Tag Archives: fleetwood mac

Review: Fleetwood Mac “Rumours” on 180-gram 45 RPM Vinyl

RumoursGo back maybe 10 or 15 years.  Classic rock radio was still seemingly churning out the same dozen or so songs every hour.  Millions of owned the Rumours album on the original LP, bought it on CD, and a few even indulged in the DVD-Audio disc when it was briefly available.  Sufficient to say, just about everyone had burned out on Fleetwood Mac’s most popular album.

So tell me, why can’t I get this 45-RPM 180-gram pressing of Rumours off of my turntable??

It’s the sound.  I know the original CDs extolled the virtues of “perfect sound forever,” only to find out that CDs followed the same mantra as any other digital medium:  garbage in, garbage out.  Any pas release of Rumours has been good, but not something that is almost breathtaking at times.  Songs like “The Chain” make you turn up the volume quite a bit; you are hearing the picks on the guitars, the windings of the bass strings coming through McVie’s pickups, the snap of a snare drum…it’s all there, fresh off the tape.  “Dreams” has a low end that will make any subwoofer superfluous; McVie’s bass fills the room, and Fleetwood’s bass drum again snaps the woofers to attention.  “Never Goin’ Back Again” is all about fretboards, picks, and a very pure guitar sound.  With these and the other tracks, you’d think you were a witness to the studio recording.

One might argue that it is easy to give “detail” by boosting the high end and fleshing out the low end with an EQ boost, but this is not what it’s all about.  There is detail here that can only come from going back to an original two-track master tape, massaging it, and committing it to lacquer with a lot of care and attention.  Hats off to the team of Steve Hoffman and Kevin Gray for the stunning sound on this release, and to Warner/Rhino for offering this in both 33-1/3 and 45 RPM versions.  If there is one must-own version, this has to be it.  Caveat: be sure to seek out the US edition of this release, as the European version was mastered elsewhere.  Highly recommended!  Yes, even if you are as burned out on this album as most of us already were…