Let There Be Rock (and Roll)?
That scraping noise you hear is coming from the bottom of the barrel.
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LATEST ADDITIONS
For the Election: Simple Gifts of American Music
Simple Gifts, a new live recording from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center (CMS), is filled with eminently accessible, decidedly optimistic American music written between 1854 and 1993. Its frequently dance-worthy melodic beauty makes for a most lovely 77 minutes of pure pleasure, and is conducive to both focused listening and background enjoyment. Available as both a 24/48 download from HDTracks (which I auditioned) and other sites, as well as in CD form, the recording reflects the positive, "new world" outlook that inspired many of its compositions.
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Toronto Retailer Open Day Saturday
Saturday November 5, 17pm, Toronto's Wynn Audio , who demonstrated a Goldmund-Tidal-Thales system costing $1,135,196 at last weekend's TAVES show, are opening their new showroom at Unit 31-20 Wertheim Court, Richmond Hill, Ontario L4B 3A8.
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If it ain't broke...the Massdrop Sennheiser HD 6XX
This story originally appeared at InnerFidelity.com
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Ooooooooo baby! If you don't have a Sennheiser HD 600 or HD 650, you need to read this!
JL Audio Fathom f212v2 powered subwoofer & CR-1 crossover
It was all so familiar. In "Music in the Round" in the January 2016 issue, Kal Rubinson praised JL Audio's latest subwoofer, the Fathom f113v2. He raved about its amplifier's higher power over the original f113, its beefier 13" woofer, its improved, 18-band Digital Automatic Room Optimization (DARO), and its significantly improved deep-bass response in-room.
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It was familiar because the same thing had happened when Kal reviewed the original Fathom f113 in his May 2007 column. As he would again nine years later, he'd extolled the sub's high power, small size, built-in single-band Automatic Room Optimization (ARO) software, and "remarkably powerful and clean" deep bass. Those were also my reactions to the Fathom f113.
PrimaLuna ProLogue Premium power amplifier
Let us pretend . . . you have a pair of loudspeakers that have proven themselves to sound articulate and musically responsive in your room, without excess boom, bloom, or frail leanness. They mate with your décor and impress your friends. But maybe you're bored, and feel certain that your speakers would sound better with a better amplifier than the one you have now. Maybe you feel an urge to spend money? Perhaps a new amp will make your records sound the way you imagine they should sound?
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I have had these thoughts many times.
TAVES 2016: Day 3
How often do you find that a new model of a loudspeaker or other audio component is less expensive than the one it replaces
?
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Sennheiser PXC 550 Noise Canceling Bluetooth Headphones
This story originally appeared at InnerFidelity.com
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Shots fired!
Sennheiser's new PXC 550 ($399) Bluetooth noise canceling headphone is a direct shot across the bow of Bose's battleship Quiet Comfort 35 ($349) dominance of noise canceling headphones, which I reviewed very positively. Not only do Bose own a big chunk of that market, they consistently, in my opinion, have the best isolation and sound quality performance. Let's see if Sennheiser can put a dent in that armored hull.
Shure KSE1500 electrostatic in-ear headphone system
I wrote several issues back that my first high-end headphones were Koss Pro4AAs, which I bought in 1972 following a positive review in the British magazine Hi-Fi News. Although that review didn't mention that the Pro4AAs were relatively fragile (footnote 1), I nonetheless loved their sound. They were the best headphones I'd hearduntil, a couple years later, I was playing bass on some sessions for record producer Tony Cox. Tony had a pair of signal-energized electrostatic headphones, Koss ESP-6es, which were heavy and clunkybut they opened my ears to the sound quality that could be obtained from "cans." I didn't hear better until after I'd moved to Santa Fe, in 1986, and J. Gordon Holt loaned me his review samples of the Stax SR-Lambda Pros.
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Music in the Round #81: Classé Sigma Mono amplifier, Sony UHP-H1 universal player
Last spring, when I was listening to Bowers & Wilkins's 802 D3 Diamond loudspeakers, Classé Audio offered a pair of their new Sigma Mono amps for the review. They claimed a synergyB&W's D3 series had been developed using Classé amps. I declined, only because using unfamiliar amplifiers would add to my assessment an uncontrolled variable. Now that the B&Ws have settled inthree 802 D3 Diamonds across the front, two 804 D3s at the backit seemed time to hear what they could do when driven by the Classés.
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