Half speed masters. Are they worth the extra scratch?

Tom Port got after me about some of the misinformation above. No, not mine. Others. He has a point. But the parts I explained are perfectly clear, and true. 

Rather than try and set the record straight let me just say not everything claimed to be from the original master, or half speed mastered, or whatever, actually is as claimed.   

For example, an "Original Master Recording" from MoFi so hilariously obviously NOT from the original master- Al Stewart Year of the Cat - was so bad it did not even have the piano in the beginning of On the Border, at all. By "at all" I mean "at all". Not buried deep down in the mix. Not muffled hard to make out. "AT ALL!" 

This particular pressing was so bad I sent it to Tom just to play, to show anyone just how truly awful a reissue can be. I have a very normal beat up and played a lot average vintage copy that is light years better than this MoFi. Tom sold me a White Hot Stamper and you better believe it is light years better than my average vintage copy.  

There are so many steps in the chain, so many opportunities for dreck to creep in, it is a miracle there are any good records out there at all. In any format. With LP, add to that the challenge of squishing plastic into grooves the size of a organic molecule. No wonder the only way to know for sure is to drop the needle and listen. 

That is what Tom Port does every day. If you really care about sound quality that is what you will do too. Or pay Tom to do it for you. That you can rely on. Labels that say half speed mastered, audiophile, original master, etc, those you cannot rely on. At all. 

MoFi has it’s detractors (obviously), and the company is to blame for their spotty record (ouch ;-) . However, one needs to know that not all Mobile Fidelity LP’s are created equally. You need to know about the history of the company, who was doing the mastering, plating, and pressing at the time a reissue was done. The sound characteristics can be broken down into two separate phases: the current Music Direct-owned releases, and those of the former ownership.

The MoFi Beatles LP’s, for example, are not as good as original UK LP’s. I had a complete set of both UK Parlophone (stereo) and MoFi pressings (just ’cause I could), but when the mono boxset was released I sold all my MoFi’s, the proceeds of which many times over paid for the box.

On the other hand, most "current" MoFi’s are really, really good. Whereas Stan Ricker was doing the mastering at MoFi in the 70’s and 80’s (and is responsible for the bass-heavy sound of the Beatles LP’s---he was a bass player ;-) , MoFi’s current team is one of the very best in the world.

Then there is Analogue Productions. In my opinion they are making the best LP’s the world has ever seen, uh, heard. Chad Kassem takes making records VERY seriously, and his products show it. If you want proof of that, at 12:00 noon CST tomorrow (Saturday, 5-8) on the YouTube channel "45 RPM Audiophile", there is going to be a live stream panel discussion about making records. The participants will be Chad, Classic Records owner Mike Hobson, mastering engineer Bernie Grundman, the production manager at QRP (Kassem’s LP manufacturing facility in Salina, KS), Michael Fremer, and Mr. 45 RPM Audiophile, Michael in Germany.

As to half-speed mastering, that was a fad in the waning days of the original LP reign. I recently read a mastering engineer explain that while running the tapes at half speed DOES provide an improvement in high frequencies, it comes at the cost of worse low frequency sound. None of the current audiophile reissue companies proudly proclaim their LP’s are half-speed mastered. ’Cause they’re not.

I can't say I notice a difference when comparing other audiophile pressings.  Half-speed mastered records are usually doing all the right things in the manufacturing process outside of the mastering, so they do tend to sound good, just not sure it's the mastering process that makes it so.  

Miller Carbon: "I have on my shelf 4 different copies of Fleetwood Mac Rumours: one original vintage vinyl, one Nautilus half speed mastered 'audiophile' pressing, one 45RPM audiophile reissue, and one White Hot Stamper."

Similarly, I have multiple versions of FM's earlier, better in all ways, 1975 breakthrough eponymous album ("The White Album"), including a Mobile Fidelity half-speed mastered "Original Master Recording" produced under license from Warner. For reasons unknown to me, this gem -- 7x Platinum and twice voted among the top 200 in RS's "500 GOAT" albums -- is seemingly forgotten. I once heard an hour-long radio special allegedly devoted to FM's career which left it entirely unmentioned, like a biography of Franklin Roosevelt failing to mention his dozen years as US President.

Sadly, for want of a worthy vinyl reproduction system, I can't now compare the half-speed, the Japanese virgin vinyl, etc. with the Reprise original. But until then, I must wonder whether MC or anyone else in the audiophile universe remembers, possesses, or even sometimes PLAYS this classic once heard from every college dorm room window in America?

Gotta admit you had me going there for a while I never heard it called "The White Album" before. Coulda sworn that was the Beatles. But yeah, I have Fleetwood Mac. Got an old original and a White Hot Stamper as well.