Mastered from the Original Master Tapes with Mobile Fidelity’s One-Step Process: Blood, Sweat & Tears UD1S 180g 45RPM 2LP Box Set Is Ultimate Version of 1968 Album

Superb Packaging Includes Opulent Box, Foil-Stamped Jackets, and SuperVinyl LPs: Deluxe Audiophile Pressing Strictly Limited to 6,000 Numbered Copies (Limit Two Per Customer)

James William Guercio-Produced Record Established New Precedents for Musical Fusion: Jazz-Rock Effort Includes “You’ve Made Me So Very Happy” and “Spinning Wheel”

Don’t call it a comeback. Not only did Blood, Sweat & Tears’ eponymous album establish new precedents for musical fusion and record production upon release in late 1968, the quadruple-platinum set marked a new commercial beginning for a cross-cultural group nearly decimated months earlier when its prominent co-founder, Al Kooper, departed along with two other members. The resultant sophomore effort simply went on to top the charts for seven straight weeks, earn the Grammy Award for Album of the Year, spawn three successive Top 5 singles, and land the group a headlining slot at Woodstock. No wonder its reputation remains golden among listeners, particularly audiophiles, which have never experienced the hybrid fare in more vibrant fashion than on this collectible reissue.

Strictly limited to 6,000 numbered copies and pressed on MoFi SuperVinyl at RTI, Mobile Fidelity’s ultra-hi-fi UltraDisc One-Step 180g 45RPM 2LP edition presents Blood, Sweat & Tears with exacting sonics and unsurpassed visuals. Prized for decades for its rainbow of textures, colours, and openness – as well as the tonalities, extension, and subtleties associated with the horn section – Blood, Sweat & Tears now comes across with multi-dimensional scope and tremendous frequency responsiveness. The collective’s genre-bending brass and woodwind instrumentation possess pointillistic details as rich, deep, and complex as a succulent Turkish espresso. Similarly, the originality, sophistication, and melodicism of the songs – anchored by Jim Fielder’s can-do-anything bass playing – emerges with a newfound warmth, realism, and presence that surpass those even on the out-of-print ORG 45RPM reissue. Such is the allure of UD1S and MoFi SuperVinyl.

In addition, the lavish packaging and gorgeous presentation of the UD1S Blood, Sweat & Tears pressing also befit its extremely select status. Housed in a deluxe box, it features special foil-stamped jackets and faithful-to-the-original graphics that illuminate the splendour of the recording. No expense has been spared. Aurally and visually, this UD1S reissue exists as a curatorial artefact meant to be preserved, pored over, touched, and examined. It is made for discerning listeners who prize sound quality and production, and who desire to fully immerse themselves in the art – and everything involved with the album, from the images to the finishes.

Speaking of these critical aspects, it remains obvious producer James William Guercio valued them above all else when he manned the boards for the sessions. Working with engineer Roy Halee and the band’s sensitive arrangements – including that for the Number Two smash “You’ve Made Me So Very Happy,” co-arranged by Kooper – he helped spin the nonet’s melange of classical, jazz, rock, folk, and blues into pop gold. Ignoring any stylistic boundaries, and preceding Chicago’s similarly jazz-rock-centric debut by almost four months, the album interrupted formal convention and went against the grain of the era’s dominant psychedelia. Along with creative interpretations of tunes by Traffic, Laura Nyro, and more, and fearless interplay of horns and keyboards, a key to the effort’s mega-success and sterling reputation remains the vocals of David Clayton-Thomas.

Reportedly discovered by Judy Collins, Clayton-Thomas brings a soulfulness and drama to the palette absent from the first album. His baritone emerges front and centre on the country-leaning “And When I Die,” baroque-inspired “Sometimes in Winter,” and syncopated “Smiling Phases.” The singer’s multifaceted ability complements his colleagues deft approaches to tempo, transition, and tension, with solos dovetailing with jazz-derived segues to produce music that’s at once elaborate, eclectic, and accessible – never better represented than on the thrice Grammy-nominated “Spinning Wheel,” a sly takedown of the LSD-addled era that ends with an Austrian tune from 1815 added at the last minute by Guercio to correct a mistake – a one-off error on a set that seemingly has none other.

Indeed, the most enduring appeal of Blood, Sweat & Tears pertains to the cohesive performances of a group that blazed its own trail. To focus on the playing of trumpeters/flugelhornists Lew Soloff and Chuck Winfield, drummer Bobby Colomby, organist Dick Halligan, guitarist Steve Katz, alto saxophonist Fred Lipsius, trombonist Jerry Hyman, and the aforementioned Clayton-Thomas and Fielder (many of whom also played auxiliary instruments) is to experience one of pop music’s remarkable adventures.

More About Mobile Fidelity UltraDisc One-Step and Why It Is Superior

Instead of utilizing the industry-standard three-step lacquer process, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab’s new UltraDisc One-Step (UD1S) uses only one step, bypassing two processes of generational loss. While three-step processing is designed for optimum yield and efficiency, UD1S is created for the ultimate in sound quality. Just as Mobile Fidelity pioneered the UHQR (Ultra High-Quality Record) with JVC in the 1980s, UD1S again represents another state-of-the-art advance in the record-manufacturing process. MFSL engineers begin with the original master tapes and meticulously cut a set of lacquers. These lacquers are used to create a very fragile, pristine UD1S stamper called a “convert.” Delicate “converts” are then formed into the actual record stampers, producing a final product that literally and figuratively brings you closer to the music. By skipping the additional steps of pulling another positive and an additional negative, as done in the three-step process used in standard pressings, UD1S produces a final LP with the lowest noise floor possible today. The removal of the additional two steps of generational loss in the plating process reveals tremendous amounts of extra musical detail and dynamics, which are otherwise lost due to the standard copying process. The exclusive nature of these very limited pressings guarantees that every UD1S pressing serves as an immaculate replica of the lacquer sourced directly from the original master tape. Every conceivable aspect of vinyl production is optimized to produce the most perfect record album available today.