Stephen Mejias

The May 2009 issue is now on newsstands. The cover's so bright, you gotta wear shades. See that orange LP sitting on the SME 20/12 turntable? That's my copy of Boris's awesome Smile.

Cover photographer, Eric Swanson, originally asked if I could send him a white LP to decorate the 'table, but I sent him several colorful options: translucent red and blue, mint green, orange, etched white, and a Thurston Moore picture disc.

Eric and his assistant, Jenna Gersbach, were well aware that I was uncomfortable with sending my own precious vinyl across the country for a photo shoot. So they spent the next couple of weeks teasing me about it. They danced on my records, played Frisbee with my records, let them melt in the truck, put them in the freezer, fed them to the dogs, baked them, etc. Very funny, guys.

In the end, Eric and Jenna went with the orange vinyl, which pretty much set the stage for graphic designer, Natalie Baca's, color treatments. Hot stuff. (The colors. And Natalie.)

Inside, John Marks opens the issue with his thoughts on the benefits of buying used audio classics. He writes:

Some pieces of audio gear are recognized classics that, because of their scarcity and/or their intrinsic quality, fetch big money….

But with the current state of the economy, what I want to focus on are likely future "Recognized Audio Classics" that, at today's prices, are real bargains.

JM goes on to list examples of components that offer great value for the money. You should hook up with that. Meanwhile, Sam Tellig takes a tour of Musical Fidelity's new V-Series components: true high-end products that are priced within the reach of real-world pocketbooks. The V-CAN headphone amp and V-LPS phono preamp sell for $199 each; the V-DAC D/A converter costs $299. Fun stuff. Great sound.

Then along comes Mikey Fremer with a review of a $15,000 phono cartridge. Fifteen thousand dollars for that little thing at the end of a tonearm. Now, that's crazy-expensive, but I'm glad it exists. The Koetsu Coralstone Platinum Mono is beautiful and Mikey loved it. "There's no excuse for the price," he concluded, "except for the sound."

Next, in his "Listening" column, Art Dudley makes poetry out of a record-cleaning machine. Me want! In "Music in the Round," Kal brings us multichannel news from CES 2009, and spends time with the McIntosh MC303 power amp and the Sony SCD-XA5400ES SACD player. Will it be Sony's last? We'll find out. Moving right along, Robert Baird introduces us to Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears. Great band! I love you, bitch! "Recording of the Month" goes to Willie Nile's House of a Thousand Guitars, and in "Aural Robert," RB finds a lost classic by Connie Converse, reissued by Brooklyn's Lau derette Recordings. I want this album, but I'm holding out for a vinyl version!

Oh, and then, you know, we also have just over 30 pages of in-depth equipment reports. That's all. No big whoop.