By: Jessie Sha

Mike Esposito, owner of a record shop in Phoenix, won’t tell anyone who tipped him off, but in July, he went public with a crazy declaration. In a video posted on the YouTube channel of his Phoenix record shop, Esposito said that pretty reliable sources told him about MoFi, Mobile Fidelity. Sebastopol, Calif., a prided company claims on using original master tapes for its relatively expensive reissues, however, they have actually been using digital files in their production chain. In the world of audiophiles, where the source is everything and the goal is to get as close to the original sound of an album as possible: digital is considered to be almost unholy and using digital while professing it’s not is the biggest sin a manufacturer can commit.

There was instant pushback to Esposito’s video, which included some from the bigger names in the passionate audio community. Shane Buettner, the owner of Intervention Records, which is another company in the reissue business. He justified MoFi on the popular message board judged by master engineer Steve Hoffman. Shane remembered running across one of the engineers at the company who was in a recording studio working with a master tape. “I know their process and it’s legit,” he wrote. Michael Fremer, the dean of audiophile writing, was limitless. He attacked Esposito for irresponsibly spreading rumors and said whatever his own unnamed source told him, the record store owner was wrong. “Will speculative click bait YouTube videos claiming otherwise be taken down after reading this?” he tweeted.

“They were completely deceitful,” says Richard Drutman, 50, a New York City filmmaker who has purchased more than 50 of MoFi’s albums over the years. “I never would have ordered a single Mobile Fidelity product if I had known it was sourced from a digital master.” John says MoFi takes significant care in seizing the digital file. It’s not simple because it won’t just take a link from a record company. This is what happens, if a master tape can’t be messaged to Sebastopol, MoFi will send engineers with their tools to capture master tape. From now on, MoFi with correctly label their recordings.