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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Sibelius Piano Trio Performs "The Korppoo Trio"
Michael Leser Johnson  |  Mar 20, 2022  |  5 comments
Grammy award winning Yarlung Records out of Los Angeles California has been releasing classical music albums on CD, LP, and R2R tape since as far back as 2006, but they had somehow managed to escape my radar. Better late than never, as they possess all the ingredients necessary to delight readers of this website; including a dedication to minimalist analog recording techniques, and the curation of the finest up-and-coming classical talent working today. This label is run by people (primarily producer and engineer Bob Attiyeh) who care deeply about classical music, and are connected to first rate performers, particularly those who orbit the many concert halls of the greater Los Angeles area. In addition to running a record label, Yarlung also has an associated nonprofit called Yarlung Artists which focuses on getting promising new artists started on their touring career.

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AAA VinylNews
Candid Records Relaunch Features 5 Classics Cut From Tape by Bernie Grundman
Michael Fremer  |  Mar 19, 2022  |  17 comments
Candid Records, founded in 1960 with Nat Hentoff as A&R director produced a catalog of great jazz and blues releases that also featured superb sound. A label relaunch was announced last week with 5 exceptionally fine titles leading the way, mastered by Bernie Grundman. The press release didn't specify if BG mastered from tape or from hi-res files so before posting this I asked the publicist to clarify.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Tornado & Lock Down Produces Welch & Rawlings'  All The Good Times Are Past And Gone
Michael Fremer  |  Feb 08, 2022  |  11 comments
First their Woodland Studio took a direct hit from the tornado that tore through Nashville March of 2020, and then came the Covid lock down.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
John Coltrane Quartet's Crescent  Reissued by Verve/Acoustic Sounds
Michael Fremer  |  Feb 02, 2022  |  19 comments
Crescent, John Coltrane’s 9th Impulse! Album, released in the summer of 1964, followed a pair of live albums (Live at Birdland and Impressions [mostly live tracks from the Vanguard dates]) and a pair of collaborations (Duke Ellington & John Coltrane, and John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman) with Ballads—a quickly recorded album of standards sandwiched in between.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Coltrane "Live" At The Village Vanguard  Lives Again!
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 27, 2022  |  23 comments
Listening today to this record originally released February, 1962—60 years ago—it’s difficult to understand why it created controversy so intense that Downbeat’s editor at the time invited Coltrane and Eric Dolphy to “defend” it in print. On the other hand, if you’re looking for a jazz album entry point, this live album probably wouldn’t be it—especially side two. Sixty years on, “Chasin’ The Trane” (name given by RVG who said he literally had to “chase Coltrane” on mic to capture him during the performances) might still send some running for cover (or covers, of which there’s but one on here, Hammerstein and Romberg’s beautiful “Softly As In a Morning Sunrise”).

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AAA VinylNews
Electric Recording Company To Release Coltrane's Giant Steps In "True Mono"
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 06, 2022  |  36 comments
The Electric Recording Company announced today it will be releasing John Coltrane's ground breaking 1959 Atlantic album Giant Steps cut from the original Atlantic master tape using a mono cutter head on its 1965 all tube Lyrec cutting system.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Willie Nelson's Singing "Chops" All There On 1961 Debut
Michael Fremer  |  Dec 23, 2021  |  9 comments
The term “singer/songwriter” hadn’t yet been coined when the “hotter’n a depot stove” 29 year-old songwriter Willie Nelson stepped into the studio to record his debut album for Liberty Records. Back then, you were either a songwriter or a singer, though of course there were a very few who were both. Here, Nelson proves he was one of them

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AAA VinylNews
Blue Note Announces Round Trip: Ornette Coleman On Blue Note : First Ever "Tone Poet" Vinyl Box Set
Michael Fremer  |  Dec 07, 2021  |  12 comments
Coming January 28th: a 6 LP all-analog 180g "Tone Poet"vinyl box set containing all six 1960s Blue Note Ornette Coleman albums including his five as a leader (the two volume At The 'Golden Circle' Stockholm (1965), The Empty Foxhole (1966), New York Is Now! (1968), and Love Call (1968)—as well as Coleman's lone sideman appearances on saxophonist Jackie McLean's New And Old Gospel (1967).

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady  Often Seethes, Yet Has Sweet and Tender Moments
Michael Fremer  |  Nov 30, 2021  |  4 comments
The always defiant, sometimes bitter and often angry Charles Mingus had a habit of declaring more than a few of his records as his best, including this one. He might be correct about The Black Saint And The Sinner Lady recorded January, 1963, though Tijuana Moods and several others are definitely in the running.

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AAA VinylFeaturesVinyl Reports
Vinyl Reports: Tales From The Used Bin!
Malachi Lui  |  Nov 28, 2021  |  14 comments
(Vinyl Reports is an AnalogPlanet feature aiming to create a definitive guide to vinyl LPs. Here, we talk about sound quality, LP packaging, music, and the overarching vinyl experience.)

Real-life used record shopping is as joyful as it is potentially frustrating. These days, I mostly find used record bins of previous decades’ detritus; however, a recent browse through Asheville’s Harvest Records yielded luck. Following are reviews of three of those finds, plus one used LP ordered on Discogs.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Duke Pearson's Merry Ole Soul   Swings You Into Christmas
Michael Fremer  |  Nov 10, 2021  |  4 comments
If Vince Guaraldi's A Charlie Brown Christmas is a melancholic look back at childhood Christmas viewed through the eyes of the Peanuts gang, Duke Pearson's 1969 Blue Note release Merry Ole Soul is the Christmas record you'll want to play at a hip holiday cocktail party.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Ella Wishes You A Swinging Christmas Will Warm An Atheist's Heart
Michael Fremer  |  Nov 03, 2021  |  18 comments
Ella Fitzgerald's Christmas album is a secular holiday delight sure to please every listener, even atheists and agnostics. Originally released in 1960, the sound here is warm and inviting as a Yule log burning in the fireplace—once you get past the opener "Jingle Bells", which is somewhat brighter, brasher and more in your face than the rest, though having Ella in your face is hardly problematic.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Katanga! Proves West Coast Jazz Need Not Be "Cool"
Michael Fremer  |  Oct 05, 2021  |  21 comments
Everything is true that you might have heard or read about this “off the beaten Tone Poet path” release.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Bill Evans Trio '64  Brought A Light Touch to a Dark Time
Michael Fremer  |  Oct 01, 2021  |  17 comments
The gentle, introspective Bill Evans Trio of The Village Vanguard sessions that produced Sunday At the Village Vanguard and Waltz For Debby yielded two years later to the somewhat more rhythmically assertive trio heard on this December 18th, 1963 Webster Hall recording released early in 1964.

The late bassist Scott LaFaro’s friend Gary Peacock replaced him in the trio with Paul Motian continuing on drums. Though no less cerebral and harmonically tuned in than was LaFaro, Peacock brought to the group a faster, more aggressive rhythmic style punctuated with nimble staccato runs. More tapping of the toes and less tugging at the heart.

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AAA VinylAlbum Reviews
Mobile Fidelity Tells The Truth
Michael Fremer  |  Sep 29, 2021  |  22 comments
The Yardbirds original "Shapes of Things" took the protest song—a surprising departure from the group's blues-based output— as a smartly rendered military march with mild middle eastern undertones. Jeff Beck played on the original but here for his first solo outing he led with a slinky, heavily syncopated version that presaged by a few years Led Zep's heaviest of metal. The song's conclusion, a rhythmic meltdown to a complete stop was something altogether new to rock fans. Needless to say, back in 1968 buyers of this record had minds blown, in part thanks to the great Ken Scott's impeccable engineering skills and of course by much of the world's first exposure to Rod Stewart.

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