The July 2010 issue of <i>Stereophile</i> is now on newsstands. It had been far too long since we received a letter complaining about our love of reviewing insanely expensive products, so we decided to make this our “Special Aspirations Issue,” featuring, almost exclusively, products you’d have to be CEO of BP to afford.
The Jazz Journalists Association held its 2010 awards bash at City Winery, a warm, spacious eatery (with an excellent wine list) in the SoHo section of New York this evening. Below are most of the winners, followed by the musicians for whom I cast my ballot. The awards covered the period from April 15, 2009, to April 15, 2010.
I have built up a large collection of CDs since the medium's launch more than a quarter century ago, along with a modest number of SACDs and a small number of DVD-As. But I find these days that, unless I'm getting down to some serious listening and can give the music my uninterrupted attention, I use iTunes to feed computer files to my high-end rig (footnote 1). I've mostly been using the superb-sounding combination of <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/hirezplayers/dcs_puccini_sacd_playback_syste… Puccini U-Clock and Puccini</A> player/DAC that I reviewed last December to take a USB feed from a Mac mini, but I've also been using the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/digitalprocessors/bel_canto_usb_link_2496_us… Canto USB Link 24/96</A> and <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/digitalprocessors/lindemann_amp_stello_usb-s… U2</A> USB-S/PDIF converters, particularly for headphone listening, when I use one of those two format converters with a <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/digitalprocessors/886">Benchmark DAC1</A> D/A headphone amplifier.
High-end audio exists at the intersection of art and science. Either discipline can produce a good product, but it takes both to create the very best. The Sonic Frontiers gear I auditioned many years ago, for example, was technically sound, nicely built, and sounded goodjust never as sublime as products from, say, Audio Research or VTL. On the other hand, an experienced, insightful designer such as Quicksilver's Michael Sanders can create wonderful products from humble circuits and parts, but be ultimately limited by the underlying technology. But when brilliant design, uncompromised execution, long experience, and artistry all come together, the results can be staggering.
The vast majority of audiophile equipment is well-built, but accidents do happen. Have you ever had anything smoke or catch on fire?
I’m on the N train heading to Manhattan from Bay Ridge and there’s a fat Mexican baby in a dull red stroller. She is screaming her heart out. I’m trying to read an article in <i>New York</i> magazine recommended to me by a co-worker, but I don’t think I’ll make it to the end. I’ve read enough about addiction to know how ugly it can be; I don’t want to live through it again.
I’ve told you a bit about my favorite cassette label, Al Bjornaa’s <a href="http://blog.stereophile.com/stephenmejias/why_cassettes/">Scotch Tapes</a>, out of Batchawana Bay, Ontario, Canada. In <a href="http://www.imposemagazine.com/features/scotch-tapes-label-sampler">this Impose article</a>, Al goes into more detail, explaining how he built the label, and revealing some of his big plans for the remainder of the year, which include 60-70 new tapes, 4-5 vinyl releases, approximately 20 lathe cuts, a dozen zines, a couple of 8-tracks, and a monster summer compilation. (You can also download a Scotch sampler.)
A trend of sorts has taken hold the past few years: albums (in most cases, multi-disc boxed sets) capturing not just the highlights of a jazz concert but the whole concert—or a whole week’s worth of concerts, the entire run of a gig at a nightclub—every note of it.
Underwood, the new vinyl-only record label, which takes its name from the typewriter invented by Frank Wagner in 1896, was founded by writer Nathan Dunne. Dunne’s goal is to publish short stories on vinyl records. Underwood urges us to slow down, focus, listen, and enjoy.
Good news for jazz and vinyl lovers: The world’s greatest record store (at least in New Jersey), <a href="http://www.stereophile.com/asweseeit/708awsi/index.html">the Princeton Record Exchange</a>, just received a collection of over 2000 carefully maintained jazz titles, and they are now on sale, most priced between $1 and $4.99.