LATEST ADDITIONS

After the Capital Audio fest vintage seminar and my visit to Vinyl Revivers, I looked at my phone and saw that time was running out: I had just over three hours left to cover seven or eight more rooms. Time to get cracking!

Dan Wright is most famous for his Oppo disc-player modifications that seem to cure the colorlessness and industrial ennui that contaminates the stock Oppo players. They look a bit weird sci-fi with the two tubes sticking out the top like alien antennae—but his BDP-105 and 205 mods sound rich fast and wonderful. Dan also makes beautifully crafted amps and preamps. And lately, he's been making glamorous-looking and -sounding headphone amplifiers like the shiny red $7900 300B tube-powered HA300 amplifier pictured above.

What I love most about the CanJam-CanMania world of headphones is, when I enter these rooms full of tables stacked with gear and cans; all laid out into individual listening stations; each with its own folding chair, DAC, amp, and headphones—all with table cloths and tangled wires—I am reminded of those ham radio meets I used to attend. Those tribal rooms were always alive with a collective vibe of discovery—just like here and now. CAF 2017's CanMania was no exception, and, exactly like those old hamfests, there are tubes everywhere.

And of course, the most hamfest-tubealistic of all is (as always) Justin Weber's Ampsandsound table...

In this video, we visit Tyll Hertsens, Editor of Stereophile's sister site InnerFidelity.com, in Bozeman, Montana. Tyll is a connoisseur of headphones and portable audio products, and is somewhat of a YouTube sensation within the headphone community. (Truthfully: Having spent most of my "early audiophile" years experimenting on headphone mods and lurking on headphone forums, I'd been watching Tyll's headphone review videos long before I ever knew about Stereophile's existence.)

When I walked into the VK Music room, I was jealous and embarrassed. I was jealous, because obviously VK Music's Victor Kung was doing something I admire; I was simultaneously embarrassed that I had never heard of his British Columbia-based operation.

Just one week after Capital Audio Fest, the three-day New York Audio Show opens on Friday, November 10, in Manhattan's Park Lane Hotel. With two live references close by—the great outdoors of Central Park is just one block away, and Carnegie Hall is just one block farther in the other direction—the three-day show promises 25 or 26 active listening rooms and up to 100 brands.

Pros: Tactile, clear, colorful, and remarkably spacious sound; beautifully made gear
Cons: Audiophile music, audiophile demonstration protocol.

The sound in the room that featured the Daedalus Apollo 11 speaker ($22,800/pair), a selection of tubed electronics from ModWright, and cabling by WyWires was superb: detailed without sounding etched, and pleasantly liquid and warm, with good texture and a really great, spacious sense of scale. On top of all that, the gear from both brands is gorgeous: as rich and colorful in appearance as in sound.