New-Music Mondays
Mondays spotlight new and recent recordings of special merit.
Month: March 2017
Sound Devices USBPre 2 Portable High-Resolution Audio Interface
Berlin the Bear celebrates Christmas with some great audio gear! Photo by John Marks
This is the fourth installment in my series about choosing Pareto-Optimal equipment to make archival digital copies of vinyl LP (long-playing) phonograph records. The first part (an overview) is here. Part 2 (Rega’s Planar 3 turntable package) is here. Part 3 (Graham Slee’s Revelation M phono stage) is here. This installment covers the conversion of the analog signal from the phono stage into a digital-audio data file.
Unfortunately, as far as I have been able to determine, the various inexpensive solutions for making digital transfers of LPs are inadequate for making archival-quality copies. In this regard, I am not referring to “Best Practices.” I am only talking about “Non-Inadequate Practices.” I cannot recommend all-in-one “USB Turntable” or “USB Phono Stage” solutions for anything other than their convenience for casually ripping an LP to a CD-R. The reasons for this disinclination on my part appear after the jump.
The John Mayer Trio: “Axis: Bold as Love” (Jimi Hendrix)
I am a bit of two minds about this video. I’ve had a positive impression of John Mayer ever since I happened across his Room for Squares CD (Sony CK 85293), which I wrote about in Stereophile in 2003, thusly:
Rock singer-songwriter-guitarist Mayer is often compared to Dave Matthews, but for me
his combination of bedevilment over the fair sex, wry wordplay, smooth arrangements,
and low-key vocal delivery strongly calls to mind Michael Franks’ early work.
So, I start out predisposed to whatever John Mayer feels like doing at any time–even though I have not been wowed by all of it. Therefore, to hear him in the “Rock Power Trio” format with totally committed bass player and drummer is good, and to hear them cover one of Jimi Hendrix’ strongest self-penned numbers is even better. Continue Reading →
John Barry: “Somewhere In Time” Soundtrack (1998 re-recording)
Film-score composer John Barry’s father owned movie theaters in England. So, in a sense, Barry (1933-2011) grew up in the movie business. (The family name was “Prendergast;” Barry used his first and middle names as his professional name.) The movie business and the music business are similar, in that fickle public tastes can make or break projects and careers. Also similar in that the process of actually getting paid can be… quirky.
John Barry composed the scores for 11 James Bond films including Goldfinger, as well as for Body Heat, Born Free, Dances With Wolves, Out of Africa, The Lion in Winter, and Midnight Cowboy. Barry’s film scores won him five Academy Awards and four Grammys. However, it is almost certain that Barry’s most popular (and profitable for him) film score was for a film that was decidedly unsuccessful upon its original theatrical release, finding a larger audience only on cable tv, and then a bit later with the advent of home video on VHS cassettes.
That film is the 1980 time-travel romantic drama Somewhere in Time. The story of Barry’s score’s musical debts to Rachmaninoff and Paganini comes after the jump. Continue Reading →
Graham Slee Lautus Analog Interconnect Cables
I wrote about Graham Slee’s UK-made Revelation M phono stage with selectable treble-cut and bass-boost controls (which enable proper playback of non-RIAA as well as RIAA 33 rpm records—and also most electrically-cut 78 rpm discs) here.
Bruce Kohl, facilitator of Graham Slee’s US in-home trial program, included a pair of Graham Slee’s Lautus analog line-level signal cables (with locking RCA phono-plug terminations at both ends–other terminations optional) in the package with the phono stage.
When listening for reviewing I try to avoid (if at all possible) changing more than one variable at a time. So, I had to put Slee’s interconnects aside; and, put-aside they stayed. I eventually did listen; but since you are reading this, you likely figured that out already. The story continues after the jump! Continue Reading →