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Tidal Piano G2 Loudspeakers

Written by: Aron Garrecht
Category: Full-Length Reviews
Created: 01 July 2018

Reviewers' ChoiceWith just about any manufactured commodity, consumers are offered various tiers of products to choose from. Volkswagens are the entry-level automobiles made by the Volkswagen Group, while their more premium brands -- Audi, Porsche, Lamborghini, Bentley -- represent consecutive upward leaps in quality, performance, and exclusivity. VW’s most boutique brand, Bugatti, is synonymous the world over with unparalleled levels of craftsmanship, industry-leading design, and world-class performance. They produce a single Bugatti model, the Chiron, and with only 500 Chirons slated for production, exclusivity is a given.

Read more …

Stuff You Didn't Know You Needed

Written by: Jason Thorpe
Category: For the Record
Created: 01 July 2018

Welcome to the world of the analog LP. In case you weren’t aware, there’re whole catalogs full of stuff for record collectors that you never knew you needed. It’s the same in any hobby. Fishing, shooting, stamp collecting -- for any pastime you can shake a stick at, cool gear and bits and pieces abound. Companies throw accessories at it and hope some of them stick.

Read more …

Leon Bridges: "Good Thing"

Written by: Joseph Taylor
Category: Recording of the Month
Created: 01 July 2018

Columbia 19075830351
Format: LP, 320kbps MP3

Musical Performance: ***½
Sound Quality: ***½
Overall Enjoyment: ***½

Leon Bridges’s debut album, Coming Home, was one of the most pleasant surprises of 2015. The fact that old-school soul music could be successfully championed and resuscitated by a 26-year-old singer showed that this music is still vital. Bass guitarist Austin Jenkins and drummer Josh Block, formerly of the band White Denim, helped produce Coming Home and were among those who played on the album. Both Bridges and the musicians who accompanied him displayed an uncanny understanding of music whose heyday was long before they were born.

Read more …

ZYX Ultimate 4D-X MC Phono Cartridge

Written by: Garrett Hongo
Category: Full-Length Reviews
Created: 15 June 2018

The winter haze in Eugene, Oregon, where I live, hangs like a veil of thin gray fog over everything, diffusing light, draining color from the landscape, and contributing to my moods a quality of vague gloom for months at a time. But in my nearly 30 years here I’ve grown mildly accustomed to its character, seeking joy and the brilliant colors of life in other things -- cooking soups and stews, reading good books, scribbling essays and poems, growing fanatical about all things audio -- to drive away the clouds of accidie and despair brought by months of winter weather.

Read more …

The Music Vault's Greatest Hits

Written by: Jeff Fritz
Category: Opinion
Created: 01 June 2018

By the time you read this, what was the Music Vault will be no more than what you’ve read in the pages of the old Ultra Audio, now SoundStage! Ultra. The new owners of my old house have ripped off its roof and are adding a full second story. The remains of the Music Vault are in some dumpster somewhere.

If those shattered walls could talk . . .

Read more …

European Audio Team E-Glo S Phono Stage

Written by: Jason Thorpe
Category: Full-Length Reviews
Created: 01 June 2018

How many people know what a phono stage is? Of that microscopic cross-section of humanity, how many do you think actually own a standalone component whose only job is to amplify the tiny electrical signal generated by a phono cartridge?

Read more …

Neil Young: "Roxy: Tonight’s the Night Live"

Written by: Joseph Taylor
Category: Recording of the Month
Created: 01 June 2018

Reprise 566051-1
Format: 2 LPs

Musical Performance: ****
Sound Quality: ***½
Overall Enjoyment: ****

Neil Young wrote and recorded Tonight’s the Night in the late summer of 1973, shortly after two close friends died of heroin overdoses. Danny Whitten had been a singer and the rhythm guitarist for Crazy Horse, Young’s backing band, and Bruce Berry was Young’s roadie and friend. Young’s studio recording of the previous year was Harvest, which was hugely popular and put him firmly in the mainstream. Tonight’s the Night was a more emotionally difficult album, sloppier in execution -- and one of his best.

Read more …

Balanced Audio Technology VK-255SE Stereo Amplifier

Written by: Aron Garrecht
Category: Full-Length Reviews
Created: 15 May 2018

For the past few months I’ve been evaluating two products from Balanced Audio Technology: the VK-53SE preamplifier and the subject of this review, the VK-255SE stereo power amplifier. The VK-255SE presents attractive measures of size, mass, gain, and power output for its asking price of $8995 USD, but would its impressive specifications result in equally impressive sound quality? I couldn’t wait to find out.

Read more …

Jeff's New Temporary Audio System

Written by: Jeff Fritz
Category: Opinion
Created: 01 May 2018

The T+A Elektroakustik PA 3100 HV integrated amplifier was the last audio product to be reviewed in my Music Vault listening room. In fact, as you read this, the new owners of my old home have probably deconstructed the space formerly known as the Music Vault, and begun renovating it to make it theirs.

Read more …

T+A Elektroakustik PA 3100 HV Integrated Amplifier

Written by: Jeff Fritz
Category: Full-Length Reviews
Created: 01 May 2018

Reviewers' ChoiceThe current popularity of the integrated amplifier is unquestioned. This component category has risen in the esteem of audiophiles over the last decade and more, even as it has grown in complexity. On average, integrated amps can now do more than ever before. In fact, if a 2018 integrated doesn’t have at least a built-in digital-to-analog converter, it breaks with current convention. Streaming options, onboard storage for music files, wireless connectivity -- these and more appear on the lists of features of many of today’s integrateds.

Read more …

  1. I Did Record Store Day
  2. Andy Sheppard Quartet: "Romaria"
  3. Furutech NCF Booster Cable Holder
  4. Jeff Buys a New (Used) Amp
  5. Raidho Acoustics XT-5 Loudspeakers
  6. GoGo Penguin: "A Humdrum Star"
  7. Waversa Systems WDAC3 Mk.II Digital-to-Analog Converter
  8. Buying Used: An Option Even for Reviewers
  9. Rethm Maarga Loudspeakers
  10. I Love My Turntable

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210x600 T+A R Criterion S (20240601)
Dynaudio Contour 20BE
 Electrocompaniet - AW300M
767x500 T+A Criterion S (20240601)

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Vitus Audio

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