Yes I have used the U.K. Bluenote store. One thing to be aware of is if you order multiple titles they will not ship your order until they have all the titles in stock.
Thanks for the feedback on the UK Bluenote store. They have a couple of titles in stock so I may take a punt. My copy of Herbie's Takin' Off has arrived. Fingers crossed that it's a good 'un with no non-fill or other nasties!
"Takin' Off" was playing well (other than some very obvious instances of wow & flutter as mentioned up-thread) until I heard some weird distortions during the final track on Side B, Alone and I. I can't see any obvious sign of stitching although it sounds more like a strange buzzing noise rather than the "zirrrrp" kind of noise you get from stitching. I'm going to listen to this track from on my redbook CD version but I can't help but think I'd have noticed if I'd heard it before.
"Takin' Off" definitely had some stitching/ non-fill related distortion so went back. I had better luck with "Indestructible!" from good old Art Blakey and his Jazz Messengers though. This just played through without any incident which is good! Today I received a replacement copy of Takin' Off, this time without any non-fill which is good. Less good was the copy of Reubin Wilson's "Blue Mode" which had small scratches causing clicks at the end of Side A then some glorious non-fill at the start of Side B. So this is going back...
Got my replacement copy of "Blue Mode". Side A was utterly flawless but unfortunately Side B had the same dismal non-fill distortion as the previous copy. Not going to try a third.
Playing Bobby Humphrey's Blacks and Blues again... perfect on this beautiful Sunday morning in Cardiff (actually, gone 1pm now). I knew I'd love the flute and the gentle funk on this album but also love the arrangements... they reward concentrated listening.
Got hold of Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers - Buhaina's Delight today. The record surface has lots of hairline scratches/ scuffs. Side A played ok but Side B has some bad crackle and popping during the first track. So that's another one to go back...
In case anyone's interested, Amazon is getting stock of Morgan's The Rumproller in mid-November so I guess it was repressed.
On Monday I took delivery of no less than four BN80 titles and I'm happy to say that all four of them are keepers. Interesting that two of them came with paper sleeves and two with poly-lined sleeves: not sure if that's because they started using these later on in the run or because they're re-presses but regardless, it's nice to get a load of records for which I don't have to go through the hassle of returning.
I picked one up. Sounds great, and for the new pressings, they have upgraded to poly lined sleeves (and bumped the retail price by a couple of bucks) like the recent Classic Vinyl Series releases.
Introducing Johnny Griffin is currently £9.99 on Amazon U.K. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07PYJ3YBX/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_1VPYQN4Y3TE0SNJMKC25.
Strange that this thread seems to go dormant. I suppose that any discussion on the BN80 titles tends to end up in the Classics thread? Well since my earlier post I recently added Herbie Hancock's 'Inventions and Dimensions'. It's another gem and one of my favourite Herbie albums although, as with 'Takin' Off' does suffer from the much-discussed wow and flutter. My first copy had a number of instances of stitching distortion but my replacement copy only has one brief instance of it. These titles are a bit hit and miss on the QC front, but I'm not saying anything new here!
To be clear, I think they only suffered from flutter, not 'wow', which is something you might hear if the LP were pressed off-center. In any event, it's a GREAT record, one of my favorite of Herbie's.
While it's safe to assume the original elements were captured digitally, do we know for sure if Fellowship has an analog or digital master? MD & AS say all analog FWIW... Brian Blade - Brian Blade Fellowship (80th) (180g Vinyl 2LP) - Music Direct Brian Blade-Brian Blade Fellowship-180 Gram Vinyl Record|Acoustic Sounds
Looking at the liner notes for the CD, Blade mentions the recording engineer and says, "may we ride into ten thousand sunsets, 883". The 883 is an analog mixer, so if we read this knowing that, we can safely assume it was at least mixed in analog.
Has anyone here ordered the framed artwork from Blue Note. I've thought about ordering the Out to Lunch (42" x 42") but I was wondering what the frame depth was and if it's framed behind plexi-glass, etc? Any information is appreciated.