First , I have to give a little background before I get into the story of my adventure.

THE LP RECORD ( otherwise known as VINYL)

Some of you are old enough to remember when the LP record was the ONLY way for ordinary citizens to hear music. Predating the cassette and CD formats, it uses technology and techniques that have basically remained unchanged for over a hundred years. It is a technology that presents the musical content totally in an analog way, as does magnetic tape. Continuous waveforms are represented, as opposed to the approximation of waveforms that occur in digital systems. It also had the advantage of being easily duplicated, being made of plastic that could be made from molds.

But along with the waveform accuracy, the LP has the downside of being a mechanical system, with the attendant noise, wow, flutter, scratches and pitch inaccuracies.

Today, the arguments for and against LPs are rather moot. The CD has been dominant with the public for years, yet today we find the LP format is currently undergoing a renaissance. Turntables are still being made and sold, and you can get cartridges and stylii ("needles?") at any Radio Shack store.

The biggest segment of turntable users today are collectors, dance music DJs or high-end audiophiles. These segments pay big money for these new releases, as they are made in small quantities and the price recovers the difference. The average city has at least one place where you can find used, and in many cases, good quality music on vinyl.

THE CALL TO MASTER

I had known these facts, yet I was ignorant of a small record company called CLASSIC RECORDS in Hollywood until last October, when I got a call from Michael Hobson, President and CEO of the company. He told me that CSN management had signed a deal with him to reissue the "COUCH" album. Not just that, as it turns out, he wants to release the WHOLE CSN catalog on VINYL!

When I mentioned the Crosby solo IICORMN, he got very excited, said he wanted to release that one too and wanted me to come down to LA as soon as I could so I could participate -- We would do the 'COUCH' album first, then IICORMN. So I made plans.

BERNIE GRUNDMAN and the HISTORY OF MASTERING

It's October 26 2000 and I'm in Hollywood, California. I've stayed the night in the Roosevelt Hotel, and Bernie Grundman's Mastering facility is located a few blocks down the street. Bernie is an institution in the West Coast music scene.

One of the first mastering engineers to cater directly to an artist's needs, he developed and used one of the first A-B mastering systems in the world. This is a method of having two sets of eq, level and limiting controls; while one set of eq's and levels are playing for the cutting of one song, the other side can be set up with alternate settings. This allowed fine control of the mastering process.

Previous to 1966-67, mastering was considered a manufacturing function, not an artistic one. A music artist, or more likely his company's A&R man would "turn in" his master tape, and the project was then out of his hands.

But the Beatles and especially "Sergeant Pepper's" convinced the record companies that letting the artists have more control over what happens to their product wasn't a bad idea.

Simultaneously, LA area recording studios were changing. The older studios owned by the labels weren't keeping up with new recording equipment and techniques. New upstarts such as Sunset Sound, United-Western, Wally Heider, Sound Factory and A&M were breaking the corporate stranglehold on studio time by offering better, customized service, and fresh, open minded and hip studio engineering talent.