John Williams (4) – E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial

Can confirm this is an absolute mess of a pressing. Side C is absolutely impossible to listen to with any kind of enjoyment since it's a festival of loud and constant pops, sometimes almost creating a rhythm of their own, not to mention crackle and high surface noise present throughout. I've asked Mondo for a return/refund but I'm from so we'll see what they say..
If you want to listen to the issues, here's a compilation I made : https://youtu.be/Cv_iII5gh9w

EDIT 05/27 : Mondo can't send me a pre-paid shipping label so they offered to refund the shipping cost and the record itself so I will be returning it unfortunately. I just can't justify keeping the item in this condition.

The sound is good. No complaints. I do feel the moon LPs don’t really look like the moon if I’m being honest.

Anyone else order this and NEVER receive it from Mondo? Mondo keeps referring me to a tracking number, but it only indicates that the label was created and never sent. It's infuriating. More so since this was a pre-order.

Mondo has really changed hands. it has nothing to do with what I have bought in recent years. The LP is of the worst quality that I have purchased new and the cover and its printing are of poor quality. If certain pressings sometimes had a few slight defects, here it is clearly a horror. Finally, they refused the criticism and offered me nothing. After more than €700 spent with them in almost 10 years, I will never buy their pressings again. It's over.

My initial copy has been replaced by Mondo and the new one sounds utterly fantastic. I don’t know what the problem was with my first pressing but the second batch are infinitely better.

This is such a great soundtrack. I’m delighted to have a copy on vinyl that sounds as good as it should.

Sadly, I must concur with all of the negative assessments of this release.

I purchased mine directly from MONDO a couple of months ago but was unable to listen to it until today as I was lacking any equipment to play the discs on. I finally received my Fluance RT85 set and hurriedly put it on after set up, only to hear...DISTORTION, with the score lingering somewhere in the background. I played multiple other discs only to discover that the problem was uniquely MONDO in origin.

I have just ed them and I hope to have a satisfactory outcome. I have read numerous negative comments about their releases on this site but I always hoped it was just a bad batch issue. Now, given that I finally have my turntable, I have to go through all their releases just to make sure I don't have another dud in my vinyl collection.

To the MONDO team: If you're gonna do something worthwhile (and vinyl is worthwhile), for god's sake do it right!

Addendum: 14th September, 2023

MONDO agreed to a refund for my ET (full moon variant) set as well as a replacement for my TRON: LEGACY. Unfortunately, my JAWS (with blood in the water vinyl) could neither be replaced nor handled as they were all out of stock. On the whole I am satisfied with their response and will continue to be a customer.

So noisy throughout. Cover art looks nice, but avoid if you want an enjoyable listening experience!

I can't speak to the audio quality but the discs (Full Moon variant) look nothing like the stock images. They actually look like pale cerulean, more blue than white.

Just acquired a NM copy of the 35th anniversary 2lp La La Land pressing. Within the first few minutes of side 1, I could hear a significant difference in audio quality - no competition - the 35th (RTI) blows this 40th (GZ) out of the water. Not only is the pressing quieter (near-silent wax), but the audio is clearer/sharper. By comparison, the 40th now sounds veiled, as if a blanket is covering the speakers.

I highly recommend the 35th pressing over the 40th, even if you have to pay a bit more, but not over $100 (I fortunately got mine near list price). Not to mention, I prefer that cover art over the 40th.

I can confirm my copy also sounds horrible. The popping is constant throughout. I've bought over 125 records in the past two years and this is by far the worst sounding. Pity, since I waited so long after pre-ordering and I was really looking forward to this release. I just ed customer service for a refund.