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"It's so easy to fall in love." Buddy Holly and Norman Petty might have just as easily been writing about reel-to-reel tape as finding one's soulmate (although tapes are not for fools!). Everything from the machines' "retro" look to the "coolness" factor to the feel of spooling up the tape to the look of the... Read More »

Sometimes bigger, I mean longer, is better! Straight out of the box, one can't help but notice that the Role Audio Starship SE speakers look a bit different than your typical compact two-way floor-standers. Oh, the cabinets appear traditional enough, albeit quite attractive and well-built; the speaker binding posts of high if not exceptional quality;... Read More »

[Note that this guest review is by Wolfgang Kemper of HiFi Statement, our affiliated journal in Germany, edited by good friend Dirk Sommer.] The famous New York Mercy Sound Studios has been working with Legacy Audio speakers for years. Now, thanks to the distributor Notabene-audio, Legacy Audio is also represented in Germany. The Signature SE Premium... Read More »

Sometimes we come to the reality that a certain product in our system is not the be all and end all we thought it was. Take for instance the "built-in DAC". It is a great idea till that fast paced technology renders that chip obsolete. I have often thought that what I have my system plugged into was... Read More »

Navigating the New Digital Highway with the Lumin D1 Audiophile Network Music Player For the past year or so, I have grown increasingly frustrated with the theoretical promise but pragmatic limitations of computer-based audio playback. When all the stars align, meaning a musical alignment of one's chosen computer and operating software, one's chosen hard drive(s), and... Read More »

One evening in the vacant space of my commute home, I contemplated phono cables. (Yes, too much free time on my hands.) Specifically, wouldn't the magnitude of difference in the output of a phono cartridge vs. that of an analog interconnect dictate a specialized design for the phono cable? (A medium output MC typically generates... Read More »

Nessun Dorma: The Puccini Album It's happened again. I'd read several years' worth of pro-and-con about Ian Bostridge before hearing the fellow, on a recital disc that I reviewed for this site a few years back. Now, after hearing numerous encomia for tenor Jonas Kaufmann, I've finally heard him sing. Given the novel repertoire for... Read More »

Who can gainsay Bach? Like Mozart or Beethoven, he is a towering figure. I don't know exactly how many recordings that I have of The Art of the Fugue over the decades now, but I do know that I have a lot of them, but not this one by The Emerson Quartet! And so, one more?... Read More »

I have always been a fan of Ayon products. While many of their offerings are not for the faint of heart from a cost perspective you can generally count on the company to produce some of the finest gear around and you could spend a lifetime listening to an Ayon based system without complaint for... Read More »

Miles Davis - Nefertiti, Miles in the Sky, and Filles de Kilimanjaro How time flies! Twenty five years almost to the day after Miles Davis passed away and close on the heels of Mobile Fidelity's 40th anniversary, the confluence of one of the most influential and iconic jazz figures with the world's preeminent record reissue label obviously brings... Read More »

CIKADA & Oslo Sinfonietta: Maja S. K. Ratkje's And sing… (2L Recordings 2L-124-SABD, available in various formats at https://shop.klicktrack.com/2l/475351) Are you musically adventurous? That question might seem dated in a spacy, Jimi Hendrix' first album sort of way, but it's an honest question for most music lovers. We all have strange and unique recordings in... Read More »

Johnny Hartman - Once In Every Life Reissued by Analogue Productions APJ 105 originally released in 1981 by Bee Hive Records BH 7012 A very difficult record to review! So much to say and so little room to say it. In 1995 Clint Eastwood directed and starred in The Bridges Of Madison County. In September... Read More »

As an engineer, I find it very gratifying when I review products that apply science to great success in delivering outstanding sound—a difference you can readily hear, provided the overall system can resolve high quality audio. Furutech has been in pursuit of such scientific application to sound reproduction. Their NanoFlux Speaker Cables, NanoFlux Power Cables,... Read More »

The Israel-based company Teddy Pardo, which shares its founder's name, has accomplished quite a feat. It has birthed the Teddy Pardo MB100, a 100-watt monoblock amplifier amid a sea of competition in the $2500USD price bracket, with very compelling reasons to be considered. The foremost being a proprietary power supply that helps the MB100 deliver... Read More »

I've been on the road for nearly three weeks now, and that's meant an interruption to the republication of John Marks' fine contributions to the musical and audio arts. Apologies all around. In this article from The Tannhauser Gate (http://www.thetannhausergate.com), John shares an elegant and polished jazz album from the '70s, Michael Franks' Sleeping Gypsy. He's right... Read More »

"Be careful what you wish for" says the old proverb. Oh yeah. In this case, I am glad I did! When I reviewed the limited edition Grado Heritage Series Headphones in all maple last year, I commented on the lively sound of the maple wood and how cool it would be for Grado to experiment... Read More »

  Lenco L 75 or Thorens TD 150 / II - that was the question that I asked myself in 1969 when I had to buy a new turntable. The mechanism of the my automatic old Dual 1015 turntable completely fell apart after only a few months. It was hard to survive these three weeks,... Read More »

The PS Audio DirectStream Junior DAC is another member of the class of audio components that exudes pride of ownership from the time it lands on your doorstep. No flimsy cardboard boxes here folks. The DSJ comes double boxed with the outer box in plain cardboard to fool nosy audiophile neighbors with a predilection for... Read More »

How many times have we all heard the left-handed compliment about an audio component when someone says it sounds "really good for the money?" The inference is that even though it sounds really good, it doesn't sound all that good because it just doesn't cost as much as the high-priced spread. I'm going to get right... Read More »