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Cables

In the mail today, I received a flat rate box measuring 14" by 12" by 4", and wearing a J.B. Stanton label. J.B. Stanton handles press communications for PSB.

A very small subwoofer? I thought to myself. A back brace? Oh, Bryan Stanton, you shouldn't have!

He didn't. Inside the box was a set of loudspeaker cables manufactured by a company I'd never heard of: QED.

QED stands for Quality Electronic Design. The company was founded by a fellow named Bob Abraham in 1973, and today is based in Bishops Stortford, UK. Lenbrook America brings the cables to…

 

Do Re Me

The amount of flux in the world of music and the businesses of marketing and selling creativity continues to be absolutely amazing. In nearly 25 years of writing about music I’m seeing things I almost don't believe.

Latest example: a flood of promotional pieces from Universal classical labels, DG, and Decca. That's right, from classical labels, albeit very proud ones, but still classical labels, a breed that's supposed to be going broke. Well if the book they’ve released first in Europe and now here for the new release by the red hot vocal marriage of convenience of soprano Anna Netrebko…

 

Erik Friedlander's American Road Trip

I’ve listened several times these past few weeks to Erik Friedlander’s new CD, Block Ice & Propane (on the Skipstone Records label), a haunting, sprawling, majestic piece of Americana. The album is subtitled “Taking Trips to America: Compositions and Improvisations for Solo Cello,” and that sums it up. The cellist’s father is the master photographer, Lee Friedlander. When Erik was growing up, Lee would spend summers driving a 1966 Chevy pickup truck around the country, taking pictures, and he’d take the family along: he and his wife in the front, often blasting the radio, Erik and his…

 

The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of

It's cheese, Grommit!

 

<I>Mad Men</I>

I've been fascinated by AMC's summer series Mad Men. Its depiction of 1960 America is revelatory—even though I was alive then, if only eight. And, as Ellen Feldman observes, it's not just the details that make it so powerful, it's a throwback in terms of character development and, dare I say it, pacing. Although AMC has commercials, it doesn't observe the same rhythm other channels do, so some scenes develop for 11 or 12 minutes before a break.

Speaking of summer TV and commercials, have any other Burn Notice viewers been as irritated as I have over DirecTV's blatant product placement…

 

Yay!

A new story by Roddy Doyle. 'Nuff said—except that the "f-bomb" is dropped in the second graf. Of course, I already said it's by Roddy Doyle.

 

Give the Drummer Some!

The Roland TR-909 is now online.

 

Gould in Love

Lifting the shroud of mystery over Glenn Gould's private life.

 

Sonny Rollins

Jerome Harris sends along this link to his former boss' Proust Questionaire in September's Vanity Fair. Rollins, in case you didn't know, will be performing at Carnegie Hall on September 18.

 

Saul Zaentz

John Fogerty aside, I bet Saul Zaentz can dance. It seems like he can pretty much do anything he sets his mind to.

Hat tip to Jan Mancuso.

 

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