Phil Collins – Hello I Must Be Going – 45RPM Vinyl Review
Vinyl surface noise: 5-
Dynamic Range: 5
Stereo Imaging: 5-
Image depth/perspective: 4
Overall frequency response: 5-
Please see here for my comments on reviewing albums.
Track List:
- Side A:
- I Don’t Care Anymore
- I Cannot Believe It’s True
- Side B:
- Like China
- Do You Know, Do You Care?
- You Can’t Hurry Love
- Side C:
- It Don’t Matter To Me
- Thru These Walls
- Side D:
- Don’t Let Him Steal Your Heart Away
- The West Side
- Why Can’t It Wait ‘Til Morning
Phil Collins is an English singer, drummer, songwriter, record producer and actor. He was the drummer and later became the lead singer of the rock band Genesis and had a successful solo career, achieving three UK number one singles and seven US number one singles as a solo artist. In total, his work with Genesis, other artists, and solo resulted in more US top-40 singles than any other artist throughout the 1980’s.
Hello, I Must Be Going is the second solo studio album by Phil Collins that created eight singles releases including the hits “You Can’t Hurry Love” and “I Cannot Believe It’s True”. It was recorded between May-June 1982 at; Old Croft, Fisher Lane Farm, The Town House and CBS Studios, and released in November 1982 by Virgin Records (UK) and Atlantic Records (US), going 3xPlatinum in both countries. This latest release was mastered by Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering and cut to lacquer from a 1/4″ EQ’d Dolby tape copy of the original master tape and pressed at Quality Record Pressings.
This 2 disc, 180gram, 45RPM, Numbered Edition (AAPA 012-45) was released by Analogue Productions (Atlantic Series 75) in December 2023 and arrives in a Tip-on old style gatefold double pocket jacket with film lamination by Stoughton Printing.
Mine is number 001426. (First 2000 copies are numbered and pressed at QRP)
Reviewed using a Hana SL, MC cartridge, Entre Lentek head amp and MX-VYNL pre-amp.
See here for my vinyl review playback hardware.
This is an outstanding pressing with low surface noise. The discs are ruler flat, perfectly concentric and looked to be a pristine pressing, all shine. In my eagerness to hear this album I again forwent cleaning it with my Nitty Gritty prior to its first play. As soon as the stylus hit the vinyl I just new this was going to be another memorable experience. The vinyl was very silent on all sides and there weren’t ANY pops or clicks on any side to be heard.
OK, yes, I am a bit of a Phil Collins fan boy, but it’s not because we are the same age. Genesis and in particular Phil Collins, are excellent musicians and together with their engineers, producers and mastering houses produced some terrific albums. This is a testament to one of his.
Now remember, this album was never created to be an audiophile recording and was produced from a 1/4″ tape copy at 15 ips with Dolby A noise reduction. So do not hold your aural expectations too high. My comments are based upon having worked in professional music recording studios and relative to other audiophile albums on my system.
The disc is well mastered and with only two or three tracks per side the cutting head seemed to extract what dynamic range was available from the master tape, sounding excellent on many tracks and having solid dynamics.
All tracks are a real pleasure to listen to and make for easy listening, providing well detailed and balanced sonics with tight bass, punchy mids and clear highs, all with either light reverb or short studio decay. Per my last Phil Collins review, once again Phil’s drum kit and drumming drives things along, sounding in a word, outstanding. The central kick drum often dug quite deep, having a solid punch and slam with occasional beater sound. Then there’s his snare placed just right of center that is tight and clean supporting a terrific dynamic range, add to that the open reverb, what impact! Toms providing distinct tones with a tight short ring and plenty of impact and being nicely imaged left to right. Top end detail is extended but not over bright or harsh, with the hi-hat sitting just right of center, the cymbals nicely spaced across the image, all creating good imaging but short on depth.
Phil’s lead vocals provide good presence with a strong central image that is often slightly set back, occasionally coming across as a little “strident”, but less so than on his Face Value album (AAPA 003-45) that was released by Analogue Productions (Atlantic Series 75) in October 2023. There are no hard edges to any instruments, with strings coming across smooth and silky and trumpets and sax clean and bright. The sax having a strong reverb tail and being set back a little to the left of center. The overall sound is quite warm and open with good separation and detail, providing moderately good imaging but with a limited depth perspective, even for the orchestral and backing parts. Clearly as a modern studio multi-track recording only a few instruments like sax and a tom provide significant depth with electronic reverb being added to provide some overall depth perspective, being abundant on various vocals and Phil’s kit.
Orchestral parts and instruments provide a broad image with moderate depth. Guitars, strings, piano, keyboards, trumpets, sax and other instruments providing natural and well defined accompaniments on all tracks.
Clearly, significant care and attention was given to the mastering, cutting and pressing processes. The final result being an excellent rendition of the original master tape, providing solid dynamics and a respectable frequency response. All rounded off by some great musicianship and tracks.
There are several notable and famous hit tracks to include the hits; You Can’t Hurry Love SBT3 and I Cannot Believe It’s True SAT2. Having an excellent mix of music and high standard of mastering and pressing this latest release just about makes it to the audiophile level of a reference/demo album. I just wish that Phil’s vocals were a little less strident.
With that said, this album is probably almost as good as it will ever sound and without doubt another Phil Collins rock/pop classic and outstanding pressing. If this is your style of music then you should own it.
Editors Note: I must add that even though I prefer the music on Face Value I find that the vocals on this album a little more pleasing with Phil’s vocals being less strident.
See my other vinyl reviews here.
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