We’ve been shipping the August issue to pre-press. There, you can see it on my desk. It involves a lot of paper, coffee, oatmeal, procrastination, juggling, John Prine, Pontiak, Bushman’s Revenge, and ass-kicking. A whole lot of ass-kicking.
Strange thing about cassettes and vinyl records: Every now and then, while listening to them, I find myself wondering what’ll happen to them when I’m dead and gone. These beautiful things will outlive me and someday someone else will “own” them. What will that person think of me? <i>Will</i> that person think of me? What do my records say about me?
We were bummed out when we heard that Steve Gritzan was closing down his wonderful and dusty record shop, <a href="http://blog.stereophile.com/stephenmejias/iris_records_closes/">Iris Records</a>, in downtown Jersey City, but heartened in knowing that he’d continue to sell albums at street fairs and at his outstanding Brooklyn Record Riot conventions.
Geri Allen’s new album, <I>Flying Toward the Sound</I> (Motema Music), is a stunner. She calls it “a solo piano excursion inspired by Cecil Taylor, McCoy Tyner and Herbie Hancock.” In jazz pianists’ lingo, this is like Babe Ruth pointing to a spot in right-center field. And she slugs the ball out of the park.
<i>Hey kid, you think that’s oil?<br>
Man, that ain’t oil, that’s blood.</i>
If you asked me to name a single specific high-end audio component that could make or break a system, I'd name the Linn LP12 turntable. Of all the thousands of hi-fi products I've heard over the years, not a one of 'em—not a speaker, amplifier, or digital processor—has been able to draw me into the music, no matter what the associated componentry, like the LP12. I've heard the most highly regarded speakers/amps/processors fall flat in certain situations due to a lack of synergy with their surrounding systems, but I've never heard an LP12-based system that didn't put a smile on my face and make me green with envy.
As fascinating as the design of high-end hardware can be, it goes without question that without musical software (or <I>firm</I>ware, as our more computer-minded readers would have it) of an appropriately high standard, the whole business would be pointless. <I>Stereophile</I>'s interviews have therefore often featured engineers and producers whose recorded work reveals sound quality to be a major concern. I interviewed Performance Recordings' James Boyk back in Vol.9 No.6; J. Gordon Holt spoke in Vol.10 No.3 with <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/asweseeit/1282awsi">Doug Sax</A> and Lincoln Mayorga, of Sheffield Lab, and with Keith Johnson of Reference Recordings, about their history-making Moscow sessions; JGH also discussed Brad Miller's and Lou Dorren's Colossus digital project in Vol.10 No.1 and <A HREF="http://stereophile.com/asweseeit/the_colossus_of_audio">Vol.11 No.4</A>; while last month Dick Olsher interviewed Peter McGrath, responsible for some superb-sounding recordings for Harmonia Mundi USA as well as for his own Audiofon label.
Let’s put the main point up front. The new duet album by Keith Jarrett and Charlie Haden, <I>Jasmine</I> (on ECM), is a gorgeous piece of work: all standards, mainly ballads, nothing fancy (not overtly anyway), but such poignance and quiet passion; it’s a glimpse into the intimacy of the act of making art.
High-end audio is an international pursuit, with components and products sourced from all over the world. Setting aside the manufacturers' headquarters addresses, how many of the products in your system are actually manufactured outside of your home country?