For years we resisted using a formal grading system for the LP's we auction on eBay and elsewhere. Now, at last, we understand why grading systems are used so often when dealing with collectible records -- laziness. OK, so we've finally succumbed to laziness. Below is our list of recognized conditions and how we define them.

Note: Most of our records are visually graded – if we play grade an item, we so state. In grading records we begin with a careful look at everything about an LP -- the playing surface, the labels, the jacket and inner sleeve, inserts (if any), edges, surfaces -- under at least a 100W lightbulb.

MINT -- Pretty darn close to perfect or like new -- in bookseller jargon: FINE. The record has no marks of any kind; the labels show no spindle marks or writing and no stickers such as address stickers. In short, neither wax nor paper label show marks of any kind. None. Period. The cover (and inserts if present) has no split seams and shows none of the bad things that can happen to paper. Neither jacket nor vinyl exhibit any signs of aging nor exposure to the elements. The vinyl retains much of its original lustre and the cover (and inserts if present) still shows bright, vibrant colours and crisp, sharp and clear black & white images. Any inserts that originally came with the LP must be present for the condition to be MINT. These include (but are not limited to) lyric sheets, posters, photographs, letters, notes, toys and promotional material. Each insert must pass its own test for “mintness” and that, friends and neighbors, is a whole nuther can of worms.
NEAR MINT -- Vinyl might have one or two minor surface flaws that do not affect play. Cover shows slight wear or slight aging. If you're holding a NEAR MINT record in your hands, you should be willing to swear it is MINT until someone puts a MINT copy of the same record into your hands. Then you might say: "Gee whiz. Now I understand the difference", i.e., a NEAR MINT record might pass for MINT in some circles.
EXCELLENT -- Vinyl has more than a couple of minor flaws but play is still not adversely affected; spindle marks might be present -- but not many. Cover shows only modest or gentle wear. In our universe of grading, EXCELLENT is a showcase piece.
VERY GOOD -- Here's where we begin to part company with other record stores, private collectors, museums and guide books. Our VERY GOOD and GOOD records are keepers. Our VERY GOOD record might have a few hairline marks on the surface of the wax. These hairline marks may produce a random click, a very soft pop, an almost imperceptible foreign noise. Any extraneous noises should be minimal and should not distract the listener from enjoyment of the recorded work. These types of hairline marks are usually made by sliding the record in and out of some kind of unfriendly inner sleeve and not by the stylus. The cover shows modest shelf wear but looks beautiful and is very sturdy. This means all seams are intact, the spine is tight and strong (and evenly blocked), and none of the bad things that can happen to paper have happened here.
GOOD -- Now we really part company with every other record collector on the planet because in our universe, GOOD means GOOD, not BAD! Why would anyone name a category "good" if they really meant "crappy?" Perhaps this goes under the heading "lies and the lying liars who tell them." I wonder if Al Franken is a record collector. I digress. In Rainy Day Records' universe, a GOOD record is a joy to own and wonderful to hear. It may be marginally a "showcase" piece but it is a very very very very nice listening copy. Any scratches are light and produce only soft and intermittent extraneous noise. There should be no startling pops or clicks, no distortion, and minimal surface noise. Your enjoyment of the recorded sound should not be hampered by pops and certainly there should be no skips and no constant surface noise; you should be able to listen to the entire record without pulling your hair out or cursing the person you bought it from. A GOOD cover is sturdy with perhaps some fraying along the seams and moderate shelf wear, sometimes in the form of ring wear. Surfaces should be pretty darn clean and colours bright and pleasing. There may be some dirty places but nothing a good book binder can't get rid of for a small fee. Signs of aging might be present. A GOOD record is not simply a filler piece that you discard when a better copy comes along. A GOOD record is a keeper.

We don't grade below GOOD because we don't deal with items below this range. We sometimes use "+" or "MINUS" to fine-tune a grade.

Here are a couple of suggestions while I have your ear. Throw away any price guides you might have for records, particularly the ones with the word "official" in the title. Online auctions and online set sale lists have made the so-called "price guides" not only irrelevant, but laughable. I know many of you have invested $40.00 or more in these guides and if throwing them out is against everything you’ve ever believed in, then don’t panic. These old-fashioned price guides make wonderful doorstops; they make great kindling if you have a wood-burning fireplace or stove; they make excellent cat scratching posts; and, last but not least, perfect packing material if shredded first.

As a record collector, your best friends should be your local book binder, your VPI machine and fellow collectors (not necessarily in that order).

A Word About SEALED LP's: Our SEALED LP's are NEW and sealed from the factory or distributor (100% guaranteed to be free from defect); we don't re-seal or shrink-wrap anything ourselves!

The acetate allows the producer, the engineer, the artist and other interested parties to see how well the recording transfers from master tape to disc. The job of the engineer is to make adjustments to the sound so that the song on the tape fits nicely within the confines of a record groove. This may include adjusting the overall level (volume), adjusting bass or treble, compressing the overall signal, etc., so that the record sounds as good as possible when played on a variety of hi-fi systems. When everyone is happy with the reference cut, the engineer will then cut the master lacquer disc and send it off to the pressing plant for mass production.

Lacquers are checked for the following problems:

• Low overall volume
• Variations in volume levels within the same song or from cut to cut
• Variations in tempo within each song
• Breaking up or distortion in the treble or high registers at peak loudness levels or toward the end of a side
• Excessive boominess or airiness in the bass or low registers
• Dullness or lack of presence in the mid-range
• Skips, buzzes, crackling noises, or dull thuds at the beginnings of notes

The engineer and/or producer will listen to the reference lacquer on both large and small speakers to determine that there is adequate treble and bass response. Once approved, the master lacquer will be cut using settings identical to those used when cutting the reference lacquers. If only minor changes are requested, the engineer probably won’t ask for additional reference lacquers.

An acetate is like the negative of a photograph. Because they are extremely rare, and in some cases, represent a one-of-a-kind item, collectors pay top dollar for them.

alternate take - At recording sessions more than one recorded version of a tune may be kept on file for future use. The best take is used for the commercial release (or what is considered the best take at the time). All other takes are referred to as alternate.

bootleg - A recording that doesn’t have the authorization of the label and/or the artist, usually a live show.

counterfeit - An illegal reproduction of an actual release (not a bootleg).

dead wax – Area between the end of the record and the label.

first pressing – The first release or issue of a record.

gatefold - An album cover that opens.

lead-in - The silent area at the beginning of a record.

matrix number / master number - The matrix number appears in the dead wax of a record (also called “the matrix” and “run-off”) and may include the stock number, the disc’s side number, the date of the recording and any technical information the engineer wants to include. Sometimes the artist may include a personal note. Bobby Darin’s first album contained a personal message from him to his fans, hand-written and hidden within the matrix.

original label - The first company to issue the record.

re-recording - A later recording of a tune usually by someone other than the original artist.

re-release – An out-of-print record is put back into the active catalog.

reissue - A budget reissue is one in which a discount label obtains permission to use the original master. Materials used are inexpensive and the sound quality may be poor. A later pressing is one in which a non-discount label picks up the original master. Here the materials used are at least equivalent to the original. If an audiophile label gets permission to use the original master, materials would be top-of-the-line and the end product of superior quality.

remake or cover - A tune issued by an artist other than the original artist.

styrene (polystyrene) - Hard, relatively inflexible plastic used in the injection moulding process to press records, mainly 7-inch singles. Styrene records will have very quiet surfaces when found in unplayed condition. However, they tend to wear quickly and produce noise particularly if tracked improperly. In addition, styrene records are prone to “cue burn.” Columbia Records’ Pittman plant was once the major source of injection moulded pressings.

test pressing - Most test pressings are early pressings without artwork used by the engineer, producer and performer to check sound quality, performance, track selection and sequencing, and many more details about the recorded sound. Occasionally, test pressings are used as promos. In some cases test pressings represent a truly unique run of the record, i.e., a pressing independent from any early commercial run. These gems fetch a premium price from collectors.

timing strip - A small strip glued to the front cover of promo copies showing the song titles and playing times for each cut on the album. The timing strip is also used to suggest cuts for airplay and cuts to ban from airplay.

vinyl (polyvinyl chloride) - Polyvinyl chloride is a flexible material used since about 1930 to make non-breakable records. Pressed by compression moulding which allows the label to be an integral part of the pressing itself, this process produces spill-out along the sides of the press. This extra material is routinely ground up and re-used. Because vinyl does not re-heat and re-cool to a smooth, glossy surface, the excessive use of “re-grind” mixed in with virgin vinyl can account for the inherently noisy surface of even unplayed examples. In addition, stampers used for the compression moulding process begin to break down after about a thousand pressings because they are forced to expand and contract -- steam heat is applied to the stamper at the start of the pressing cycle and then it is allowed to cool to solidify the grooves. Most record companies routinely overused their stampers and used re-grind almost exclusively to save a buck. Understandably, virgin vinyl, free of the re-grind, is highly sought after by collectors as is the early pressing when the stamper is fresh and clean.

white label promo - A white label promo (wlp) is a 12” record with plain white label produced in small amounts, usually fewer than a hundred copies, by record companies. Traditionally, the white label promo is an advance pressing with a label that has the same text and artwork as the commercial label, but with a white background instead of the color or artwork found on the commercial pressings. The wlp is used as a give-away for dj’s, retail stores, sales reps and anyone along the line who might promote the album. The wlp is very desirable to collectors because it represents the very first run from the stamper and therefore produces a superior sound (earlier pressings always produce better sound since the stamper is fresh and unworn at that point in time).

"Hot Stampers" refers to the metal parts, called stampers, which actually press down on a "puck" of vinyl until it's flat, thereby producing a record. Record mastering is an art, not a science. One engineer's cutting can sound dramatically different from another's. There are also many things that can go wrong after the acetate is cut. I won't go into all of them here; suffice to say that when the record sounds good, lots of things had to have gone right. And when the record sounds really good, unusually good, sometimes as good as we've ever heard it, we call such a hot sounding record a Hot Stamper pressing. To evaluate such a record, it must be cleaned thoroughly and then played. There is no such thing as a sealed Hot Stamper.

Hot Stampers are all about finding the pressings that present the master tape at its best. Notice I did not say "represent" the master tape, because the master tape may have faults that need to be fixed, and the only way to do that is in the mastering. The presentation of any recorded music is of course a matter of taste. We make judgements about the way we think the record "ought" to sound, based on what we like or don't like about recordings in general. Audiophiles who play records listen for different things and ascribe to them higher and lower relative values based on their own tastes. While doing our Hot Stamper shootouts we, as audiophiles, do the same. We try to communicate as accurately as possible through our commentaries the special qualities of the pressings found on our site (better-records.com).

So what are we listening for, specifically?

Tonality. Tonal correctness -- to any audiophile this should go without saying. It is the sine qua non of reproduced sound.

Dynamics, Bass and Energy. We prize dynamics, bass, and the overall energetic quality of recordings more than transparency, tubey magic, sweetness and the like, even though we love those qualities in a record. We like the Big Speaker sound, the kind of sound that, when played at loud levels, can almost make you think you're listening to live music. That means it's dynamic, present and full-range. Small speakers, screens and their ilk can do some nice things, don't get me wrong, but they can't move much air, so they never give you a true sense of the power and energy of the recording the way dynamic drivers can (assuming of course the drivers are big enough and you have enough of them).

Good Music Has Power. Music has the power to take you out of the world you know and place you in a world of its own making. How it can do that nobody knows. Whatever Neil tapped into to make it happen on Danger Bird (discussed below), he succeeded completely. If you're in the right frame of mind, in the right environment, with everything working audio-wise, a minute into this song you will no longer be sitting in your comfy audio chair. You won't really know where you are, and that's exactly where you want to be.

Trancendental Recordings. To accomplish this feat the sound has to be right. As always this is the rub. If you're an audiophile these transcendent experiences tend to be prompted by very high quality recordings, the kind that allow you to forget you're listening to a recording at all. So many recordings do the reverse: they call attention to their shortcomings. When that happens the effect of losing oneself in the music quickly becomes unsustainable.

Ruined Recordings. Of course I'm using the word "recording" inaccurately above. We don't really know what the recording sounds like. All we have are pressings, and the sad fact of the matter is that most recordings are ruined in the mastering and pressing phase. How else to explain how a record like this can sound so amazing, yet the average copy sounds just, well, average? Which brings us to the sound of Zuma. Zuma has a kind of garage band sonic purity that makes practically any other studio album you own sound phony in comparison. This is clearly a bunch of guys playing together live in a room, a room which happens to be a studio but could just as easily have been somebody's garage. It has exactly that kind of loose feel; there's a sense of real communication between the players. Much like great jazz musicians, they're completely in tune with each other. Drop the needle on any song at random and you can tell right away that these guys are comfortable playing together. They've known each other for a long, long time. This is a real band; this ain't no Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.

Raw and Real Sound. The sound is as raw and as real as it gets. It's about as far from Deja Vu as you can get, except for the one song on Deja Vu that really DOES sound like a band playing live in the studio: Almost Cut My Hair. Slowly over the years it has become my favorite CSNY track, mostly because it really does make them sound like a BAND. If you love THAT SOUND as much as we do, you will absolutely love Zuma. The whole album has that sound -- good news. The better news is that Zuma is a better recording, and it's better in every way -- rock solid bass (the kind that all the best Neil Young records always have); explosive dynamics; superb transparency; extended highs; some of the best sounding drums and guitars you've ever heard; clear, correct, unprocessed, lifelike vocals and choruses -- I could go on, but I'm guessing you get the picture. This is it folks. For grungy guitar rock it just doesn't get any better than Zuma.

Danger Bird! Listen to the way Danger Bird opens. Each instrument, one by one, slowly, deliberately, one could almost say haltingly, feeds into the mix, until the churning guitars give way to Neil's spare vocal -- fatalistic, doomed, already resigned to some fate he barely understands. Even though the song has just begun, you sense that Neil feels a weight and a darkness bearing down on him, that it's ongoing, that it's already started, that somehow you're coming into it in the middle, well after the weight of it has begun to crush and perhaps even kill him. He knows how Danger Bird has to end. It's as powerful and intense a piece of music as any I have ever experienced; sublime in its simplicity, transcendental in effect. You feel yourself swept along, an out of body experience that you can't control. When Neil launches into the first of many guitar solos, the sense of journeying or exploring with him the imaginary musical world he inhabits is palpable. He doesn't seem to know where it will lead and neither do you. There is no structure to reassure you, no end in sight, only the succession of notes that play from moment to moment, first tensing, then relaxing; cresting, then falling away. The best pressings, played on the best equipment, allow you to go on that journey with Neil. That's what really good records -- and nothing else in my experience, outside of the live event -- can do. When we listen to records, we're listening for records that do THAT.

LEARN MORE AND CHECK OUT SOME HOT STAMPERS: better-records.com