Thank you for buying this record. What follows is its documentation: the pressing identified, the matrix / runout transcribed by hand from the dead wax, and the condition as assessed before it was listed. It is yours to keep with the record.

— Paul, Vinyl Curator

Nina Simone

The Best Of Nina Simone

1970 · RCA Victor LSP-4374 · Stereo · US · LP · 33 1/3 RPM

Pressing details

Label	RCA Victor
Catalogue number	LSP-4374
Year	1970
Mono / Stereo	Stereo
Country	US
Format	LP
Speed	33 1/3 RPM
Genre	Soul-Jazz / R&B - Compilation
Producer	Andy Stroud (Stroud Productions & Enterprises Inc.), with individual tracks produced by Joe Rene, Gerry Lowe and Horace Ott
Conductor	Nina Simone, Gerry Lowe, Horace Ott (various tracks, as noted on the labels)
Musicians	Nina Simone (vocals, piano, arrangements); various session personnel drawn from her 1967-1969 RCA Victor studio and live sessions, not individually itemized on this compilation's jacket or labels

Matrix / Runout

Side A:  ZPRS-5242-2S A1D R
Side B:  ZPRS-5243-2S A1A R

Condition

Cover: VG+
Vinyl: NM-

Variant chronology

1970 - US RCA Victor LSP-4374, orange/gold label, first issue  <- this copy
1970 - Germany RCA LSP 4374
c. 1970s - US RCA Victor AFL1-4374, black label reissue

This Pressing

1970 RCA Victor first pressing (stereo) - orange/gold RCA Victor labels, catalogue LSP-4374, ZPRS-5242/5243 pressing codes.

The Album

Nina Simone signed to RCA Victor in 1967 after leaving Philips, and over the following three years cut a run of albums - Nina Simone Sings the Blues, Silk & Soul, 'Nuff Said!, To Love Somebody and Black Gold - that captured her at her most politically direct and musically restless, moving fluidly between blues, gospel, folk-rock covers, and originals born of the civil rights and Black Power movements. This 1970 compilation gathers highlights from that RCA period, pairing her own compositions like It Be's That Way Sometime and I Want a Little Sugar in My Bowl with pointed covers of Dylan's I Shall Be Released and the Bee Gees' In the Morning, alongside two of her most enduring protest statements, Why? (The King of Love Is Dead), written in the days after Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, and I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free. Simone had already established herself in the early 1960s as a classically trained pianist turned singular vocal stylist whose repertoire refused easy genre labels, and by the RCA years she was as much a spokesperson for Black consciousness as a performer, a stance the back-cover essay on this release explicitly foregrounds. The album's importance lies less in being a chart event than in functioning as a compact primer on her most galvanizing late-1960s work, introducing newer listeners to the persona - uncompromising, politically engaged, vocally commanding - that cemented her legacy as one of the era's essential Black artists. Critical regard for the individual RCA recordings has only grown with time, even as this particular compilation has drawn mixed notice from collectors for its song selection and source fidelity.

Tracklist

Side 1

1. In the Morning (Gibb)
2. I Shall Be Released (Dylan)
3. Day and Night (Stevenson)
4. It Be's That Way Sometime (Waymon)
5. I Want a Little Sugar in My Bowl (Simone)
6. My Man's Gone Now (from "Porgy and Bess") (Heyward-Gershwin)

Side 2

1. Why? (The King of Love Is Dead) (Taylor)
2. Compensation (Dunbar-Simone)
3. I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free (Taylor)
4. Go to Hell (Bailey, Jr.)
5. Do What You Gotta Do (Webb)
6. Suzanne (Cohen)

The Label

The side labels are the standard 1970-era RCA Victor design: orange/gold background, the large outline "RCA" logo and script "Victor" wordmark flanking the spindle, black text, catalogue number LSP-4374 with the ZPRS pressing-plant work-order numbers underneath the side/format line - a design RCA used across its pop and soul catalogue from about 1968 into the early-to-mid 1970s. There is no deep groove and no earlier "Victrola"-style or "nipper" dog-logo design present, consistent with a 1970-era pressing rather than a 1960s-style label. This is the compilation's first and only significant label design on LSP-4374 for the domestic US RCA Victor issue (as distinct from the earlier, unrelated 1969 Philips compilation of the same title, catalogue PHS 600-298, drawn from her earlier Philips-era recordings).

Fidelity

RCA pressed this title on its lighter-weight "Dynaflex" vinyl formula used across its catalogue circa 1969-1972, and collector commentary is mixed to negative on this specific compilation's sound, with some listeners suspecting dubs rather than first-generation masters for a few tracks; there is no dedicated audiophile reissue of this RCA compilation to rank against. Within the LSP-4374 pressing run itself this is an ordinary domestic stereo copy with no unusual mastering credit visible on the labels, so fidelity should be judged as typical-to-below-average for an early-1970s RCA Dynaflex pressing rather than exceptional.

Notes

1970 RCA Victor LSP-4374 stereo - domestic US pressing on the standard 1970-era orange/gold RCA Victor label. This title is a distinct RCA-era compilation from the earlier, unrelated 1969 Philips "Best Of" (PHS 600-298), which draws on her Philips catalogue; the two must not be conflated when pricing or grading. The runouts carry the stamper/mother suffixes ZPRS-5242-2S A1D R and ZPRS-5243-2S A1A R.

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