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Super Hot StamperThe Rolling Stones
Aftermath
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Product DetailTrack ListingAMG ReviewDave Hassinger - Engineer
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SONIC GRADE: (?) |
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| Side one: |
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| Side two: |
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VINYL PLAYGRADE:(?) |
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| Side one: |
Mint Minus Minus |
| Side two: |
Mint Minus Minus |
The sound of this pressing is going to be very hard to beat. Until just recently it had been ages since we'd found a copy of Aftermath with sound quality of this caliber to list on the site. It's surprisingly clean, clear and smooth, with prodigious amounts of Tubey Magic, which is the kind of sound that lets you play the album at the appropriate volume -- LOUD.
Although some songs sound amazing, not every track is well recorded. We just have to accept that the Stones are not The Beatles when it comes consistent quality for their earliest recordings. However, a strong copy like this one paired with the great music on the album will certainly deliver a lot of pleasure to audiophile Stones fans.
What the best sides of this Stones Classic from 1966 have to offer is not hard to hear:
The biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space
The most Tubey Magic, without which you have almost nothing. CDs give you clean and clear. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes in 1966Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low
Natural tonality in the midrange -- with the guitars and drums having the correct sound for this kind of recording
Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional space of the studio
No doubt there's more but we hope that should do for now. Playing the record is the only way to hear all of the qualities we listed above, and playing the best pressings against a pile of other copies under rigorously controlled conditions is the only way to find a pressing that sounds as good as this one does.
Finally! Top Sound for the Stones
This is our favorite of the early Stones records. You can't argue with Lady Jane and Under My Thumb, two of the best tracks this band ever put down on tape.
Lady Jane, Under My Thumb and Mother's Little Helper are three of the best sounding tracks on side one. On side two Out of Time and I Am Waiting are especially well recorded
Credit must go to the engineering talents of Dave Hassinger. You can read more about him in the link above.
What We Listen For on Aftermath
Energy for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?
Then: presence and immediacy. The vocals aren't "back there" somewhere, lost in the mix. They're front and center where any recording engineer worth his salt -- Dave Hassinger in this case -- would put them.
The Big Sound comes next -- wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.
Then transient information -- fast, clear, sharp attacks, not the smear and thickness so common to these LPs.
Tight punchy bass -- which ties in with good transient information, also the issue of frequency extension further down.
Next: transparency -- the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the instruments.
Extend the top and bottom and voila, you have The Real Thing -- an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.
Vinyl Condition
Mint Minus Minus is about as quiet as any vintage pressing will play, and since only the right vintage pressings have any hope of sounding good on this album, that will most often be the playing condition of the copies we sell. (The copies that are even a bit noisier get listed on the site are seriously reduced prices or traded back in to the local record stores we shop at.)
Those of you looking for quiet vinyl will have to settle for the sound of other pressings and Heavy Vinyl reissues, purchased elsewhere of course as we have no interest in selling records that don't have the vintage analog magic of these wonderful recordings.
If you want to make the trade-off between bad sound and quiet surfaces with whatever Heavy Vinyl pressing might be available, well, that's certainly your prerogative, but we can't imagine losing what's good about this music -- the size, the energy, the presence, the clarity, the weight -- just to hear it with less background noise.
TRACK LISTING
Side One
Mothers Little Helper
Superb! On the best copies this track is so transparent you can feel the cool air of the studio.
Stupid Girl
Somewhat dark and compressed as a rule.
Lady Jane
Wow! On the best pressings this one is killer. You won't hear too many better sounding Stones songs from this period.
Under My Thumb
On the best copies this song has amazing bass. It's what makes the song work, check it out.
Doncha Bother Me
Goin' Home
Very nice sound as a rule.
Side Two
Flight 505
High and Dry
Out Of Time
Wow -- on the best copies the intro to this song is Demo Disc Quality (all things considered) but it gets compressed and harmonically distorted as they keep adding layers of tape.
It's Not Easy
Listen to that tape hiss -- if it's correct all the highs will be there.
I Am Waiting
This track can have especially sweet guitars.
Take It Or Leave It
Think
What To Do
AMG 5 Star Rave Review
The Rolling Stones finally delivered a set of all-original material with this LP, which also did much to define the group as the bad boys of rock & roll with their sneering attitude toward the world in general and the female sex in particular.
The borderline misogyny could get a bit juvenile in tunes like "Stupid Girl." But on the other hand the group began incorporating the influences of psychedelia and Dylan into their material with classics like "Paint It Black," an eerily insistent number one hit graced by some of the best use of sitar (played by Brian Jones) on a rock record. Other classics included the jazzy "Under My Thumb," where Jones added exotic accents with his vibes, and the delicate Elizabethan ballad "Lady Jane," where dulcimer can be heard...
Dave Hassinger - Engineer
As a staff engineer at RCA's Hollywood studios in the 1960s, David Hassinger worked on a number of important and classic recordings. The most famous of these, perhaps, are mid-'60s tracks that the Rolling Stones recorded in Hollywood, including the entirety of their 1966 album, Aftermath. They also include, however, the first two Jefferson Airplane albums, along with efforts by Sam Cooke, Love, the Monkees, the Byrds (their first attempt at "Eight Miles High," re-recorded later for official release), Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, and others. Hassinger also attempted to establish himself as a producer in the late '60s, with limited success, most notably with the Electric Prunes and the first Grateful Dead album.
Hassinger's work with the Rolling Stones was probably pivotal in expanding his musical and professional horizons. The Stones liked working in American studios, and during their mid-'60s tours in the States, they would often record in that country, including sessions at RCA in Hollywood. Hassinger first worked with them at the end of 1964, and did engineering on tracks that appeared on Out of Our Heads and December's Children. He did all of Aftermath, even writing the liner notes. The palette of sounds and instruments on the record -- marimbas, dulcimer, sitar, harpsichord, and fuzz bass -- was a challenge for both the Stones and the producer (Andrew Oldham) and engineer.
Allmusic
(RCA) wasn't as funky as Chess obviously but it was more commercial. And (Dave Hassinger) really... he had a good ear, he'd get good sounds, and we experimented with more instruments... And he'd always get good sounds so we'd always get a good take at 3 or 4 shots at a song.
Bill Wyman
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