PAUL SIMON Paul Simon (DCC Compact Classics)

Nothing to do with Philips’ doomed Digital Compact Cassette format, fortunately, Californian company DCC’s stock in trade is the reissuing of classic pop, rock and jazz albums in a manner that befits their importance. To this end, DCC’s numbered, limited edition reissues have heavy, laminated cardboard sleeves that duplicate all the information to be found on the original issues, are mastered from analogue tapes using an all vacuum-tube cutting system and are lovingly poured onto 180 grams’ worth of virgin vinyl. All of which should make for a pretty impressive sounding record, for those of us that care about such things. Eager to see how much better a decent audiophile pressing could be (or not), I snapped up their reissue of Paul Simon’s first post-Simon & Garfunkel album, chosen because a) I didn’t already have it and b) the mint, original issue "There Goes Rhymin’ Simon" that I picked up for a derisory £2 at a record fair is my current jawdrop reference recording ("Take Me To The Mardi Gras", in particular, sounds scarily realistic), and would make a reasonably scientific benchmark for judging the worth of DCC’s painstaking effort.

Musically "Paul Simon" is something of a ragbag of influences: taking its cue from the eclecticism of "Bridge Over Troubled Water", reggae jostles for space next to jazz, blues, Latin and Simon’s more traditional urban folk. This all makes for an album that’s fitfully entertaining: the likes of "Mother And Child Reunion", "Duncan" and "Me And Julio Down By The Schoolyard" are rightly regarded as classics, but the remainder seems to have been, perhaps justifiably, airbrushed out of rock history - songs such as "Armistice Day" seem underwritten, without the clarity of direction that you’d expect from such a master tunesmith. Still, the combined talent assembled here gives the material fine support, including performances from many of the "Bridge Over Troubled Water" backup musicians, Whitney Houston’s mum, Los Incas and Stephane Grappelli.

The crunch for any audiophile reissue, though, is what it sounds like, and at first I was disappointed. Playing it at the sort of volumes I reserve for when my neighbours are on holiday (because my neighbours were on holiday) I was impressed by the huge slabs of bass this DCC pressing possesses, and the discovery of hitherto unheard backing vocal lines on "Mother And Child Reunion" (a song I’ve been playing since I was three!). Little details, like the sound of (presumably) Simon scratching his chin or drawing breath before singing a vocal, were clearly audible, and what I originally thought to be a high level of surface noise actually turned out to be the hiss of the master tape between tracks, something I’d never heard before as it’s usually subsumed below the background roar that we’ve come to accept as inevitable with vinyl - DCC have clearly proved otherwise. On the other hand the treble had a glassy hardness and harshness that seemed closer to that expected from CD, and at odds with the claims of analogue and valve heritage on the cover, something that other more conventional recent 180 gram issues from the likes of Beck, Miles Davis and Jimi Hendrix have managed to avoid, and a trait completely absent from my ‘control’ £2 record fair wonder.

Later listening at a more relaxed volume (because my neighbours had come back from their holiday!) lessened the effect, fortunately, suggesting that, all told, the DCC reissue process has much to offer any vinyl enthusiast who hasn’t already got a pristine original pressing of the album concerned. Although not cheap - Diverse sell them for £22.90 each - the only alternative route to sonic nirvana is probably a season ticket on the record fair circuit and the perseverance of Sisyphus, and even then you won’t find an original pressing as immaculately packaged as this.