Foreign Pressings

[Jac Hawk]

I've recently bought 2 LP's, Roxy Music Siren which is on the Polydor label and pressed in France, the other is Fleetwood Mac Tango in the Night on Warner Bros WEA label and pressed in Czechoslovakia. Both are very well finished dead flat and of a heavier / thicker vinyl than UK pressings of similar age, this got me thinking, probably 90% of my vinyl hails from the UK, I thought our vinyl production, LP pressing plants were up there with the best if not THE best, but are they? I'll certainly be looking out for foreign pressings in the future.

[Dubster68]

I have a lot of German and Dutch pressings. They appear to be a thicker better quality vinyl than the original UK equivalent. I think a lot of it is luck of the draw. Some poor presses can come from the UK and abroad.

[Pierre De Grenoble]

I can't say for current pressings but my general rule of thumb for 60's/70's and possibly 80's is that Euro (inc. GB) pressings are far superior to anything worldwide except for Japanese.

I'd prefer a Japanese copy of anything but sadly only have few.

I try to avoid USA pressings if possible as the majority always seem bright and noisy even if bought as "still sealed"

I'm also not a fan of the Sony / Universal "Back To Black" reishs. A couple of them have given me little nagging thoughts that the vinyl itself is substandard. :confused:

[Jac Hawk]

I didn't pay much attention as to where in the world my LP's had been pressed until i bought these two as i said, like everyone i guess, i presumed that vinyl quality generally deteriorated through the 80's and 90's, however the Czech copy of Tango in the night is more like something from the 70's with regard to weight and overall finish

[Barry]

Avoid Portugese and Greek pressings, in my experience they are very poor.

[struth]

Not had any problems especially with American pressings. Ive plenty Old blues ones that are top class. Ive a US pressing from Verve got recently that is fine.

[jollyfix]

Avoid Portugese and Greek pressings, in my experience they are very poor.
Yep, Spanish too. The Japanese stuff i have is very good, though translated sleeve / lyric writing can some times be hilarious.

[magiccarpetride]

I've recently bought 2 LP's, Roxy Music Siren which is on the Polydor label and pressed in France, the other is Fleetwood Mac Tango in the Night on Warner Bros WEA label and pressed in Czechoslovakia. Both are very well finished dead flat and of a heavier / thicker vinyl than UK pressings of similar age, this got me thinking, probably 90% of my vinyl hails from the UK, I thought our vinyl production, LP pressing plants were up there with the best if not THE best, but are they? I'll certainly be looking out for foreign pressings in the future.

I have a number of old LPs (mostly from late sixties/early seventies) that state "Made in England" on the label. Most of those are in amazing shape, barely any pops or clicks. The only other old batch of LPs I have that are equally high quality are the ones that say "Made in Germany". I'd say that LPs that used to be made in England are usually top notch.

The absolute worst pressings I've ever heard in my life were from Peru.