This is an amazing record when it’s mastered and pressed correctly, but our experience with dozens of pressings over the years tells us that most copies leave much to be desired. Playing the record is the only way to hear all of the qualities we discuss above, and playing the best pressings against a pile of other copies under rigorously controlled conditions is the only way to find a pressing that sounds as good as this one does. No doubt there’s more but we hope that should do for now.
Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional studio space. Natural tonality in the midrange - with all the instruments having the correct timbre. Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes in 1985 The most Tubey Magic, without which you have almost nothing. The biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space. What the best sides of Rapture have to offer is not hard to hear: Old records have it - not often, and certainly not always - but less than one out of 100 new records do, if our experience with the hundreds we’ve played can serve as a guide. If you exclusively play modern repressings of older recordings (this one is now 34 years old), I can say without fear of contradiction that you have never heard this kind of sound on vinyl. 
The best copies have an uncanny way of doing just that. The music is not so much about the details in the recording, but rather in trying to recreate a solid, palpable, real Anita Baker singing live in your listening room. We rate these qualities higher than others we might be listening for (e.g., bass definition, soundstage, depth, etc.). Having done this for so long, we understand and appreciate that rich, full, solid, Tubey Magical sound is key to the presentation of this primarily vocal music.
5 stars: “Rapture gave Baker one moving hit after another, including ‘Sweet Love,’ ‘Caught up in the Rapture,’ ‘Same Ole Love,’ and ‘No One in This World.'”Ī Soul Classic - winner, and deservedly so, of 2 Grammy Awards: Best R&B Song and Best R&B Female Vocal. Key to the sound is richness and Tubey Magic, along with strong midrange presence, and on this Super Hot Stamper you get all three. Rapture is one of the best sounding recordings from the era – with all due respect to Whitney Houston, if I could have only one album of ’80s soulful female vocals, it would have to be this one. 
This quiet-storm classic earned outstanding Double Plus (A++) grades for sound on both sides and plays on exceptionally quiet vinyl to boot.
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