Unexpected Tom Petty "stamper" discovery


Did some New Years cull of Rock albums. Went through the Tom Petty catalog.

My faves are his first 3 albums, with my interest fading by his 5th, "Long After Dark"
I was a big fan, saw TP & the Heartbreakers perform arguably at their peak -New Years Eve, 1978 at the Santa Monica Civic.

Playing my 2nd least favorite album "Hard Promises," the great sonics kept me listening to it.

A quick Wiki revealed this, which I thought was cool:

"During the recording of the album, John Lennon was scheduled to be in the same studio at the same time. Petty was looking forward to meeting him when he came in. The meeting never occurred, as Lennon was murdered before the date of his planned visit the studio. Petty and the band paid tribute to the slain former Beatle by etching "WE LOVE YOU J.L." in the runout deadwax on early U.S. and Canadian pressings of Hard Promises."

After side 1 was finished, a quick inspection verified my suspicion-I have a Tom Port HOT STAMPER$$!!

All those Tom Port descriptors used for those $3-500 "WHITE HOT STAMPER" were heard!

Reality, I just thought the sonics were quite nice, so im keeping it. The album was a sealed copy. I found it during one of my neighborhood store, bin diving sessions years ago. It was played once back then, never saw daylight since.

Played side 2, then back on the shelf, where it likely won’t get played for another couple years.








tablejockey
@tablejockey,

That sounds great!. Although, I've never known TP to make known his stamper codes.

My story is only somewhat related (being about not the sound quality of a certain pressing, but rather its musical content), but anyone who likes Tom Petty is likely to also like T Bone Burnett. I bought T Bone’s 1980 Truth Decay album on Takoma Records, and loved it. I had the copy for a few years, not listening to it during the time my system was becoming more revealing. Hearing it again on that system disclosed just how noisy the LP was, so I took it into my local Tower Records (at which I had established a relationship as a good, repeat customer) for a different copy. I put that copy on the turntable, and was pleased that it indeed had lower surface noise.

I was however very surprised when the Rockabillyish-song which closes side 1, "Driving Wheel", ended; rather than the song starting up again after a false ending as it had on the first copy, on the second it simply ended. The rest of the song was missing! I looked at the bottom of the back side of the LP cover, and discovered that the new copy, while still on the Takoma Records label, was being distributed by Allegiance Records, not Chrysalis as had been the original copy. Allegiance had obviously remastered the LP for their release, and the engineer had not realized the false ending was just that.

I returned the second copy, and the clerk retrieved the first copy from the stores back room. Good thing I played the Allegiance Records-distributed LP immediately! If you go looking for an LP copy of Truth Decay, make sure the cover says "Distributed by Chrysalis Records"!

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