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Product DetailTrack ListingAMG Review
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VINYL PLAYGRADE:(?) |
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Mint Minus to Mint Minus Minus |
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Mint Minus to Mint Minus Minus |
This copy was full-bodied, clear and lively, the three things it most needed to be!
What to Listen For (WTLF)
Top end extension is critical to the sound of the best copies. Lots of old records (and new ones) have no real top end; consequently the studio or stage will be missing much of its natural air and space, and instruments -- especially the critical percussion instruments -- will lack the full complement of harmonic information.
In addition, when the top end is rolled off the upper midrange and high frequencies get jammed together -- the highs can't extend up and away from the upper mids. This causes a number of much-too-common problems that we hear in the upper midrange of many of the records we play: congestion, hardness, harshness and squawk.
Painstaking VTA adjustment is absolutely critical if you want your records to play with the least amount of these problems, a subject we discuss in the Commentary section of the site at length.
Jazz/Rock Fusion
What the best sides of this Latin Jazz-Rock Fusion album from 1972 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 1972
Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low
Natural tonality in the midrange -- with all the horns, keyboards, guitars, drums and percussion having the correct sound for this kind of recording
Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional studio space
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 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.
TRACK LISTING
Side One
Eternal Caravan Of Reincarnation
Waves Within
Look Up (To See What's Coming Down)
Just In Time To See The Sun
Song Of The Wind
All The Love Of The Universe
Side Two
Future Primitive
Stone Flower
La Fuente Del Ritmo
Every Step Of The Way
AMG 4 1/2 Star Rave Review
Drawing on rock, salsa, and jazz, Santana recorded one imaginative, unpredictable gem after another during the 1970s. But Caravanserai is daring even by Santana's high standards. Carlos Santana was obviously very hip to jazz fusion -- something the innovative guitarist provides a generous dose of on the largely instrumental Caravanserai.
Whether its approach is jazz-rock or simply rock, this album is consistently inspired and quite adventurous. Full of heartfelt, introspective guitar solos, it lacks the immediacy of Santana or Abraxas. Like the type of jazz that influenced it, this pearl (which marked the beginning of keyboardist/composer Tom Coster's highly beneficial membership in the band) requires a number of listenings in order to be absorbed and fully appreciated.
But make no mistake: this is one of Santana's finest accomplishments.
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