Wire – Pink Flag

Solid Repress. Noticed no major distortion or background. A excellent example of 70S British punk, Some really nice punchy drums and iconic guitar riffs, especially on the classic ‘ex lion tamer’

Ok press. Very dirty on side 2 and needed a good clean. Even after that, my stylus picked up that much crap that it needed a massive scrub down. Final two tracks sound a bit distorted.

the platonic ideal of 70s punk. my favorite punk record of all time, maybe?

I don't know if my experience is based on sheer luck, but I picked up the first three Wire albums in their 2018 PF pressings... came out sleeve flat with no scratch by simply squeezing the edges of strong card inner and rolling them out. De-stat, brush, and after a thorough cleaning these are silent surface, wide dynamic and timbral range, no sibilance -easily my favourite copies of these great LPs. Digital or not. Depth of field and lack of cd brick wall limiting makes these an absolute bargain and a fun listen.

Yes it is a digital master but let's face it, what album wasn't made or produced using digital related tech since the 90s. Yes, I understand albums are still being reissued using "master tapes" however, I would like to see what is being used to capture the music from those tapes to create the reissue....something digital?

The pressing is perfect. While it is a digital master, it still sounds better than streaming it - more open sound.

Mine has the same labels on both sides. Both sides “side 2”.

Nice early punk: short songs, melodic, and not terribly dense like Sex Pistols or Ramones who would follow closely behind. Several nice sounding tracks on this record. But hey, if you don't like the song, just wait 45 seconds for the next to start.

What an outstanding pressing. Packaging is great. Sounds wonderful.
3.5 stars. Recommended.

High quality pressing - sounds bright and noise free. I like the packaging - good print and materials

Great pressing. Optimal usually does a good job. Haven't heard the original (one day, hopefully) but I'm willing to bet that it sounds better because this sounds to me like a remaster where the dynamics have been squashed a little. Still sounds punchy, but lacks that nice wide dynamic range that makes this kind of music exciting. It'll do you just fine if you don't wanna shell out at least 5x the price for an original.

Not sure if anyone else has mentioned this already but I just noticed that compared to my 78 US press, the album art here is a tad bit dull compared to the more vibrant/darker blue on the 78. Did they edit the image for some reason?