Stephen Mejias

Matmos: The Marriage of True Minds

Back in September, I told you a bit about Matmos’s The Ganzfeld EP, which blew my mind and promised many more great things to come.

It’s been a long wait, but The Marriage of True Minds, Matmos’s eighth full-length album, will be released by Thrill Jockey on February 19th. My complete review will appear in our April issue, but you can stream the entire album right now through Pitchfork Advance.

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Cassettivity

Interested in new cassette releases, but don't know where to start? Cassettivity is a cassette-only distribution site, founded by music lover Dave Sandifer. In 2013, a cassette-only distro might seem like an odd venture, but I was delighted to see it: I’ve had a difficult time keeping up with the many new and exciting cassette-only labels&#151they’re often extremely obscure and titles are often extremely limited&#151so an intelligent distribution channel makes good sense.
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Behind the Scenes: What the Brothers Sang

Even though my own band has recorded and released a handful of CDs and EPs, the act of making music remains mysterious and awesome. I love it. I’ll never get tired of watching musicians create.

Here, we get a behind-the-scenes look into the making of Dawn McCarthy and Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s upcoming album, What the Brothers Sang, inspired by the music of the Everly Brothers.

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Music Hall: Hi-Fi for Everyone

Earlier in this show report, I mentioned that the excellent music played in Jeffrey Catalano’s High Water Sound room served as a reminder of my passion for the high-end audio hobby. And it’s true: From time to time, I do need those gentle reminders. So much of high-end audio remains so completely foreign and unobtainable that I sometimes feel entirely out of place.

But in the Music Hall room, I always feel right at home. . .

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Moving Music from High Water Sound

Over the last several years, whenever I’ve run into High Water Sound’s Jeffrey Catalano at a show, he reminds me that I have an invitation to visit his NYC salon for a proper listen. I smile, thank him, and honestly agree: Yes, we definitely have to get together soon. It’s gotten to the point now that we don’t even have to talk about it. I know what he’s going to say, he knows what I’m going to say. For no good reason at all, I still haven’t made it down to 274 Water Street.
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Luxman DS-200 DAC and M-200 amp

While the sound and music in Philip O’Hanlon’s On A Higher Note systems is uniformly excellent, I had an especially good time listening to his smaller desktop system: MacBook running Audirvana, a pair of passive Eclipse desktop speakers, and Luxman’s new DA-200 USB DAC/preamp and M-200 stereo amp ($2790 each).
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