Here we are looking at Bill Evans Trio’s Live at the Vanguard with Scott LaFaro, on Riverside from 1961.
This one is super nice – it was a find in a box from a collection I bought a year ago. Looking at the cover, this is in sweet shape. There is a bit of age showing on the cover in some discoloring./rubbing (sometimes called foxing I think), and same for the back – but it is minor, and definitely commensurate with the age of the record. It is not excessive by any measure. No writing, no tape. More like age spots on old people.
The edge on the top is solid, the spine has a little wear to it, and almost a split, about 1/2 inch, in the middle of it. I took a picture to try to show it but it does not show that well – it is not a lot. The bottom edge has minor wear, and there is a small (under 3/4 inch) split from the mouth – very, very small, but noted.
The wax looks great. Look at the labels – if a record has been spun a bunch, there are marks near the spindle holes…this has zero. I am not saying it was never played, but there are no seen problems from it – no scuffs, scratches, or anything that I would associate from play or overplaying it. It looks very newish.
On side 2, there are 2 small scuffs – one in track one, one in track two, close to each other. To me, these seem to be from some kind of storage thing – they are not consistent with a play scuff. To me – just my opinion there, I don’t know for sure.
Again, I zoomed on it, and moved around until I caught it in the light for you…this is the only imperfection I found in visually grading this one – it looks like it will give you a NM playback all the way…and if these are the only trouble spots, you may be able to clean them out – I did not put forth a ton of effort that way. I did not spin test it either, and see no reason to test side one – but if you want to to test play side two to see if it plays without any click or anything, I am happy to. I see nothing in the wax beyond those scuffs to tell you – it looks like a stellar record.
Click any image below to make it larger/zoom in, and use your browser to get back here for more. Let me know if there’s more you need to know – this one looks like a honey and a half to me.
