LATEST ADDITIONS

I have found that turntable designers typically fall into one of two camps. First are what I call the obsessive machinists. These are the people with impressive manufacturing chops and a sharp eye for fine detail and precision. For them, making a better turntable usually involves taking what we already know and simply doing it better.

Whether it's a thicker chassis, more powerful motor, more precise bearing, more effective isolation system, or something else, the emphasis is always on stepping things up a notch or two, rather than reinventing the wheel. This obsession can result in some impressive 'tables—some of the most impressive in the world, with awesome attention to detail. But are they the best sounding?

The other camp is what I call the deep thinkers. They approach the task of playing a record from a theoretical perspective and leverage their knowledge of physics to come up with fresh and innovative designs. The results may look unconventional, or even odd at first glance, but when such lateral thinking clicks, it can really push the boundaries of what's possible.

Today's scrappy record labels understand that an intimate brand connection captures consumers. Every major label has its own boutique imprints, from Columbia's Legacy to Blue Note's Tone Poet and Classic Vinyl. Craft Recordings, the catalog label for Concord, is set up well for achieving such a connection, since the parent company also owns Fania, Prestige, Milestone, Pablo, Telarc, Vanguard, Concord Jazz, and Riverside (not to mention Stax, Rounder, and Sugar Hill). For vinyl reissues, that's the jazz motherlode.

Craft created Jazz Dispensary to reissue some of this music, with shall we say uplifting goals: "With jazz as its source, ... Jazz Dispensary blurs boundaries and opens minds to the psychoactive potential of music, introducing a new generation to the grooves that elevated the hippest heads of the '60s and '70s." One Jazz Dispensary review copy came with branded rolling papers.

Note: This is a developing story. Updates will be posted as they unfold.

Lenbrook Corp, the privately owned Canadian enterprise whose holdings include NAD electronics, PSB speakers, and Bluesound (the maker of the BluOS music operating software system) has acquired the assets of MQA, Ltd, including MQA technology and the SCL6. The press release announcing the acquisition, which went public September 19 at 8am EDT, notes that the deal "further solidifies Lenbrook's commitment to excellence and innovation in the evolving landscape of audio technology."

Resurrecting musical treasures is a tough business. The explosion of vinyl-reissue labels, ranging from superlative to second-rate, has made it increasingly difficult for newcomers to stand out—to make the kind of splash that serious LP buyers will notice. Even more elusive is endurance and turning a profit. The affable, musically savvy James Batsford, owner of a pair of vinyl-only UK labels, New Land Records and Omerta Records, can't help but laugh over our New York–to–London Zoom connection when I ask why an obviously intelligent person with taste, like himself, would jump into the vinyl-reissue tarpit?

PJ Harvey: I Inside the Old Year Dying
PTKF (auditioned as 16/44.1 FLAC stream on Qobuz). 2023. Produced by PJ Harvey, Flood, and John Parish.
Performance ****
Sonics ****

In 2022, PJ Harvey published an epic poem called Orlam. Harvey's 10th studio album, I Inside the Old Year Dying, isn't exactly a musical setting of Orlam's English- and Dorset-dialect poetry; rather, it's an interpretation of the poem with added improvisation. The result is as bizarre and fascinating as one could hope.

C.P.E. Bach: Württemberg Sonatas (6), Wq. 49, Keith Jarrett, piano; Mahler: Symphony No.5, Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Rafael Payare, cond.; Schubert: Symphonies Nos.5 & 7 (Unfinished), Freiburger Barockorchester, Pablo Heras-Casado, cond.; Robert Schumann: Dichterliebe • Kerner Lieder, Florian Boesch, baritone; Malcolm Martineau, piano.

Arne Jansen/Stephan Braun: Going Home; Joe Farnsworth: In What Direction Are You Headed?; Darcy James Argue's Secret Society: Dynamic Maximum Tension; Dave McMurray: Grateful Deadication 2.