It’s fair to ask how many audiophile pressings of John Coltrane’s <I>Blue Train</I> do we need? Yet Mike Hobson of Classic Records makes a compelling case for this answer: one more. Classic is putting out a whole new type of LP, and though its technical tweak seems preposterous—a parody of vinylphilic obsession—it really does yield a substantial improvement; it makes the head spin.

Paul Gowan's letter in the October 1989 Stereophile hinted that, whether or not audiophiles enjoy music, it should be true that the emotional experience we derive from music is what really matters. There, barefaced, lies the problem: who are "we"? A well-known Latin epigram affirms that in matters of taste there is no point in discussion. And a Greek epigram (coined in fact by Max Beerbohm in his Oxford novel Zuleika Dobson) suggests that "for people who like that kind of thing, that is the kind of thing they like."

It kind of happens intuitively, like breathing or crying or finding your way back home. Every year around this time, I scan my compact disc racks and watch as my hand reaches for The Flaming Lips' 1995 album, <i>Clouds Taste Metallic</i>. I put the disc in the player. I sit back. And I listen, and I remember.

The January 2009 issue of <i>Stereophile</i> is now on newsstands. Volume 32 Number 1 is pretty much bursting at the seams with radicalness. I received a voicemail from a long-time subscriber telling me so. It went:

We started the day with a bit of Bell's and a couple cups of coffee. Then, we started walking.

We walked and walked and walked&#151stopping in pubs along the way&#151and gradually became more and more lost.