Mack Avenue Records, the up and coming independent record label that has been viewed as the savior for all things jazz, has continued to go “all in” for release of its biggest recordings on vinyl LPs. The trend continues with the new vinyl release by French-American vocalist Cécile McLorin Salvant. The program has released seven 180-gram vinyl LPs since it began in 2009, beginning with Christian McBride‘s Kind of Brown and then returning in 2012 with McBride’s The Good Feeling as well as The New Gary Burton Quartet‘s Common Ground. 2013 has also seen the vinyl releases of Kenny Garrett‘s Seeds From the Underground, Stanley Jordan‘s Friends, Kevin Eubanks‘ Zen Food, andYellowjackets‘ Timeline.
“Our commitment to this medium is underscored by our willingness to represent each artist’s work with double LPs,” says Al Pryor, Executive Vice President of A&R for Mack Avenue Records, “providing music lovers with all of the artists’ performances that are available on their CDs with enough real estate to insure the widest dynamic range possible for each pressing.”
“Like most other music fans, we at Mack Avenue Records have watched with delight the resurgence of interest in vinyl as a medium for music reproduction in the marketplace. We settled on Record Technology Incorporated for manufacturing and Kevin Gray as the engineer responsible for creating the lacquer masters used in the manufacturing process,” explains Pryor. “Mack Avenue Records opted for RTI’s HQ-180 three step process using virgin vinyl and limited runs on the stampers that press the LPs to insure the best possible results. The extra weight of a 180 gram pressing offers a flatter LP, coupling more securely with the turntable, delivering more music with a lower noise floor to the listeners’ home stereo.”
We wrote a few weeks ago about the rebirth of vinyl records, and the Mack Avenue announcement is yet another valiation that the vinyl resurgence is real.