03)
• A5: Set Fire To The Rain (4.01)
• A6: He Won't Go (4.38)
• B1: Take It All (3.48)
• B2: I'll Be Waiting (4.01)
• B3: One And Only (5.48)
• B4: Lovesong (5.16)
• B5: Someone Like You (4.47)

The record features all the songs we've come to love, with the exact same versions we've heard millions of times before (by now, I'm sure). So, how does it play on a turntable?

The first four tracks go by smoothly. The longer the needle skims over the grooves, I'm impressed with what I hear. You have to understand to all those new to vinyl: to turn an audio recording that was mastered and recorded digitally onto vinyl is complicated. Sometimes, the final product isn't always so pleasant (aka trebles are terrible, bass sounds flat, etc.). I find it funny, however, that XL Recordings, the record label Adele is signed to, makes it seem like everything had been recorded onto vinyl first, THEN translated into a digital file. C'mon guys, some of us aren't so stupid! We know how this works.

Okay. Getting slightly off-track. Back to the sound. Yes.

The sound quality is pretty good for a digital-to-vinyl release, I'm not gunna lie. The bass is there, definitely (and thank God for that!), the trebles are just at the right level, and the dynamics are fantastic. Slightly quiet, but again, digital to vinyl. It was bound to happen. The pressing, however, makes for weird sound warbles while the music plays.

Let me explain what I mean. "Warbles" indicates when a turntable's needle is being pushed awkwardly, and the sound coming out of the turntable sounds slightly flat. It's not quite pleasant. This happens if, when a record is playing, someone applies pressure on the tip of the stylus of the tonearm. It apparently, as I've learned, happens if the pressing isn't up-to-snuff and is off-center.

Yes. This pressing experiences warbles. Very slight, and if I hadn't trained my ears years ago to different tones in music, I probably wouldn't have picked up on it. But I did, which worried me. I for sure thought it had something to do with my turntable. I mean, it can't be the record's fault, right? But apparently it is -- every other record I own with properly centered pressings do not warble. Oh, by pressings I mean those rings of grooves you see on the record is pressed onto vinyl and we record collectors call them pressings. :)

I find that this happens especially on the first side. I mean, six tracks with grooves tightly pressed... I can see how that would cause some issues. They had it mastered in the 80s, though! So, because of that, the last-half of Set Fire to the Rain and the entirety of He Won't Go experiences awkward warbles in places where notes are held for longer than two beats. For some reason, that grates on my nerves.

Flip the record and begin playing again ... ah, fresh and sounds good again! On my pressing, it's a little more centered than the first side and results in more even tones. Everything sounds great until, what?! My favorite Adele track, Someone Like You?!

Let me just vent a little. The track before, which is just as beautiful as Don't You Remember, sounds just as great as the rest of the record. Lovesong is a beautifully-built song that sings of how even in the typical troubles of relationships, love still gives us those butterflies and slightly crazy. Okay, cool. But Someone Like You was my anthem of 2011/2012 and I even tried to master singing it (not a good idea, by the way, and no, no audio recordings of a cover shall appear on this blog). On the record pressing though, it sounds slightly muddy. Like how an MP3 would sound at any bitrate lower than 320kbps. Which is odd for vinyl to sound -- vinyl usually sounds clearer. But it's honestly so slight that a regular listener wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

Alright, so, here's your conclusion for this record pressing of Adele's highly-popular album "21": 

• Sound Quality: 4.25 out of 5.
• This scoring is due to the two things mentioned above.
• Mastering: 4.5 out of 5.
• Overall: 4.5 out of 5.

Link to Discogs.com listing here.
You can buy this vinyl record from CDUniverse.com, Amazon.ca & Amazon.com.

Dire Straits - Brothers In Arms (Back To Black [UGM Series] Re-Release; 1985, [Re] 2010)

So! Here we are, talking about the record that sparked the idea for this blog.

Let's begin by breaking the record down.

The tracklist is as follows:

• A1: So Far Away (3.59)
• A2: Money For Nothing (7.04)
• A3: Walk Of Life (4.07)
• A4: Your Latest Trick (4.46)
• A5: Why Worry (5.22)
• B1: Ride Across The River (5.57)
• B2: The Man's Too Strong (4.40)
• B3: One World (3.40)
• B4: Brothers In Arms (6.00)

So as you can already see, all of these tracks are shorter than the re-release that is widely available, mostly available on CD and recently available on the RSD 2-LP 45RPM re-release (almost like a disease), yet a little longer than the original 1985 release. That was definitely one thing I had noticed while listening to this record. Some of the versions included on this re-release are strangely cut; for example, on Your Latest Trick and Why Worry, the music begins to fade out right after Mark Knopfler barks out his final lyrics before the long, musically whimsical instrumentals at the end, which made me question the intentions on whoever worked on this "deleted version". That was the only downside to this re-release.

Now, for sound quality, all I have to say is: WOW. Never have I heard such amazing acoustics from vinyl! I will give the record and the remasters in the studio this. With my set-up, my subwoofer nearly causes an earthquake in my house, the lows of each track is that powerful. The treble and highs are terrific and needs almost no treatment or adjustments. The sound quality, for a lack of a better phrase, is powerful. Everything you would hear from a CD recorded with today's studio standards (played on an actual stereo system, not some cheap Walmart boombox) is exactly what you hear from this vinyl. There is just one downside though, and that is on Money For Nothing. In the original pressing back in 1985, I feel as if the drums at the beginning, building up to the guitar solo, are stronger than in the repress. It's just not nearly as powerful as I have heard even on MP3 (bleck, I hate even typing that, it's so lossy). Yet the rest of track is just as great and pleasant on the ears. Hmph. Funny how that works.

Maybe it's the virgin vinyl at play, or just how well this record was mastered and pressed, but all in all, despite the weird versions of the tracks, this record is awesome and worth every penny for awesome music enjoyment. Fellow audiophiles, you will not be disappointed! Huzzah!

The conclusion:

• Sound Quality: 4.75 out of 5.
• Mastering: 4.75 out of 5.
• Overall: 4.75 out of 5.

Link to Discogs.com listing here.

You can buy this vinyl record from Amazon.ca (2-LP) & Amazon.com.

The First Post!

Hello everyone who has stumbled upon this tiny little blog!

My name is Jamie and I will be your host here. I hope I can make this blog as pleasant as I possibly can.

Now that we have the formalities are out of the way as best as I can muster, let's move onto the reason why we are here today. P.S. - I apologize ahead of time for any swears that may be read in the near future. I'm just a guy, after all. I write like how I talk.

The blog you are reading right now is a vinyl review blog. Since I was 15, I became very interested in vinyl. I was stumbling through my mother's storage one day and just happened to cross a box marked "records" and wondered what the hell was in this box. Lo and behold! did I find all of my mother's old vinyl records. The rest is history. I started my own collection of records a year after and have become continually fascinated and obsessed with vinyl ever since.

Fast forward to four years later. I was living in the big city where record shops and large shopping centres that just started selling records were aplenty. I was wandering around in London Drugs, bored on my day off from work, and shock! I found a re-release of Dire Straits' biggest selling record, "Brothers In Arms".

"Brothers In Arms" has been released and re-released since forever all across the globe. Records, cassettes, CDs, deleted and rare-to-find versions, Record Store Day (RSD) vinyl presses ... you name it. Yet for some strange reason, you'd be damned to find a good copy of this album on vinyl for a decent price. The original release, still sealed, starts as low as around $35 and works its way up to around $85. Crazy, right? Even then, the lowest priced album is the 2-LP 45RPM RSD re-release on eBay.

But finding "Brothers In Arms" in London Drugs, and the year is 2013? WOW! Must have been my lucky day. The price wasn't shabby at all, either. Double luckiness!

This re-release though was quite special, though. Or apparently, it is, according to the sticker and the website it's featured on (don't be fooled though - the version listed here is the same one you can buy on CD, yet the version on vinyl is allegedly as the following describes). The re-release came from the vaults of Universal Music Group, in their Back to Black series. I had never heard of this Back to Black re-release and finding anything on the Internet was a loss. The only thing I could read about it was that this version of "Brothers in Arms" was a special, deleted version that was hardly released. The sticker on the shrink wrap boasted being pressed on virgin 180 gram vinyl. Holy shit. A record pressed on virgin 180g vinyl in London Drugs?! That must be pretty special right? I had read about 180g vinyl and heard a lot of good things about, and a fair number of neutral reviews. But I still wanted to know more. I asked some of the employees in the electronics & audio department of London Drugs if they knew anything about the re-release I wanted to purchase, but to no avail. Nobody knew anything. Regardless, I bought the damn thing and rushed home to go listen to it.

This blog is, more or less, dedicated to that one record and that one special time when all I wanted was some information about the re-release of a damn record I had been vying for for years.

This blog is a vinyl review blog, giving you the in-depth details of the sound quality on specific records that maybe you've seen before but didn't know if it'd be worth buying, or spending the extra buck on.

Welcome. :)