Tales from the Hudson

A note before anything else: this title has no original vinyl pressing

Unlike every other guide on this site, there is no vintage pressing to chase here. Tales from the Hudson was recorded and released in 1996, well into the CD era, and was issued exclusively on CD at the time – no vinyl edition existed until 2012, sixteen years later. This guide covers that single first-ever vinyl release rather than comparing multiple historical pressings, because there's only one to discuss.

Recording history and tape provenance

The band is a genuine all-star lineup: Jack DeJohnette on drums and Dave Holland on bass – the same rhythm section, decades later, that had anchored Miles Davis's electric band around 1970 – alongside pianist Joey Calderazzo on most tracks, with McCoy Tyner sitting in on piano for two tracks specifically ("Song for Bilbao" and "African Skies"), and Don Alias on percussion. Brecker wrote five of the nine compositions himself, with one composition apiece contributed by Metheny ("Song for Bilbao"), Calderazzo ("Midnight Voyage"), and the late pianist Don Grolnick ("Willie T."). The original 1996 recording and mixing were done by James Farber, with mastering for the CD release handled at Masterdisk Corporation.

Sixteen years later, Universal Music Korea selected this title for its "Play 33⅓ Series" – a reissue program specifically dedicated to bringing CD-era albums originally issued between 1992 and 2010 onto vinyl for the very first time, since many of these recordings, having been made and released after vinyl's commercial decline, had simply never been pressed on the format at all. Issued in 2012 as a 180-gram 2LP set, it was mastered by Greg Calbi from the original master tapes – a different mastering pass from the 1996 CD's Masterdisk mastering, done specifically for this vinyl cut. The package includes a gatefold cover, a 6-page insert booklet, and black poly-lined inner sleeves. Retailer product descriptions credit two separate contributors here, worth distinguishing rather than conflating: the vinyl itself was pressed by MMP, a German pressing plant, while the packaging and sleeve design work is separately credited to Khiov, a design house that has worked on a number of similar first-time-on-vinyl reissues in the same series. Because no earlier vinyl edition exists to compare it against, there isn't a "definitive original pressing versus reissue" comparison to make here the way there is for most albums on this site – this pressing simply is the vinyl version of the album, full stop.

This is a mid-1990s digital-era jazz recording, tracked and mixed using the studio technology and conventions of its time – expect a cleaner, more contemporary sonic signature than the tape-era recordings covered elsewhere on this site, rather than vintage analog warmth. Greg Calbi's vinyl-specific mastering pass from the original tapes should, in principle, give this pressing a reasonable claim to representing the recording accurately, though a substantial body of independent owner reviews specifically evaluating the vinyl's sound quality against the CD could not be found.

Buyer's guide by budget

$$$: The Universal Music Korea Play 33⅓ Series edition (catalog DZ 3107) – there is no other vinyl option to weigh it against.

Pressing tier summary

References

• Discogs (master, all versions): https://www.discogs.com/master/284678
• Wikipedia, "Tales from the Hudson": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_from_the_Hudson

Related guides: Black Codes (From the Underground) · Heavy Weather · The Epic