2. analog
  3. 157640-89202

The very best sound: Direct to Disc

Since I got a new cartridge (Clear Audio Virtuoso) i’ve rediscovered the Sheffield and RR Direct Disc albums in my collection.  
Wow! they put everything else to shame.  I picked up about twenty Sheffield D2D’s when Tower Records went out of business for a song (no pun intended.) I’m just now listening to them and find there’s nothing that sonically compares.  They’re just more real sounding than anything else.  Not spectacular but realistic.   
rvpiano
gp4jesus
37 posts
 
Just chiming in on a topic that drives us all bonkers for the right reason: the music!
rauliruegas
13,129 posts
 
Dear @bdp24 : Now that you named the Virgil Fox by Crystal Clear ( I own it both recordings. ) the Bach organ scores in the D2D M&K recordings could be a little better engineered but in reality is hard to say it.. As I posted before not all D2D has the same top quality sound but the ones that have it are just outstanding and nothing beats it.

""" and drummer Jim Keltner .."""

well the Keltner track in the Sheffield Drum Record is just excellent, impressive and so full of TRUE that even we can’t " believe " exist this quality level sound in LP.

Yes For Duke with Bill Berry is great too. It’s very dificult to say which of so many D2D is the best, maybe could be better to say: the 10 best and that Flamenco Fever with out doubt can be in that list.
Btw, do you own it?

In my posts in this thread I forgot to mention that to listen and appreciate all the unique splendor of D2D recordings we must to listen at a little or not so little higher SPL over our normal SPL we listened. This is an important subject.


""" Doug Sax had proven in the early-1970’s that a direct-to-disc LP afforded higher sound quality than any tape recording ever made. """


no single doubt about ! ! !

If we are MUSIC lovers and like to enjoy it at the higher levels LP recordings can achieve we have to listen at least one of the top D2D through our audio life because with out that you can understand of what quality level we are talking in this thread with this specific subject.

R.
tomic601's avatar
tomic601
13,182 posts
 
@bdp24 thanks for the history :-) I recently acquired a few of the titles you mentioned ( Fox Vol 1 and 2, Sheffield Test and 6 other D2D for $1.92 each....

The LA 4 disc is a fascinating study of microphone selection and the jacket includes the recording layout as well as EQ settings... that will shock the anti tone control crowd...
tomic601's avatar
tomic601
13,182 posts
 
Personally I would love to hear Gillian Welch / David R do a D2D


bdp24's avatar
bdp24
10,277 posts
 

One reason many d-2-d LP’s are so musically tepid is the musicians’ fear of making a mistake, which requires scrapping the lacquer and starting anew. The cost of doing that runs into thousands of dollars. That’s why Sax and Mayorga used the best studio musicians, who are used to working under the intense pressure of studio recording, which can be very intimidating to non-studio players. Bands actually break up while making their first recordings, finally hearing what they actually sound like. Such was the case for Russ Kunkel, who went on to become a very successful studio drummer (James Taylor, Carole King, Linda Ronstadt, Carly Simon, Jackson Browne, Stephen Stills, Lyle Lovett, etc.). The other members of the band he moved to L.A. with continued to toil in obscurity.

The Thelma Houston Sheffield is a little brash, some thinking there is overload taking place somewhere in the chain (the cutter head or electronics, the mic pre-amps, or perhaps even the mics). The Sheffield Drum Record suffers no such imperfection; just clean, extremely dynamic drumsets played by Keltner and Elvis’ drummer Ron Tutt. Keltner’s playing is good, but Tutt choked a little. ;-)

I don’t own Flamenco Fever or the L.A. 4 discs, having grown weary of using mediocre music as source material for speaker evaluations before finding copies. Time is too precious to me now to waste on just good sound---I turned 70 last week. Plus, I'm done evaluating loudspeakers.

More to discover