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The Rise of the House of Usher

"Have you heard the little Ushers?" I was asked Friday. "Have you heard the little Ushers?" I was asked repeatedly on Saturday.

No!, but not because I hadn't tried. I just couldn't get near the room. It was that packed. Finally, on Sunday I not only got in, I got the sweet spot.

Hmmm, I see, umm, hear, what what people were buzzing about. And, again, it ain't just the speakers, of course, but the Oracle Audio Technologies gear and JPS Labs cables as well—yet even we sophisticated audiophiles tend to think of that last link in the chain as being what we're hearing. In one…

Better Than Pudding

Late Sunday afternoon, with only about an hour left before the show closed, it was still standing room only in the Music Hall room. Perhaps that had something to do with the choice of music. I walked in to be greeted by the naughty sounds of the Bear Family Records compilation, Eat to the Beat: the dirtiest of them dirty blues, featuring song titles I can't even mention here.

Such as: The Blenders' "Don't Fuck Around With Love," Wynonie Harris' "I Like My Baby's Pudding," and many more much better than that.

The music, coming from Music Hall's very attractive, all-in-…

Better Now

When I finally made it through the crowd and into the Music Hall room, I took one look at pasty party animal, Leland Leard, and cried, "Good god, man! How are you feeling?"

He looked at me, a bit of the previous night still trembling in his glassy eyes, and, holding onto a styrofoam cup of matzah ball soup, he responded, "Better now."

"That's good," I said.

"Want a whisky?" he asked.

And Now For Something Completely Different

Stereophile hired good friend (and talented artist) Jeff Wong to cover HE2007 in his inimitable style. Jeff's three-page hand-drawn impression of the show will appear in the August issue.

Watching Jeff sketch the proceedings was a humbling experience—he's fast and he's good. Here, he's capturing JA attacking the bass solo of "So What." Yes, Fearless Leader does glower at his hands while he's playing.

Violin Technology

Understanding the trad of Strad.

Mentoring at the Amplifier & Speaker Workshops

They were a hit at last year's Rocky Mountain Audio Fest, so I asked Bob Cordell (resting his dogs in the photo), Peter "PJay" Smith, and Darren Kuzma to give a repeat performance of their seminars on amplifier and loudspeaker performance at HE2007. These ran throughout the Show, and I kept being stopped in the corridor by audiophiles who would say something like "Now I know what tube amplifier clipping sounds like" or "Now I know what is meant by 'dynamic range.'" I was reminded by something I had been told years ago, perhaps by Jon Iverson: that the only difference between an…

Roast Them Reviewers!

Stereophile's traditional "Ask the Editors" session took place Saturday afternoon. A room packed with audiophiles hurled questions at the panel, who included (from left to right in Jonathan Scull’s photo): Ken Kessler, Michael Fremer, Bob Deutsch, Larry Greenhill, Wes Phillips (at rear), and Sam Tellig. (Not shown in photo but still very vocal were Bob Reina, Kal Rubinson, John Marks, and Art Dudley.) I dodged the bullet by moderating but I was well pleased by the insightful nature of the questions asked.

In All Things, Moderation (Except Audio)

I never know what to expect at the "Ask the Editors" sessions, traditionally moderated by Stereophile editor John Atkinson (above). Sometimes we get a lot of people looking for advice on potential purchases of equipment, questions about arcane aspects of amplifier design, questions about cables, about double-blind testing, where the future of audio lies, and, of course, questions about what we thought of the sound in specific rooms at the Show. This time, many of the questions dealt with, of all things, music! There were opinions expressed about the major symphony orchestras of today…

Salagar Sonics

Remember the name: Salagar Sonics. It's the name of a new American speaker company, whose first product, the Salagar S210 ($7500/pair), still in prototype form, made a strong impression at HE 2007. It's an active two-way—digital crossover; the amp uses the latest B&O ICE module—with a Scanspeak AirCirc tweeter and a 10" Peerless VIFA mid-bass driver, in an unusually-shaped (and highly inert) enclosure. I thought these speakers sounded terrific: lively, low in coloration, and with excellent imaging.

"Created, Designed, and Checked in the USA"

As far as I can tell, Omaha Audio has no connection with the city in Nebraska: its headquarters are in California, and the products are made in China—but "created, designed and checked in the USA." The system they were playing used their own speaker (named, fittingly enough, the Omaha Speaker), a fairly large two-way with some resemblance to Sonus Faber products ($2000/pair), the Omaha Tube CD player ($1600), and the OD-300B single-ended-triode integrated amplifier ($1400, photographed here by Larry Greenhill). At the Stereophile Ask the Editors session, Sam Tellig was raving about…