March - April 2021
Audio Discourse
Audio Existentialism - Questions; Music… It's Slipping
The lapping of the bay, the wind through fallen tree. Birds of the sea and the land. It is all music gifted to us by nature. We use our nature to make...
Alesis ADAT - 30 Years of Digital Recorder that Revolutionized...
Part 1: TECHNOLOGY In the 1990s, the music industry moved from reel-to-reel recorders, both analog and digital, to DAW recording systems, i.e. computer...
Acoustics and Critical Listening
Norman Varney of AV RoomService Ltd. has joined Positive Feedback as a Senior Technical Editor as of Issue 113. His expertise in his field of audio...
(Good) Vibrations: Roger Skoff Writes About What it's Really...
If you stop to think about it, you'll see that all of everything about our hobby—the music we love, the gear we give so much of our wealth and...
Roy Hamilton and His Influence on Elvis
Part 1: The Awaking Late October of last year, a friend of mine who lives in Wichita Kansas, came to visit me for a jam session and a guitar lesson. We...
A Fair Audio Playing Field
Norman Varney of AV RoomService Ltd. has joined Positive Feedback as a Senior Technical Editor as of Issue 113. His expertise in his field of audio...
Hardware Reviews
Ahhh zaZen! The zaZen II Isolation Platform
ZaZen is a Zen Buddhist practice for individuals to achieve some peace, however temporary. I am familiar enough with Zen practices to know that I have...
Xavian Ambra Esclusiva Loudspeakers
"Hello beautiful" is what I found myself thinking, as I unpacked the Xavian Ambra Esclusiva speakers from their carton. I am a fan of immaculately...
Audience adeptResponse aR6-T4 Passive Power Conditioner
With Audience's frontRow powerChord. Reacquaint yourself with the art of deep listening. Review By Dr. Michael Bump With this article, Positive...
Record Doctor Clamp
Might this be the easiest review I have ever written? I'll cut to the chase and claim that the Record Doctor record clamp is a "no brainer" essential...
Karan Acoustics KAS 600 Stereo Amplifier and KAL Reference MK3...
A System For All Seasons It seems like a lifetime ago I reviewed the Karan Acoustics KAS 450 stereo amplifier. My conclusion was "This is an amplifier...
Synergistic Research Galileo SX Ground Block - The Benefits of...
For many of us, it has been a process. Maybe a long and challenging process, but one with plenty of rewards and satisfaction. Can we call it a hobby,...
Fono Acustica Armónico Interconnect
Hecho a Mano When I first visited the Fono Acustica site, my attention was drawn to the repeated use of the words artisanal and hand-crafted. These are...
Technics SL-1200MK7 Turntable
Reboots are everywhere these days, and it's easy to understand why. Capitalizing on existing goodwill and warm nostalgia is a surefire strategy for...
SOTA Escape Turntable
Within the audio hobby, there is an imaginary divide between companies that produce high-end components and others that create products meant to fill...
Mytek Audio's Brooklyn ADC
Most diehard audiophiles believe the best system you can build will have the following components: a turntable, phono stage/preamp, and an amplifier....
AGD Productions' Gran Vivace Amplifiers and Andante Preamplifier
While I was evaluating AGD Productions' "The Audion" Amplifier (HERE), there was a rumor that AGD Productions was going to release a new flagship...
SOTA Nova VI Vinyl LP Turntable
World Premier! The new SOTA sound allows music to become tactile. Review By Ron Nagle With this article, Positive Feedback continues its...
Taking it With You - Clarus CODA DAC
In December of 2020, Clarus Cable released the Coda DAC/headphone amplifier ($300), giving the audiophile on-the-go a new and elevated option for...
Audience frontRow Loudspeaker Cables
Advocacy for Neutrality Last year I came across several articles on high-end sites purporting to address, What is good sound? Most veered off to the...
Stu's Space - The PS Audio Stellar M1200 Power Amplifier
I've long been a fan of both Tube amplifiers and Class D amplifiers, and here, finally, I get to check out their love child. Is it an illicit union, a...
Interviews
Marius Leirånes: Man of the Wilderness
Marius Leirånes. Photo by Natalie Jensen, used with permission. A few miles south of the arctic circle, in the small village of Rognan, Norwegian...
Music - SuperSonic Recordings
Top 500 SuperSonic List - Part 25
This is an ongoing project by Claude Lemaire of Soundevaluations 161. Diahann Carroll and The André Previn Trio, Porgy and Bess. United Artists...
Music Reviews
Brief Impressions on the Music: Blue Coast Records Heavenly...
Anyone who's followed my love of great recordings and exceptional productions knows that I value the work of Cookie Marenco and company very highly....
Max Richter's Voices 2
Ambient music, like all other genres, has no rules. There may be, however, at least one tenant that many ambient artists collectively follow, or at...
Notes of an Amateur: First Quarter, 2021
Complete Peter Serkin. Sony 19439713872. 30 CD's. If Serkin is one of your very favorite pianists, as he is one of mine, then this is a treasure...
Winterreise with Ragazze Quartet and Martijn Cornet
Schubert's Winterreise, one of the greatest song cycles written, is most often heard with piano and voice. The Ragazze Quartet treats us to a...
Travis, Good Feeling LP Reissue from Craft Recordings
Travis, Good Feeling. 120 gram, black vinyl LP: $21.99 MSRP. Available from Craft Recordings. It's been said that everyone who listened to the Velvet...
James Blake, Covers
James Blake, Covers Standing out from the noise in popular music is no easy feat. It takes more than a strong voice to stick out from the crowd these...
Magic from the Van Baerle Trio and Bert van der Wolf
It's rare that one gets to experience a true tour de force, but that is what I've enjoyed the past several months with the Van Baerle Trio's traversal...
Mogwai, As the Love Continues
Mogwai, As the Love Continues Like most popular art forms, music is over-classified. When an artistic medium is overly distilled through endless...
The Silence Between - Another Remarkable TRPTK Recording
The Silence Between, Pieter van Loenen, violin, and Tobias Borsboom, piano, TRPTK (2021, DSD256, DXD) HERE The Silence Between is a marvelously...
The Other Cleopatra, Queen of Armenia
HASSE: Il Tigrane: Overture and Arias; VIVALDI: Il Tigrane: Arias; GLUCK: Il Tigrane: Arias. Isabel Bayrakdarian, soprano; Kansas City Symphony...
Chet Baker on Riverside: Four Iconic 180 gram LPs from Craft...
At the peak of his career, Chesney "Chet" Baker represented the epitome of jazz cool, and along with the likes of Dave Brubeck, Paul Desmond, Gerry...
Somewhere Between: Mutant Pop, Electronic Minimalism and Shadow...
Light In The Attic Records (LITA) is a record label based in Seattle that has a certain knack for the unconventional, and has specialized over the last...
Creedence Clearwater Revival: Pendulum and Mardi Gras 50th...
Craft Recordings completes their 50th anniversary celebration of the founding of Creedence Clearwater Revival with new LP reissues of the band's final...
New Old Stock - Articles from Our Days in Print
Stu's Place - Beneath the Planet of the Son of Tube Fest,...
This article originally ran in Volume 5, No. 2 of Positive Feedback Back in the Tube Saddle Again It's been a while, hasn't it? A couple of...
Our Friends at HIFI Statement
iFi DSD portable Headphoneamp
Fi geht einen Pakt mit dem Teufel ein. Der neue portable Kopfhörerverstärker iDSD Diablo setzt auf eine neue Designsprache. Sind wir von iFi eher.... . . Read More »
PS Audio Perfectwave SACD-Transport
Ein hochpreisiges SACD-Laufwerk im Zeitalter von vergleichsweise preisgünstigen Möglichkeiten hochkarätiger Wiedergabe von gerippten CDs oder.... . . Read More »
Odeon Rigoletto 2020 Speaker
Hätten Sie zu einem Hersteller so viel Vertrauen, dass Sie sich von ihm eine Komponente ohne vorherigen Hörtest bestellen würden? Einen Lautsprecher.... . . Read More »
Our Friends at High Fidelity
Accuphase C-3900 Line Preamplifier
The Japanese company Accuphase was set up in 1972 as Kensonic Laboratory, Inc. in Tokyo and after it moved to Yokohama in 1973, its products have born...
Krakow Sonic Society Meeting 128 - Ayon Audio S-10 II Signature...
KRAKOW SONIC SOCIETY is an informal group of audiophiles and friends who meet every now and then to learn something new about audio products, music...
