At last! And welcome! The NEW-LOOK Positive Feedback Web site will be going live on July 1, 2015, with the launch of Issue 80. You'll see that we've spent an enormous lot of time, effort, and money to take PF to a state-of-the-art new publication system. The results speak for themselves, as you'll see: A... Read More »
Sagebrush Rebellion Papillon Recordings BluePort Jazz, BPJ-024 Producer: Dmitri Matheny Recording Engineer: Jim Merod Mastered by: Jim Merod and Steve McCormack Recorded Live at Dizzy's in San Diego, CA, 11/29/13 [Image courtesy of Dmitri Matheny and BluPort Jazz] Dedicated to the artistry of Art Farmer, four stellar jazz musicians (Dmitri Matheny on flugelhorn, Nick Manson playing piano,... Read More »
Bartok. Sonatas for Violin Nos. 1 and 2; Sonata for Solo Violin. Barnabás Kelemen, violin; Zoltán Kocsis, piano. Hungaroton HSACD 32515. SACD. How do you like your Bartok? Do you like Bartok? It took me several years to persuade a good fellow graduate student (who knew a lot about music) to believe me when I... Read More »
The past few years I've been pretty soured on the whole Audio Show routine. Too much excessively high priced equipment being demonstrated to appeal to a smaller and smaller market of ultra rich clients, left me feeling I'd be more welcome in a yacht club membership committee meeting than most of the rooms exhibiting at... Read More »
Before we get to our show report... here are a few general thoughts on shows and the people who attend: People count, in most cases, more than gear. You have to have an emotional connection to whatever is playing, so if your room is empty it might be because you are playing music that is... Read More »
NuWave DSD is now available! PS Audio, makers of fine audio components since 1974, is excited to announce the availability of the NuWave DSD DAC. With an MSRP of $1,299 (US), DSD capability, unrivalled connectivity and sound quality that will remind you of DirectStream, we think the NuWave DSD will be the new class leader.... Read More »
Watch David Robinson and Peter Breuninger of AV Showrooms.com, share their thoughts on the THE Show Newport 2015 on YouTube Part 2 Courtesy of AV Showrooms
Watch David Robinson and Peter Breuninger of AV Showrooms.com, share their thoughts on the THE Show Newport 2015 on YouTube Part 1 Courtesy of AV Showrooms
Watch David Robinson and Myles Astor, along with Peter Breuninger of AV Showrooms.com, share their final thoughts on the 2015 AXPONA Show on YouTube. Courtesy of AV Showrooms.
Last late Winter… or early, early pre-Spring, depending on how you prefer your "pretty much the same with some slight differences, though not really all that much" seasons here is SoCal, I found myself staring at John Young's Acoustic Imagery Atsah (Htpex NCore 1200 Class D power amplifiers, $9995/ pair based on the Hypex NC1200... Read More »
Dan Schmalle, Paul Stubblebine and Mike Romanowski, aka The Tape Project's tres amigos, are more than anyone else responsible for putting the reels back in motion. When my first Tape Project piece appeared in the virtual pages of PF some six years ago now (Issue 46), these folks were the only game in town; today... Read More »
The recent edition of THE Show Newport was held at the Hotel Irvine and featured not only a host of audio exhibits and demonstrations, but also a series of seminars titled "Audio University". One of these sessions focused on the similarities between Single, Double, and Quad bit rate DSD and Analog Recording. The panelists have... Read More »
I missed the golden age of stereo, I've said it before and that really sucks. By the time I got a job at Pearson Publishing, home of The Absolute Sound magazine in 1994 (where other mags also lived, like The Perfect Vision & Films in Review) the party was nearing its end.
Verastarr Grand Illusion AC power cords ($2500 in 6 foot length) use high purity copper metal foils and produce a musical presentation that is big, bold, and robust. Not to be clichéd here, but being a copper-based cable, and using lots of copper to address skin effect with its four 2-inch wide foils, music with... Read More »
If you're an audiophile, you realize at some point that digital spinning discs won't be around forever. Although that realization hit me several years ago, it took quite a while before I really decided to get serious about a digital source based on a computer. I'd heard several computer-based rigs at shows, and what I... Read More »
Avec l'assistance de M. Bastille "We sang songs of childhood Hymns of faith that made us strong Ones that mother Maybelle taught us Hear the angels sing along" —"Will the Circle be Unbroken" by Johnny Cash OK, first I have to admit something. I'm about to receive an Ayre QB-9 DSD as my new reference... Read More »
Best New Product in Show DPA has come out with something new, a vocal microphone using their existing 4000-series capsules. You can order it as an omni, cardioid, or hypercardioid, and you can order it as a a handheld mike or as a head that fits onto a number of standard wireless systems. These are very... Read More »
The European AES show is a very different beast than the American shows, in part because of much lower vendor involvement. The trade show section is very small, filling up only a section of a hotel ballroom rather than a whole convention center as with the US shows, and that puts more emphasis on the... Read More »
Style of the work of Czesław Niemen is very heterogenic. It covers big-beat, progressive work, rock with jazz elements, blues-rock, avant-garde, and electronic music—you will find all these elements in his works. The period from 1967, the year of his debut album Dziwny jest ten świat… till 2001 was the most interesting period in popular... Read More »
Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu Shrine (jap. 石清水八幡宮) is one of the three most important Hachiman-gu Shintō shrines in Japan. It was founded in 859 by the monk Gyokyo on the instructions of the Emperor Seiwa in Yawata. Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu enshrines Hachiman, the God of War, associated with the mythical Emperor Ojin. Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu was built for the... Read More »
During my career with AT&T Bell Laboratories, I had many opportunities to visit some of the finest higher education institutions in the country. My focus was on central office switches for voice and data services—typically purchased and utilized by regional telephone companies for medium to large cities and urban areas. Of course these elite Universities... Read More »
As personal audio enthusiasts, most of us have a decent portable rig to get us through the day.
Occasionally, it becomes our only rig for days (or weeks) at a time during business trips or vacations. However, we always sleep soundly knowing that we'll come home to our reference rigs - eventually - where bliss awaits. But what if there was no home rig to come back to?
There will always be those who doubt ability to assess and differentiate audio devices by listening to them in controlled environment and comparing them with others. That's human nature—many people won't believe something until they have touched it themselves. But comparing different audio devices is a very good way to assess them. One should listen,... Read More »
Most likely by a pure coincident, if you believe such thing exists, a few things analogue related happened within one week period, important things I must add. First, on Tuesday, I received the latest issue of Hi-Fi News & Record Reviews magazine, with TechDAS Air Force Two on its cover, and with a review of... Read More »
Some devices are able to fit into particular audio system seamlessly, like they have always been a part of it, as if they've always belonged. They fulfill sonic character of this system, allowing its user to elevate his level of music perception by adding some elements he hasn't even known existed. That sound serious, right,... Read More »
As I already mentioned once (in the review of Wow Audio Lab L1/M1 amplifier), Audio Show in Warsaw is a place for me to collect information. Not necessarily about the sound but rather about brands, products and people. But I always welcome a nice surprise, I mean a really good sounding system. Such a system,... Read More »
One can wonder why so many people at certain age start using expression "I remember that..." more and more often. I can not not remember that several years ago whenever I came across such expression in a text it usually ignited at least some level of aversion towards obviously "advanced" age of its author. Why... Read More »
To be honest I can't remember how it started. In my own review of Dionysos preamplifier for January 2011 I wrote that I'd firstly learned about existence of Thrax Audio one year earlier during High End 2010 Show in Munich. But now I really can't remember any details. It seems though that I somehow knew... Read More »
Dr. David W. Robinson, Yarlung Records, and DSD David W. Robinson, enjoying some holy smoke of a recent afternoon. Photograph by John W. Robinson…yes, one of my sons, who was also enjoying a fine pipe! Bob Attiyeh is the President and Chief Producer-Audio Engineer at Yarlung Records. He has just released an article talking... Read More »
The four composers represented in this overview and the accompanying album, all wrote music in a variety of styles and for many different types of ensembles. This broad spectrum of styles is a consequence of the four composers choosing to work within and to develop traditional formats and techniques, while at the same time mastering... Read More »
Jennifer Koh, Bach and Beyond 2. Solo Violin Sonatas by Bach, Bartok, and Saariaho. Jennifer Koh, violin. Çedille 90000-154. Nobody plays Bach better than Jennifer Koh. As I've written before, I heard her play the Partita No. 2 live in Amherst College's Buckley Recital Hall several years ago and at the time it felt as... Read More »
Here is a band that changed the way I view Neanderthals. Most people might see a caveman, or a Neanderthal, and instinctively see the old Geico commercials run through their mind. This is clearly not the case with Fartbarf. They are wild, energetic, comedic, brazen, outlandish, and enthralling to see live. Josh McLeod, Dan Burley,... Read More »
Sometimes the road beckons. When I heard the call this time it wasn't nearly as easy to just get-up and go. I'm not twenty anymore! I'm middle-aged, burly, married, and like most of you I have responsibilities to attend to in my every-day.
Don't forget to hit SAVE while writing a new blog - Learned that lesson the Hard-Way JUST NOW!! I had a whole thing typed and ready - w/ a link to the mix of mine and everything.
Seriously: Still denying the "paradigm shift" in consumer culture? Forget that I used the damn terminology. Forget that I have some sort of twisted-back-door stake in being right about this shit.
Dmitri Shostakovich, arranged Rudolph Barshai. Chamber Symphonies. The Dmitri Ensemble, Graham Ross. Harmonia Mundi HMU 907634. These are three of Shostakovich's string quartets arranged for chamber orchestra by a student, friend, and close associate of the composer. Only one of them, the arrangement of Quartet No. 8, has gotten much attention before now. I have... Read More »
