AAA Vinyl

What a voice, what a loss. Dolores O'Riordan, lead singer of the Irish group The Cranberries died suddenly in London January 15th, 2018 at age 46. She was in town for a recording session.

O'Riordan wrote lyrics and on some of the group's songs, the music as well, including three on this, the group's 1993 debut album. She also wrote music and lyrics on probably the group's best known song "Zombie"—her reaction to terrorist bombings by the Irish Republican Army—which is not on this album.

Beginning in the late ‘70s, continuing throughout the 1980s and once in 1994 Wilson Audio Specialties founder Dave Wilson released a series of records that he co-produced with wife Sheryl Lee, many of which he also engineered. They were minimally miked—often a spaced pair of Schoeps was all—and mastered by an all-star lineup of disc cutters including Bruce Leek (who also shared engineering credit on some), Stan Ricker and Doug Sax (Google if any of the names are unfamiliar). The tape machine for all but the very early organ record Recital (Wilson W-278) was an Ultramaster™ by John Curl, a highly modified Studer 1/2" deck running at 30 IPS.

Mobile Fidelity just announced the availability for order of its Bridge Over Troubled Water reissue, produced as a limited to 7500 copies "one-step" double 45rpm release.

During the great folk music revival of the 1960s how many buyers of Peter, Paul & Mary's stunning debut album knew who was the Reverend Gary Davis, writer of the apocalyptic side 2 opener "If I Had My Way"? Probably very few. In those days you'd have to visit the local library to find out who he was, assuming you paid attention to label credits in the first place.

After the messy "supergroup" hype surrounding Blind Faith—more a one-off money maker than a group formed to last—Eric Clapton decided to downplay his fame and so was born in 1970 Derek and the Dominoes and the Layla... double LP that initially flopped. Many people today forget that, but flop it did. It didn't help that it was a costly double LP by an "unknown" group.

Pianist Jamie Saft's trio recorded a well-received, sonically superb 2014 album called New Standard. If you need a group or individual backgrounder, please hit that hyperlink.