Japanese Vinyl?

A record label may press different records at different plants so you can't just go by the label. You need to look at the back cover to see where it was pressed. IMHO, anything pressed by JVC Victor is exceptional.

I have bought alot of Japanese Vinyl with mixed results. The benefit is that the vinyl itself is better, lower noise floor, pressing quality is high. But the rest depends on the master tape, is it 2nd generation, mastering process, amps, etc. If you are talking about Jazz, almost all the 1950's/60's Verve or blue notes sound pretty good and an improvement to me (case in point Stan Getz). Classical I couldn't tell you, Pop/rock: sometimes better, sometimes less soundstage/"air" spacial detail and more inner groove distortion. Example (don't laugh if you hate Yes): the Yes recordings "Fragile", "Relayer", "Going for the One" all sound worse in regards to above on Japanese Vinyl; all sound best on original 1st pressings from U.K. But I would say the Jap. pressings are perhaps better than U.S. The above is true for almost all U.K. progressive/art rock bands: Camel, King Crimson, ELP, etc.

The Japanese Yes pressings are not better than their US counterparts.

The original US pressings mastered by George Piros, especially "The Yes Album" and "Fragile", smoke the Jap versions.

Sadly, both the UK and US releases of "Close to the Edge" pale in comparison to these 2 albums' sonics.