Carly Simon – No Secrets

The listening is very good, wide and precise, warm but defined, until you feel those horrible distortions. Fortunately there are very few, but they make themselves felt.

Needed a damn good spin in the ultrasonic to kill-off the static but once playable it turned out to be a fine record.
No "whooshing" with my microlinear stylus - a little flat at the top-end but so are my ears by now and nothing that a tweek of treble didn't sort out. - Well worth the money.

There are significant QC issues with this release - from whooshing sounds to some distortion on Carly’s vocals. In my experience, your stylus profile will determine whether these issues - specifically a whooshing sound in one channel, are exacerbated or not. I’ve purchased three copies before I managed to find a clean one & I’ve also changed cartridges. Kevin Gray has done a great job on the mastering front - recording sounds super-warm and detailed. A2 still has some vocal distortion. ”You’re So Vain” is of course the big winner here - the song never sounded better. I haven’t experienced any noise or pressing issues with my current copy, so my advice is to hunt around, you may need to go through several copies to find a good one.

Extended bass, a dull midrange and on the first run I wondered if my tweeters are working or not... There's a huge lack of treble in this record.

Just picked a copy of this up from Amazon UK (October 2022). Unfortunately it sounds terrible, wooshing sound in the right hand channel throughout side A as others have mentioned. Appears to be a pressing defect, also the high end appears to be cut off compared to my early UK pressing. The early pressing sounds slightly distorted as I think the cutting engineer Ray Staff appears to have cut it pretty hot. Comparing the vinyl the original has a much glossier shine and the grooves better defined. The speakers corner in contrast is Matt and the grooves do not look as well defined. Speculating that this is a poor pressing by the manufacturing plant - Pallas?

Find a clean US original pressing if I were you as the lacquer was cut by Doug Sax.

Will update when I receive the replacement from Amazon UK.

Fantastic pressing! All the ingredients are there - Kevin Gray, Pallas pressing and all analogue production from Speakers Corner at an affordable price. Grab a copy while you can!

Regarding all the comments complaining about a whooshing sound on side one of this particular pressing, I had the same problem and ed Speakers Corner about it.
This was their reply, verbatim:

thank you very much for your inquiry and your kind comments concerning our releases.

The mentioned disturbances of Elektra EKS-75049 are a tricky subject, I have to confess. They are there, no doubt, but audible just on a handful of turntables. On none of our turntables nor on the ones Pallas is using for quality control the problem was audible - this is why we published the title as it is.

To give you and impression of the magnitude of the problem, of almost 3000 copies sold we received 16 defect returns.

This is ittedly more than usual, so we looked into the subject again. We bought reportedly defect copies back, but the problem was not identifiable. Pallas then dived deep in their stock of different needles and after all we were able to hear the problem.
To cut a long story short, we used another procedure of surface treatment to the stamper and it seems that the problem is solved. So if you obtain a sample from the last pressing run, the problem shouldn't be audible anymore.
Unfortunately you have to rely on the relevant shop when they have obtained the copy you are going to buy, there is no way to separate the frist 5 pressing runs from the last one.

I am sorry that we have not a more convenient solution to the problem.

Best regards,

Compared to the first U.K. pressing (https://discogs.mejordescarga.net/release/3740776-Carly-Simon-No-Secrets), this sounds so much better. Much fuller and more natural sound.

Great mastering. Really let’s the glorious mix by Bill Schnee shine! Pallas also did a delightful job on this pressing.

This version is highly recommended. Mastering is by Kevin Gray ("KPG@CA")