The last time I covered the New York Audio Show it was not, frankly, a great experience. The show was really small. It seemed like everyone was playing Diana Krall or some pop-classical piece from an audiophile label. Nobody, it seemed, dared to play interesting music.

We know, we know, it's only November 12. But it's one heck of an issue, featuring our Products of 2018, and it's hitting newsstands, tablets, and mailbox now! The versatile Ovation PA 8.2 preamplifier from German company AVM is featured on the December cover and this issue's line-up of reviews has a European flavor: as well as the AVM, we audition Elac's Adante AF-61 speaker and EMT's HSD 006 phono cartridge (Germany); the ATC CDA2 CD player, Harbeth P3ESR minimonitor, and Wharfedale Diamond 11.2 bookshelf speaker (UK); Ortofon SPU Wood pickup head (Denmark); and Aqua Formula xHD DAC (Italy).

A fun fixture of every audio show is the hanging badge-on-a-lanyard we all acquire at the registration table. I'm glad for these things—at least the large-print editions—because they help me overcome the steady embarrassment I feel because I can't remember any names. If you know me, I am sure you have talked to me while I've stared at your belly trying hopelessly to memorize your name.

This review and its companion that will follow next week spotlight two very different and equally recommendable recordings of contemporary music with a common theme: the quest for freedom and justice in perilous times. This week's special, Lament/Witches' Sabbath (New Focus Recordings), due out today (November 9), contains four works by Mathew Rosenblum, an East Coast composer who occasionally ventures into forbidden territory as he blends percussion, acoustic instruments, electronics, voice and microtonal elements in extremely visceral, moving, and sometimes gut-wrenching ways.