The Strokes – Is This It

Just wanted to mention I bought the new pressing that has a red record, and it seems to have the same stampers as this release. That release sounds pretty darn good.

Best version I've heard (I have UK and US originals, both RJ-Sterling, as well as the SST mastered European original). The masters are Pro Tools so there is no technical advantage for an original. Note the recording is intentionally compressed and distorted but this version renders it most pleasingly. Judgments via VPI Classic 3/Dynavector DV20.

I just bought a version whose dead wax matrix matches this release (specifically variant 2), but it's in a jacket that belongs to this one: https://www.discogs.sie.com/release/15664217-The-Strokes-Is-This-It. It has no booklet, either. Just the album in a white, poly-lined inner sleeve. It sounds good.

A masterpiece. Get this record if you love rock n roll, cause it’s timeless.

This sounds really really really good rhythm is is super punchy, it’s all really dynamic, super impressive off a kinda low fidelity record

It is an excellent version, perhaps the best, All the stereo relationships between the instruments / voices are very well suited all the robust gritty of the production of its time sounds very reluctant, there was no compression distortion in my copy, I got one Let's say a very optimal copy, it has a perfect finish and without being clearer I recommend it at least in its time it was easy to find we could say that it is assimilated to a remastered but it is natural it is not forced nor does it feel digitized, very good impression despite how common this album is with its thousands of copies!

Any one did compare this press to 2020 black reissue? any opinions? Thankss

I compared the MOV (butt cover) pressing to the standard U.S repress that widely available. To my ears the generic repress sounds much better and has a fuller/crisper analog sound then the MOV version which sounds kinda flat and compressed. Worth having for the cover, I suppose.

Sounds like it's supposed to sound (Casablancas is *supposed* to sound like he's singing through a Dixie Cup). Got the more recent RCA pressing and it was full of bubbles and skips, this one sounds much better and has no manufacturing errors.

I think some commenters on Discogs forget the fact that there is actually a recording process - microphones, a mixer, an engineer and all this can accumulatively effect the presence and ultimately the listening experience along way before mastering. This Strokes album was recorded in a 'dimly lit basement' and doesn't have the recording fidelity of a multi million dollar studio, which inversely doesn't have the creative vibe of a dimly lit basement. It's not a great fidelity experience, with vocals being sung through a £300 mic or into a guitar amp on many tracks... "I would start turning the knobs on every piece of equipment until the frowns began turning into smiles. That was the technique for working with The Strokes" - doesn't sound like an exact science really or a high fidelity recording. It's also worth noting that a lot of smaller studios had poor quality sound cards at their centre, poor in comparison to todays incredible AD/DA converters. Tape was still infinitely better in my opinion in 2000, but most couldn't bare to work without a computer.

We all know that when a high fidelity recording is remastered / pressed by Music on Vinyl, they deliver a stellar job. This is a brash sounding album of a garage rock band that was recorded in a basement studio on reasonably budget equipment. It's a spontaneous recording, not the audiophile experience, something that I am sad about as in the right hands, it could very well have been a sonic masterpiece too.

Straight after, I put on my beloved Mobile Fidelity version of the Pixies 'Doolittle' for a reality check. If only....