Ned Doheny – Hard Candy (1976) (2014 Be With Records 180g reissue)

Ned Doheny – Hard Candy
Vinyl rip in 24-bit/192 kHz | FLAC |  Art scans at 300 dpi
1.4801GB (24/192) | 714MB (24/96) + 238 MB (16/44) |
2014 Be With Records BEWITH003LP | Genre:   Soul, Funk, Rock

I’m not sure that the release of Ned Doheny’s 1973 album sold enough copies to inculcate anything much in the way of expectations, but anybody who had happened to own that album could be forgiven for wondering if his second record in 1976 hadn’t accidentally been switched with the latest Vangelis when they first put it on the turntable. A full thirty seconds of  slowly faded-in, droning synth chords opens the album before a splash of Ned’s acoustic guitar, chimes and eventually drummer Gary Mallaber laying down a rock-solid beat on the moody “Get It Up For Love.” The whole record is heavenly blue-eyed soul, folky funk, swimming pool dreaminess and about as Laurel Canyon 1976 as it could possibly be.

A1 Get It Up For Love 4:44
A2 If You Should Fall 3:36
A3 Each Time You Pray 3:38
A4 When Love Hangs In The Balance 5:12
B1 A Love Of Your Own 3:46
B2 I’ve Got Your Number 3:14
B3 On The Swingshift 3:03
B4 Sing To Me 3:36
B5 Valentine (I Was Wrong About You) 5:06

Executive Producer [Reissue] – Rob Butler
Producer – Steve Cropper

Recorded at Clover Studios, Hollywood & Record Plan, Sausalito.

Limited edition of 500 copies.

Be With Records would like to thank: Ned Doheny, Bradley Fallon, Scotty Coats, Phil Birchall, Sean Wallace and Grant & Olly at Sony.

LINEAGE: Be With Records BEWITH003LP; Pro-Ject RM-5SE with Audio Tecnica AT440-MLa cartridge; Speedbox power supply; Creek Audio OBH-15; Audioquest King Cobra cables; M-Audio Audiophile 192 Soundcard ; Adobe Audition at 32-bit float 192khz; clicks and pops removed manually with Adobe Audition 3.0; dithered and resampled using iZotope RX Advanced. Converted to FLAC in either Trader’s Little Helper or dBPoweramp. Tags done with Foobar 2000 and Tag and Rename.

Doheny may have shied away from the spotlight (and even turned down an offer from Viagra to use the opening cut here in a TV commercial), but he hung out with some heavy company. Backing vocals from J.D. Souther and Linda Ronstadt; horns by Tom Scott, Chuck Findlay, and the Tower of Power; vibes and percussion by Victor Feldman; and crystalline production by Steve Cropper. Every song on here is a winner, and if (like me) you’ve been known to raise an eyebrow at some of the hipster chic of “Yacht rock”, “AOR” or “Balearic” sounds made trendy again by DJ’s playing to the hard-partying jet set in Ibiza, well this right here is top quality stuff that sounds great under any circumstances and in any atmosphere.

Unlike other reissue labels I could name, Be With Records in the UK really cares about how their records sound and work really hard to make them the best that they can.  Their engineer actually works closely with the guy who cuts the lacquers, as well as the facility in the Netherlands that presses their vinyl. Nice job on the reproduction of the original artwork too.

I’ll also be sharing the follow-up to this album, Prone, before the summer is out. Ned’s fourth album, Life After Romance, has only ever been issued in Japan (including a brand-new P-Vine vinyl release, fresh off the presses in June). Doheny is currently touring the UK so if anybody has checked out any of those shows please leave a comment about your experience here, it would be great to hear from you.

16-bit 44.1 khz

password: vibes

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