Everything But The Girl Idlewild 1988 blanco y negro BYN 14 DMM Audiophile

Description: Everything But The Girl. Idlewild. Still In Shrink Wrap. Special German "Direct Metal Mastering" (DMM) Cutting and Plating Process (see below). Early First Pressing - (does not have "I Don't Want To Talk About It" added to 2nd press). Jacket has "W" (WEA Records Ltd.) Embossed into Back Right Rear Bottom Corner. Listed In Book: "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die". High Coverage Play Testing Performed (see vinyl grading details below). Item Details Manufactured At: Record Service Alsdorf, West Germany Recorded And Mixed At: Livingston Studios, London, UK Mastered At: The Town House, London, UK DMM Cutting And Pressing By: Record Service Alsdorf, West Germany Original Issue: February 29, 1988 This Issue: Early 1988 (based on matrix and labels) Label: blanco y negro BYN 14 Runout Deadwax Matrix Numbers: Side 1: (stamp:) R/S Alsdorf 242288-1-A (etch:) Town House DMM Side 2: (stamp:) R/S Alsdorf 242288-1-Bx (etch:) 6 Town House DMM D Direct Metal Mastering (DMM) has several advantages over normal lacquer cutting processes. A DMM lathe cuts directly onto a copper-plated master disc. Acting as a traditional lacquer "mother," stampers can be plated directly off the copper metal master disc eliminating two conventional electroplating steps. A result is much less pressing noise introduction. There is also no lacquer "groove wall bounce back" as a lacquer master sits idle so there is greater preservation of the original modulation details. Other benefits are: improved transient response and linear phase response plus extended upper frequencies. It also reduces adjacent groove print-through sounds known as "pre-echo." Only about 30 DMM lathes were originally manufactured with less than 20 still in use now. Was bought by this seller many years ago and now offered from his private collection (you have absolutely known provenance). Has had just a few plays only on an expertly setup high-end audiophile turntable, arm, and cartridge. Has never been exposed to heat or tobacco smoke and always stored vertically in a specially designed record cabinet (Rackit brand) to prevent warpage. All vinyl sides are cleaned on a VPI HW-16.5 record cleaner. I use the Audio Intelligent "One-Step" formula that requires no rinsing and leaves no residue. It is alcohol free and uses enzyme agents to remove pressing mold-release compounds, fungi & bacteria, finger oils, and many other environmental contaminants. Made with laboratory-grade pure water(50X purer than distilled water). I neutralize residual static charge from both vinyl and new inner sleeve with a Milty Zerostat. I wear nitrile surgical gloves while cleaning and play testing to avoid any chance of transferring finger oils to the vinyl. Very sensitive play testing was performed straight off my Ayre P-5xe fully balanced phono preamp over Sennheiser HD 600 headphones using a Schiit Audio Valhalla 2 tube headphone amp fitted with NOS Soviet Voskhod matched tubes (see last photo). Track list For track listings, please see my attached record label photographs. I never post "distant" photos nor the so-prevalent type with the LP sticking halfway out of the jacket in my listings. I take close-ups under photo lamps so you can see nearly everything I describe in the jacket grading. It is virtually impossible to show the true vinyl condition/grade from any photograph. After cleaning I use very bright light and close visual inspection on each side to assign "visual-only" grades. However, I always perform play testing with thorough coverage on high resolution equipment to assign play grades. Grading Details Note: Grading LPs by text characters is subjective and at best are only a guide as no two used records are of exactly the same quality. I do not use "EX" grades as my VG+ is right below "NM-." I never sell a "G" play grade and very rarely ever sell a "VG" play grade. Please, refer to both my photo evidence and detailed descriptions to judge by YOUR OWN grading standards. Questions are always welcome. Play quality is personally most important to me so vinyl visual qualities are separately graded and described in detail for your complete assessment. Outer Jacket Inspection/grading: NM/NM Shrink wrap has preserved the jacket at "like new" condition. Vinyl Visual Inspection/Grading: NM-/NM Side 1 has a very thin and faint curved reflective hairline going from T1 to halfway into T3. This was from a recent accidental bump of my linear tracking cuing lever when re-recording ma few favorite tracks before working on this sale. The arm floats on a frictionless compressed air "bearing" so there was very gentle contact with the top surface of the vinyl as the arm slid. I immediately replayed that whole area and luckily it caused no vinyl noise. It will be checked again once more during play testing. Side 2 looked absolutely perfect. Play Testing/Grading: NM+/NM+ Extensive play testing was performed after visual inspection (continuous written notes were taken). I listened to the beginning, middle, and end of each track for a few minutes on each needle drop. When the track width was noticeably greater I took more play samples to get good coverage. I also listened to all lead-in, lead-out and transition grooves between each track. Some tracks were played all the way thru when digitizing my favorites to 96k/24-bit WAV files. This allowed me to go back and re-check some of my notes on digital playback in ProTools. Here is rundown of each side from those notes. Side 1 Play The lead-in grooves were uncommonly quiet. T1 has always been a favorite track so I had to record it. Right away it shows the strengths of a DMM pressing. Very hot drum machine whacks with no pre-echo. Stereo spread and depth is very extensive. Gobs of details and "slam." Zero vinyl noise even at end of fade into the transition grooves. T2 and T3 were also recorded for more 100% play coverage. Both had zero vinyl noise, and the transition grooves were also quiet. T3 had just gobs of depth on the HPs. T4 had zero vinyl noise and T4 is my side favorite. It only had a single HF tick at the threshold of hearing in the first minute, then no other vinyl noise. The recording, mix, mastering, and DMM pressing were so impressive I just had to grade S1 NM+. Side 2 Play T1 had lots of delicate detail and extension on the high frequencies. Just no vinyl noise picked up on a 100% play for digitizing it. The first trans-groove was dead silent (likely due to DMM one-step plating). T2 is my "best of album" track that had to be recorded one last time with my new cartridge. It had perfect vinyl performance. T3 had no vinyl noise on any play sample. T4 only had a single LF tick in the fade out. T5 is a very gentle, spare, and low volume-level track. I was able to pick up a couple of HF "micro-ticks in the first few seconds of ramp-up and again in the last few seconds of fade-out. They were all very non distracting. T5 is my 2nd best of the album. S2 performs at the same high level as S1 and deserves another NM+ rating. What an album! The pressing and audio performance of this record makes me sad that real significant advances were being made in the early 80's on analog playback just when CDs started to make vinyl almost extinct. Its really a shame that DMM cutting equipment fabrication ceased with just a few still in use (only for very expensive audiophile pressings). This 1988 album demonstrates just how much a DMM vinyl pressing can still make beautiful music. Packaging Records are placed outside the jacket to protect against seam splitting. Original inner sleeves (if still present) are included separately. All records will be placed into new MFSL-style "rice paper" plastic sleeves. Any original sleeves may be holding onto some dust and if paper lined could even be abrasive. This will keep vinyl surfaces clean and well protected during shipping and ultimately during buyer usage. Outer jacket is contained in a new clear polyethylene protective sleeve. Sent in high quality record mailer with cardboard stiffeners and all corners double-taped. Shipping Shipping will be via USPS Media Mail for a flat charge of $4.75 per single album sale. eBay keeps raising the rates for Media Mail but I still don't pass all of that or any costs for shipping materials on to the buyer. I do try to reduce additional costs for my customers. A combined shipping discount is available on multiple sales completed on the same day ($4.75 plus $0.50 for each additional LP). If you do buy more than one LP on the same daydo not pay immediately but wait for my all-combined with the discount applied to your total.eBay does give you the option to "Request an invoice from the buyer," but this option is not available on the eBay mobile app. A discount for the combined items will show on that invoice. Then, once payment is received, the items will ship.

Price: 35 USD

Location: El Dorado Hills, California

End Time: 2024-12-12T14:42:53.000Z

Shipping Cost: 4.75 USD