LATEST ADDITIONS

When my LP collection grew larger than space allowed for them on the couch, I started stacking records up against my short stools. A stack of a dozen or so LPs soon became a stack of three or four dozen LPs; soon became impossible to move and stretched from the left side of one stool all the way to the right side of the opposite stool. I had the Pulaski Skyway of vinyl LPs arcing through my small apartment.

I had made room for LPs on my tall bookshelf, carefully placing vinyl records along the cheap chipboard until the shelf bowed in the center and threatened to collapse. I didn't like this very much at all. I spent days away from home fearing that the shelf would give way. I'd come home from a long day in the office to find The Byrds and Henry Fiol, Herbie Hancock and Sam Beam, all in a jumbled mess of vinyl and plastic and wood and carpet. Yet, more LPs would soon arrive.

I had made room for vinyl LPs on my small bookshelf. It worked out alright, except that the shelf only went ten inches deep, leaving a good two inches of my poor, homeless LPs hanging off into open space. I could not continue to subject them to this sort of abuse. They would need a proper home, and soon.

My new Rega P3-24 sits atop a Polycrystal equipment rack given to me by Jonathan Scull. Radiohead's <i>Kid A</i> never sounded so good.

I have a column in today’s <I>Slate</I>, delving more deeply into the Monk at Town Hall concert that I’ve covered in this blog—and the whole concept, and risk, of jazz tributes.

That first morning, I woke and immediately began to worry. How would I know what to wear? What if there were train delays? What if there had been some horrible catastrophe requiring that I stay away from Manhattan?

This still young love affair with vinyl LPs has worked to introduce me to many musicians I had previously neglected.