Adele (3) – 19

The album itself is fantastic, Adele’s best in my opinion. But the sound quality is quite poor. Badly mixed, very harsh and a lot of distortion. It could do with a good remaster.

This album went mega and you can see why. Big songs, great hooks and a top voice set Adele up for world conquering stardom but she still had time for tender moments such as her cover of Cure’s Lovesong. A career high she looks incapable of matching again.

The quality of the pressing is really low. I can sense how cheap the vinyl and the jacket are made, very light and thin. Apart from that, there are some surface noise along the way, which made it worse. Moreover, the cold shoulder is also distorted in some parts. overall, it's a 2.5/5.

Fantastic album but some distortion with the pressing on parts of Chasing Pavements and Cold Shoulder but a great pressing otherwise.

My copy actually doesn’t sound bad!
No cracks or surface noise at all!
The only problem I have is that chasing pavements and cold shoulder sound pretty distorted at some parts and have some problems with the sssss.
And of course the inner groove distortion on Hometown Glory isn’t optimal but inner groove distortion is totally normal

Whilst far from great, my copy is not quite the car crash others have described.
SQ wise it's a mixed bag, with A3 & A4 being particularly poor, whilst elsewhere it's quite listenable and shines in a few places.
Whilst it looks like there have been later reissues, I ordered 2022 and got this edition (Australia).

Can only confirm the criticism. The quality of the recording is a disaster!

It’s a shame and a disgrace to release an album in such a shitty quality.
The music is wonderful!

Not a sound connoisseur but didn’t leave a favorable impression. Not an Adele fan either. First time I hear her other than songs on the radio from 21 during that era. Someone gave me 30 as a gift and I bought this because I wanted to see a debut to latest contrast. Not too impressed and it may be the tunes but the technical sound quality may not be doing it too many favors to warm up to me. Makes me want to put on Frank by Amy Winehouse.

The pressing is good (not many crackles, pops, and so on), but yet the album sounds awful. It's almost an accomplishment! Chasing Pavements is a good example. When the track builds, the sound is getting worse and worse. Like a very bad cd. And it's like this on all tracks with a little more instrumentation than a voice and a single instrument.
But the worst part is, Adele has one of the best voices currently around, but on this pressing she sounds thin and muffled.
This vinyl version is not recommended.