The British speaker manufacturer PMC Ltd. has built a professional client list seemingly as extensive as its almost mind-numbingly broad line of speakers. The <I>i</I> series alone includes 12 models, one of which is the DB1<I>i</I> ($1929/pair).
Step 1: Find something that works. Step 2: Use it. Step 3: Repeat as necessary, then retire.
<I>She responds as expected to the only sound: hysterical voices!—Brian Eno</I>
Ah me, another year gone by. The rest of my holiday-gift suggestions are at the end of this column, but I wanted to kick off with a hearty recommendation of <I>Aja</I>, a book by Don Breithaupt. You may recall Breithaupt as a co-author (with his brother, Jeff) of the survey <I>Precious and Few: Pop Music in the Early '70s</I>, which cracked me up in my <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/thefifthelement/the_fifth_element_56">October column</A>.
The January 2010 issue of <i>Stereophile</i> is now on newsstands. Hooray! A new volume! A new year! Twelve more issues of <i>Stereophile</i>! Whee! We are pretty excited about starting the year off with a review of a PC soundcard. And at just $200, the ASUS Xonar Essence is the least expensive product to ever grace the cover of our magazine. Plus, it’s got that pretty golden tiger thing on it. What aroused John Atkinson’s interest, however, was the ASUS’s claimed signal/noise ratio of 124dB: “True high-end territory.”
I’ve received two packages in the mail today. Both were from Portland, Oregon, a hotbed for outstanding independent music, and both contained <i><a href="http://blog.stereophile.com/stephenmejias/why_cassettes/">tapes</a></i&…;.
It could have been a stupendously bad purchase or, perhaps, a cat running across the turntable while your first-pressing Parlophone Beatles LP was playing. What stands out as your biggest audio disaster?
The jazz book of the year is called, simply,<I>Jazz</I>. Written by Gary Giddins, the best living jazz critic, and Scott DeVeaux, one of the most astute jazz historians, it’s a vital reference for those well versed in the subject and an essential guide for those who get lost in its thickets and want to know how to listen to the music so that it at least makes sense.
John Hammond has always been a strange case. Son of the legendary record producer and scout John Hammond Sr. who worked with Billie Holiday, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen, young John who sang and played guitar staked out a difficult piece of musical turf when he decided to make playing acoustic Delta–styled blues on the National Steel guitar his signature move.