Two recent Stereophile columns have offered thoughts on record cleaning machines (RCMs). Writing about the Klaudio RCM (above left), Michael Trei noted that the manufacturer says to use just water. No surfactant.

If I have a bias toward Magico, it's because I've never heard a Magico speaker I didn't like. Even so, when I listened to the company's M6 towers ($185,000/pair) in a large demo room at AXPONA 2022, my brain broke.

A conversation with Magico founder Alon Wolf can feel like stepping onto a moving walkway; it's best to find your balance early. Over the course of a spirited five-hour conversation at the company's impressive production facility in Hayward, California, Wolf questioned my choice of gear. Twice.

Lucinda Williams: World's Gone Wrong
Highway 20 Records/Thirty Tigers H20015LP (LP). 2026. Ray Kennedy, Tom Overby, prods.; Kennedy, John Rooney, engs.
Performance ****½
Sonics ****½

Jim Austin (left) succeeded John Atkinson (right) as Stereophile's editor in April 2019 and has preserved the magazine's Great Wall between editorial and advertising. Here are some of the most important principles that Stereophile religiously follows.

Brandi Carlile: Returning to Myself; Kings Of Leon: EP #2; New York Dolls: New York Dolls; Tyler Childers: Snipe Hunter; Dry Cleaning: Secret Love.

ill Ware and The Club Bird All Stars: Martian Sunset; JD Allen: Love Letters (The Ballad Sessions); Pat Bianchi: Confluence; Melissa Errico: I Can Dream, Can't I? (Illusions and Conversations from the Great American Songbook); Joel Ross: Gospel Music.