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I am currently looking at a moderately large pile of vinyl that represents the audiophile output of Blue Note in 2019 – a combination of the Tone Poet and Blue Note 80 series. Tone Poet is a Don Was / Joe Harley project that released a number of BN recordings, identical to the Music Matters 33rpm series, under the Universal Music moniker for roughly the same price ($35.99) –  but actually distributed in Europe (for about €40). These are beautifully presented glossy hard cardboard products with glorious photographs of the artists. The vinyl was mastered – all analogue – where possible – from the original master tapes – by Kevin Gray and pressed at RTI. Perfect provenance. And yes, the records all sound great. In total, 16 Tone Poet albums were released. Only one, by Cassandra Wilson, was a double. The records were all terrific, but I have to confess – if I was given $525 (plus tax) / €600 and told that I could buy any 15 of the Music Matters 33rpm or any of the Tone Poets, I’m not sure that any of these would have made the cut (possibly “Contours” by Sam Rivers and “Cornbread” by Lee Morgan). Certainly, none of the albums could be considered the best that that particular artist produced for Blue Note records. For Music Matters collectors, buying these records was a no brainer: they already have the popular stuff. For audiophiles, who cannot afford the ludicrous prices that one would have to pay in Europe for MM 33rpm (up to $100), one would feel a bit short changed. Here is a thought: send the metal stampers for the MM 33rpm series to Optimal or Pallas, press off a couple of thousand copies of those albums, and sell them for €40 in Europe. It doesn’t matter whether they are under the Universal or MM brand – they are the best pressings of the best recordings of the best jazz reissue series ever.

Weirdly and simultaneously, Blue Note released its 80th anniversary series in May. Aside from being housed in standard record sleeves with sand-paper-ish inner sleeves, these records were remastered AAA (where possible) by Kevin Gray and pressed at Optimal (which means that you likely have to clean them before playing – if you do so they are really good). So far 22 albums have been released – with 21 more in the new year. The albums have released in groups of 3 – under a theme – debuts, Reid Miles covers, live, grooves, great drummers (!) etc. Honestly, this method of selection is bizarre. Much as I love the cover art of BN – I buy records for the music not the cover. I was disappointed by the sound quality of the first album – Takin’ Off by Herbie Hancock – but the rest have been very good to excellent. “Hand Jive” is probably my least favorite John Scofield album – and it was digitally sourced – and I have a bit of buyers’ remorse here – the cover isn’t even cool. I didn’t buy the Robert Glasper album. The second Herbie Hancock – well it’s good but (aside from the Prisoner) probably his weakest BN album. The Art Blakey live albums were interesting – but – honestly they sat on a shelf for decades because the sound is only ok (certainly not in the top 20 best BN live albums – and 2 LPs to boot). “Hub Tones” and “In and Out” are true BN classics and should be in any record collection. I already had them – so cannot comment about the sound quality. And the rest – well – they are all good. I wouldn’t have rushed out to buy the Bobby Humphries or Reuben Wilson LPs – but they sat in my listening space on heavy rotation for weeks – they are terrific. Special mention should go to the Jutta Hipp with Zoot Simms record – it is a joyous recording from 1956 that really swings. Hipp, who was German, disappeared off the planet subsequently.  She cut off all ties from the music industry, worked in a clothing factors and eventually died in 2003.  An original pressing would set you back more than €200 in reasonable condition.

No doubt, BN 80 is a great reissue series, an excellent product at a reasonable price.There are 21 BN 80 albums yet to be released. Again, these are not the crown jewels of the BN catalog (most of which were reissued – cut from digital for the BN 75 and didn’t sound great).
One of the issues with vinyl records is that they require non an insignificant amount of storage space. The Tone Poet albums take up roughly the space of 2.4 BN 80s. Do they have long term collectable value – who knows?

I do think that these vinyl reissues lay down a marker for other companies and the type of product that they are releasing. Chief among these is Concord records  – who release reissued audiophile vinyl under the “Craft” recordings moniker. Concord own the Fantasy recordings – that include Fantasy, Stax, Riverside, Prestige and Contemporary – i.e. basically all of the great recordings in jazz not released by BN or Columbia or Verve during the 1950s and 1960s. To date they have been releasing some great recordings, on vinyl, sourced from digital copies of the original master tapes. They do sound good – the Creedence Clearwater Revival vinyl box set and Terry Callier’s “New Folk Sound” and the 10″ Collection by Thelonius Monk, are representative examples. Unfortunately Sonny Rollins’ “Way Out West” – the most important recording, I believe, on the Contemporary label (I think the Contemporary records sound better than Blue Notes – although I have never heard first pressing BNs)  – despite a lovely box set presentation – was aurally mediocre. Craft are celebrating the 70th anniversary of Prestige records. They needed to be creative as Analogue Productions produced an incredible Prestige reissue series. Craft’s prestige output so far has included a great, digitally sourced, John Coltrane box set and the forthcoming  Miles Davis Prestige recordings . The laquers for these were cut by Clint Holley at Well Made Music from hi-res digital transfers of the original master tapes. Hmmm,
The good news is that Craft seem to be getting the message: the soon to be released Chet Baker box set contains four Riverside albums cut AAA by Kevin Gray from the original masters. A recent release the “The Country Blues of John Lee Hooker” has similar provenance. I don’t know why they have not been doing this all along (as Michael Fremer says – “Use the fucking tapes!”

~ by Pat Neligan on November 21, 2019.

Posted in Box Sets, Hi-Fi, Music Lists, Retromania, Vinyl
Tags: blue note, blue note 80, tone poet, vinyl reissues