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Choosing between Reissue and Original pressings

Reissues have been common since quite some time but these days as vinyl has picked up momentum again, there have been some very high quality reissues from labels like Classic, Analogue Productions, Speakers corner, MFSL, Boxstar etc. For any particular album how do you decide whether buy a good reissue or get a good copy of original pressing from ebay ?

For the sake of discussion lets keep out exceptions where the original pressing is too hard to get or too expensive. In most cases it is possible to buy a copy of original pressing for sane amount of money if one shops carefully on ebay but I have also found that quite a few times a high quality reissue can sound better. Whats the general thought among hardcore vinyl followers here ?
pani

Showing 1 response by roscoeiii

roscoeiii's avatar
roscoeiii
1,155 posts
 
Pressings are really a case by case thing in my experience. As such, SH Forum is a great resource to find out about particular pressings. My go-to site for vinyl related questions.

That said, there are some details that can help you make educated decisions.

1) where the LP was pressed (currently IME: Good=QRP, RTI or Pallas;Bad/Inconsistent=United, Rainbo; Rainbo for example pressed the Beatles reissues which there are tons of QC complaints about).

2) Who remastered the record (Safe bets: Hoffman, Gray, Bellman)

3) Limitations of the original pressings (poor vinyl quality, rolled off in the bass, poor pressing plant)

There have been some fabulous reissues lately, that were clearly superior to my early pressings: QRP's Tea For the Tillerman, MoFi's Music From the Big Pink and the Basement Tapes jump to mind.
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