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Headphonium, Earphonium, Canjam. Every audio show has its own name for a section set aside to serve headphone enthusiasts, an increasingly active audiophile sub-segment. The one at this year's Newport show was smaller than the one I recall at the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest show last fall. But among the newcomers were headphones from Mr. Speakers (like the $1499 planar designs shown here). Astell&Kern also has a new, even more upscale portable music player than its well-received AK240. The $3500 AK380 offers 32-bit/384kHz Bit to Bit and DSD playback, 20-band EQ with 0.1dB (!) steps, and…
After spending the entire Saturday morning writing show coverage, I skipped lunch and continued my hunt for every cost-no-object system I could find at THE Show Newport Beach (in Irvine). Cost-no-object, of course, is a relative thing, especially when you have no money for objects that cost far more than you make in three years' time. But that's not to stop anyone from enjoying some of the best sound the high end has to offer at a show whose admission price certainly qualifies as a major bargain.
If I were forced to spend a week alone on a desert island, with my only companions a small,…
Sunday morning may be a time of rest for some people, but not at THE Show Newport 2015. I felt a bit like an earnest medic making my room rounds: "Morning, I'm Doctor Matson. And how is our stereo feeling today?" My first patient was doing just fine, and ready to be discharged. PBN Audio, out of San Diego, led by designer/owner Peter Bichel Noerbaek (above).
PBN is a one-stop shop pretty much—speakers, amps, turntables. Peter introduced me to a couple of his amps, the EB-SA1 Amplifier ($30,000/pair as monoblocks, or $15,000 for a stereo version), and also on-hand was the Erno Borbely…
Photo: Jason Victor Serinus
During THE Show, the Woo Audio/MA Recordings room became my restful oasis. I am an extreme fan of MA Recordings and its most worldly proprietor, Todd Garfinkle (right above in Jason's photo). Todd makes perfect-sounding recordings of real in-the-world music. Not audiophile recordings of some faux chanteuse in clown makeup singing songs she doesn't understand for an audience that cares more about sonics than poetic expression. In contrast, Todd Garfinkle picks up gypsies in the Paris Metro and brings them home. He shares his best food and wine with them—and…
Resolving to get an early start, I skipped breakfast and hit the show floor at 10:30am on Sunday. Will Kline of Fine Sounds (left) and Sunil Merchant (right) of Covina, CA's Sunny's Components were justifiably proud of the simply beautiful midrange created by the marriage of Wilson Audio Alexia loudspeakers ($52,000/pair) and Audio Research components. This wasn't the most transparent of systems I auditioned, but it was unquestionably among the most musical. Hats off to Will for playing Francis Cabrel's "La Corrida," one of the many superb selections on Philip O'Hanlon's coveted Demo Disc…
One of the most delightful annual surprises of the now departed Las Vegas installment of THE Show was stumbling upon the NFS (Not For Sale) room. Assembled by the distinguished personage known as Buddha, it allowed visitors to become submerged in a combination of post-psychedelic revelry, good sound, lots of free booze, and a total absence of hawking.
With their laudable spirit undiminished by the passage of time, Michael Alazard (left) and Anton Dotson (Buddha) traveled all the way from Las Vegas to continue holding forth in mind-bending splendor. Was this the true funhouse within the…
As readers of this space know, I'm a huge admirer of Maria Schneider's music, but her latest, The Thompson Fields (on the ArtistShare label), breaks through to a new level. It's her most ambitious recording, and her most accomplished; it places her in the pantheon of big-band composer-leaders, just below Ellington, Strayhorn, and Gil Evans at his very best; it's a masterpiece.
Schneider started out as Evans' assistant, as well as a student of Bob Brookmeyer's, and, especially in her first decade as a bandleader, their influences—those lush, stacked harmonies—were clear. Over time, her…
The business of high-end audio can fascinate me almost as much as does high-end audio itself. Designers and entrepreneurs such as Frank McIntosh, Avery Fisher, Saul Marantz, Edgar Villchur (AR), David Hafler (Dynaco), and Henry Kloss (AR, KLH, Advent, Advent Video, Cambridge Soundworks, Tivoli Audio) combined technical brilliance and varying levels of business skill with flairs for publicity and marketing. Many of their products became objects of desire, and some became household names in the post-WWII era. Of that list, only McIntosh and Marantz are still in business as high-end audio…
A product listed in Class A of Stereophile's "Recommended Components" has the "[b]est attainable sound for a component of its kind, almost without practical considerations." Channel Islands Audio's E200S amplifier is not quite that good, but its sound quality puts it well above the line that separates Class C from Class B: "the next best thing to the very best sound reproduction." The E200S also deserves our "$$$" mark of distinction, for a product that performs "much better than might be expected from its price."
Well done, and recommended for audition if your power needs stretch up…
"I don't know what I think on that one. I haven't written about it yet."—Walter Lippmann (attributed)
As sometimes happens, this started out to be a very different column. But by the time I was a thousand words into it, I found that my point of view had changed.
A number of months ago, I received from a Canadian company called BIS Audio a review sample of their Expression interconnect: a shielded, unbalanced interconnect terminated with Eichmann BulletPlugs (RCA). Priced at $480 Canadian per 1m pair, the Expression falls squarely in the middle of BIS's interconnect line: a lowish…