Neil Young, Greendale Special Vinyl Weight Comparison Test Pressing Box Set
ULTRA RARE — HIGHLY COLLECTIBLE!
This auction is for a STILL SEALED, NUMBERED (1 of 1), 11-Disc Special Vinyl Weight Comparison LP Test Pressing Box Set. This set consists of 11 discs of Side A/B of the Classic Records reissue of Neil Young’s „Greendale“.
When Classic Records initially approached Neil Young to work with him on his vinyl releases, management rejected the idea. One day when a couple of Neil’s engineers were at Bernie Grundman Mastering working a new Neil Young vinyl release, Chris Bellman, one of the top engineer’s at Grundman Mastering, suggested that the new release would sound great on Classic Records 200g Flat profile pressings. Intrigued, the engineers went back to Northern California and told Neil who immediately wanted to hear a sample which classic provided by pressing a 200g version of a previous NY release „Are You Passionate“ as a test pressing. Neil and others auditioned the Classic 200g pressing and immediately Neil ordered management to have all his vinyl pressed exclusively on Classic’s 200g Super Vinyl „Flat“ Profile which Classic did for years thereafter. In preparation for the Neil Young „Greendale“ release, Michael Hobson, founder of Classic Records wanted to see what the effect of vinyl weight above 200g had on the sound of the pressing. Gary Salstrom, at that time Classic’s production director, (now plant manager at Quality Record Pressing in Salina KS), was tasked with having different weights above 200g pressed from the A/B sides of the Greendale 3 LP set. Salstrom was on-site at Bill Smith Custom Records and supervised the pressing of 11 discs on one of the FineBuilt semi automatic presses fitted with Classic’s own Super Vinyl Profile dies. Heavier pressings can be achieved by a larger vinyl biscuit in conjunction with stream and cycle time. This „one of a kind“ 11 LP Vinyl Weight comparison package includes the A/B sides of Neil Young’s Greendale release at the following weights:
215g , 217g , 218g , 219g , 220g , 221g , 222g , 223g , 225g , 227g , 228g
using Kenan 550 vinyl and on the same machine with the same stampers. Notes from Michael Hobson suggest that the heavier pressings did sound better than a standard 200g
test pressing used for comparison and Hobson was apparently thinking about re-releasing a good portion of the Classic catalog on 220g Clarity vinyl when Classic was sold to
Acoustic Sounds in 2010. Kassem – are you listening?
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