AP had a couple of these 45s available at $25 just a year or so ago. I’m not sure the market for all of these would be there. IMHO Rollins Vol 2 would be the only one of that group deserving of another reissue so soon. I really like Whims of Chambers personally, but it was one of the last AP 45s to sell out. I guess you could say the same for the Rollins though.
I remember that AP $25 sale on the BN 45 series. I think I bought a half dozen or so. But I don’t remember Whims of Chambers being part of it. I didn’t get that one. I have an old Liberty I think.
Whims is probably Chambers best album of his 3 as leader from Blue Note. Imo of course. Bass on Top did pretty well so I would think this would too.
Yeah, Whims was not a part of it. Hub Cap and New Soil definitely were. Maybe the Rollins also, but I don’t remember. I’ve had that one for years. I don’t disagree, but it took the AP over a decade to sell out, and they didn’t press all that many.
Id argue that the vast majority of audiophile jazz sales in general happened in the last 4 years. Even 5 or 6 years ago the demand was significantly lower than it is today. I feel like the amount of jazz fans willing to buy audiophile jazz records have quadrupled in the past 4 years
fantastic post!! btw: can you help out a rookie collector out here -- where does one go to shop for these "minty gems" from japan ?!
I don’t recall the Rollins being part of it, but I already had ot too. I picked up New Soil, Hub Cap, plus A.T.’s Delight, Davis Cup, Introducing the Three Sounds, Blowing in From Chicago, Dippin’ and Movin n Groovin’. So it was eight titles I picked up for $25 each. I think I have about 35 titles or so of the AP 50.
As I recall, only 4 titles made it across the pond in the ‘sale’ (but I could be wrong) @ £45 a pop. New Soil Tokyo Blues AT’s Delight Dippin’ I bought the first 2 on that list but in hindsight should have nabbed them all
I also have Whims of Chambers on backorder, but at full price ($55). There are still maybe a half dozen titles left from the two series of 50 (25x2).
Yeah, because Dippin’ is a definite classic. I have a OG mono, but the AP stereo 45 sounds great. AT’s Delight was new to me but I’m glad I have it. I think there were about a dozen titles available on the sale. I bought eight, but had the others already, IIRC.
My experience and observations are that I have had better buying experiences on eBay than Discogs. Of course, every scenario is unique. You'll also see the same seller offering the same item on both platforms, at the same time. I've seen that quite a bit. I'd guess they'd just have to end their auction on eBay in a timely fashion if someone buys it off Discogs. Sometimes the item is a few dollars less on Discogs. I've yet to sell there so I don't know if this phenomenon reflects lower seller costs on Discogs versus eBay's fees. Specifically, these minty gems were purchased from eBay seller, bullsite2000. I've also had excellent results with another mainstream heavy eBay seller in Japan, facerecords. Anymore, the highest description facerecords gives is E/E (excellent/excellent), for the jacket and the vinyl disc. They used to use NM (near mint) but I haven't seen that for a while. Maybe it was more expeditious to quote Excellent than deal with return/refund scenarios. Despite the recent reality that facerecords doesn't use the NM description, where possible on eBay, I always stick with NM -- especially when one is dealing with shipping fees, which typically start ~$20, from Japan. Back to eBay seller, bullsite2000, this seller does not have any current offerings. When I find a seller whose description meets or exceeds my expectations, I tend to stay with them. Surprises are rarely to the benefit of the buyer. Ha. I'll be watching for future offerings from bullsite2000. A couple of other fine sellers, who I deal with on Discogs: ella records in Japan, and moby-disques in France. A final selling platform, which I only recently discovered: Vinyl Records by AudioPhile USA . I was doing a very thorough and deep search for an obscure vinyl series and a link to their site came across my radar. I'd never heard of them. I just bought three records in one order from them. The service, packaging, and items were A+++ in my book. I think their website is cumbersome compared to eBay and Discogs. But if I recall, they don't fool around with subpar material. I believe they own their inventory. It's not a third-party seller platform. They only sell the best of the best. That was my experience, based on a single order for three vintage items, all listed as NOS (new old stock). I would agree they truly were NOS.
I’ll second that recommendation of Ella Records in Japan. Have bought a stack of jazz records from them over the years and every experience has been excellent. They also grade very conservatively so their VG+ ratings are as good as NM. And in the very rare occurrence of a a problem with the order they quickly and politely sort it out. Packaging is excellent and shipping lightning quick even to Australia. Apart from modern reissues most of my Blue Notes / Prestige jazz is from Japan and a fair bit of that from Ella in Japan.
oh and didn’t notice you also mentioned facerecords on EBay. I can second that recommendation too. They’re also quite good and I’ve nabbed a few real bargains on their auctions. Also quite courteous and quick to ship. Who knows we’ve probably bid against each other from time to time too!
Just be very cautious about the grading system facerecords uses. I bought a few E- records one time and was really disappointed. I felt very dumb when I read the grading system more closely. E+ seems to translate to NM. "E" seems to be what most sellers would call VG or VG+, and "E-" is VG or VG-. What facerecords calls "VG+" is probably more like a "G."
Maybe I’ve been lucky but I’ve never had a problem with them. I’ve bought about 10 records from them over the last 12 month graded between “E+”, “E” and “E-“ and they’ve all been well within my expectations. Ironically I’m less nervous these days about buying a 50 or 60 year old second hand record than a brand new record that should be ‘mint’ out of the shrinkwrap…..
I remember many people being quite upset and vowing “I’ll never pay that much for a record” when the Music Matters titles debuted at $50 a pop. How times have changed.
thanks so much for the information! this is of great help and should get me started in accessing these LPs.
Revisiting Jimmy Smith's Prayer Meetin': what a nice late night listen. The Tone Poet is a treat. I love Stanley Turrentine's tone, he could really work a groove. Now I feel that I need to put Back At The Chicken Shack and Midnight Special on the turntable.
that's quite a score MisterBritt! I recently picked up Bill Evans 'interplay' as part of the same series and was a bit bummed on the SQ - was wondering if you had that one as well and could comment on your experience with the sound.
Boo!!!!!!!!!!! Typical Brave loss last night. Not over yet...At least those Bulldogs look great this year. Some awesome posts above and somehow I'm in the mood to listen to some AP 45s...go figure. "Bass On Top" is a must play later as well. And you Beatles fans got your "Let It Be" box last week, not my cup of tea, but arriving Friday will be my 5 LP box set with hard cover book of "Tattoo You" 40th Anniversary. Now we are talking! The wife is heading to St. Louis tomorrow for a nice visit and going to overdose on music while she is away. But now that I think about it, that sure is nothing new.
I said I wasn't picking up any more Blue Note reissues after my experience thus far, but a 20% discount coupon on ebay with a UK seller led me to picking up another BN80 and another Tone Poet title. Things got off to a bad start this evening when the BN80 title revealed itself to be yet another defective title And when I put my copy of McCoy Tyner's Expansions on the record cleaning machine, I thought I'd just got my most off-centred record ever as it rotated. However upon playing it seemed that the record wasn't so much off-centre (no tonearm sway at all) but misshapen i.e. not perfectly circular. It seems free of any stitching/ non-fill/ scratches and seems to play pretty nicely. So it seems a keeper. Still have to wonder about QC at one of the world's most esteemed plants. Surely RTI shouldn't be putting stuff like this out...
First, I wanted to do some housekeeping. That post of mine was actually supposed to be formatted as a reply to @Dai 's reference to "double-double basses." He came up with that expression for two upright bassists on the same tune, not me. I think that's great. Next, as to the matter of the Bill Evans Interplay album. My memory of that album matched your experience about the sound quality. To be thorough, however, I just put that album on listened to both sides. It's really not as poor as I recalled. In fact, it's "okay" to my ear. Nothing great like the wonderful Bill Evans Trio dates, Waltz for Debby, and Sunday at the Village Vanguard. Those are exceptional, twin pinnacles against which all others might be measured. One observation I might share is that there seems to be a general dullness to the Interplay session. I've got meters on my dedicated phono preamp and they mostly loiter around the -20 to -10 dB range, then bam! they'll leap clear out to 0 dB on the transients. Boy, it doesn't sound that dynamic to my ear. I'm recognizing those transients as the threshold under which the musical program must be held. Otherwise, we'd get a mess (such as many of us experienced with the Joe Henderson Vol. 1 Tone Poet). Adding to this, it seems to me like there is a lot of thermal noise or ambient sound in the studio. It seems like Interplay was not mic'd as well as the other Bill Evans dates -- too distant from the musicians. Looking under the hood, we have discovered this date was done at the Nola Recording Studio, aka "Nola Penthouse Studios," located above the Steinway piano factory, 111 West 57th Street, New York, NY 10019. I might have guessed Nola Recording Studio was in New Orleans. Not so. Apparently, this location has always served as the headquarters for Steinway and Sons, including a recording studio (the 16th Floor must have previously been the penthouse), and was later built upon the original 16 floors to now manifest as an 84 story skyscraper. I used to work within stone's throw from there and never knew about the recording studio. I would have invited myself in for a tour. Ha. We see the additional residential stories weren't added until about ten years ago, long after I'd left. At any rate, it might be that the Nola Recording Studio was not up to snuff versus Riverside's usual recording facilities, Reeves Sound Studios (on East 44th Street) or Bell Sound Studios (West 54th Street) in Manhattan. I'll probably spend more time under the hood, researching these various recording facilities. None of them, in my opinion, comes close to the spectacular sound captured live by engineer Dave Jones at the Village Vanguard. Speaking of which, several years ago I rolled up my sleeves years ago trying to get a better idea why the Bill Evans Trio live dates at the Village Vanguard sound so great. One ingredient is engineer, Dave Jones. Another might be the fabulous Sony C37 tube microphone he used. Both albums were mastered, by the way, at the Plaza Sound Studios, the home base of Riverside Records on West 50th, the eighth floor of Radio City Music Hall. Here is the gear rundown (source: cut and pasted from Discogs) on the Bill Evans Trio's Village Vanguard dates: Microphone: Sony C37 Tube Type Tape Recorder: AMPEX 350 Modified Tape: Scotch 111 Speed: 15 IPS Track: 2-Track Mixing: Hand-built custom console, tube type Add all of this together, and we might be comparing an also-ran Bill Evans date (is there such a thing?), Interplay, against what I consider the gold standard(s) of his career, the Waltz for Debby and Saturday at the Village Vanguard dates. The recently remastered Analog Productions Trio 64 album, by the way, was recorded by Bob Simpson, who worked exclusively out of RCA Studio A, and the piano sounds a bit muted, not unlike a Rudy Van Gelder production. While the upcoming AP reissue of Trio '65 was engineered by RVG, and the piano sounds fabulous. (I haven't heard the upcoming AP reissue, of course; my minty Japan vinyl is my reference.) Go figure. Long story short, I don't think Interplay is an abomination, but I don't think it's anything special.
@Petter Premberg Hi Petter, could you say where you've ordered these from ..if not publicly then kindly pm me thanks
