LATEST ADDITIONS

The year’s not quite over, but it’s a safe bet that Sonny Rollins’ <I>Road Shows Vol. 1</I> (on his own Doxy label) will be the best jazz album of 2008 and rank among the best of the decade.

It isn't enough to say that engineer <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/artdudleylistening/404listening">Denis N. Morecroft</A> is one of contemporary audio's few visionaries: He's one of a <I>very</I> few mature designers whose passion for doing things a certain way hasn't abandoned him in the least, and whose well-argued convictions seem stronger than ever. Thus, as others cave in to commerce&#151;the tube-amp designer who offers a solid-state product just to help his dealers fill a price niche, the source-component manufacturer who rails against digital audio one day and starts cranking out CD players the next&#151;DNM Design remains the likeliest of all modern companies to stay its course.

You know me. I'm not perzackly an audio slut, but I <I>am</I> easy. When Audio Advisor's Wayne Schuurman called me to pitch the Vincent KHV-1pre tube-transistor headphone amplifier, he pretty much had me at "tube" and "headphone." But I wasn't familiar with Vincent Audio.

Secondly, we listened to Bobby Womack's The Facts of Life. Actually, I didn't even listen to it. I had to get some guitar stuff prepared for band practice later that evening, but Alex chilled on my couch, listening to the LP.

After Side 1 was over, he screamed, "This guy is AMAZING."

You've become acquainted with The Daily Beast, but do you know <a href="http://www.dailyaudiophile.com/">The Daily Audiophile</a>? The two are kind of similar. On the former, you can read about nude New York City dinners, while on the latter, you can read about hi-fi reviews. See what I mean?

Then there's <a href="http://www.pbase.com/sid_presley/the_record_collection">this site</a> full of awesome Asian record covers from the 60s and 70s. (Thanks <a href="http://blog.stereophile.com/stephenmejias/project_sapphire_at_the_end_o…;.)

Oh, <a href="http://www.sleeveface.com/">Sleeveface</a&gt;, how you do crack me up. (Thanks <a href="http://www.stereophile.com/asweseeit/1108awsi/">Ariel</a&gt;.)

When Audio Advisor's Wayne Schuurman contacted me about reviewing the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/headphones/1108vincent">Vincent Audio KHV-1pre</A> headphone amplifier, I felt confident that I had everything I needed to handle the task, owning, as I do, both the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/headphones/806akg">AKG K701</A> and <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/thefifthelement/605fifth/index1.html">Sennhe… HD-650</A> headphones, which have long been my references. <I>That oughta get 'er done</I>, I thought.

Reader "dr.d" asks: "Is it better to have a decent system that allows all recordings to sound good, or to have a system that might make some not-so-hot recordings no fun to listen to?" What's your preference, a system that always creates beauty or one that can reveal the ugly truth?

Continuing with the theme started with last week's question: Which single composer or performer would you recommend to introduce someone to jazz music? And why?