Wednesday night and last night (Wednesday May 21st and May 22nd), Maier Shadi's The Audio Salon, Santa Monica, hosted an event celebrating Acoustic Sounds' founder Chad Kassem, who was in town visiting record company executives, band management and others for obvious reasons.Kassem was coy about who he met and what recordings he was seeking for future Analogue Productions LPs, SACDs and R2R tapes, but he did say the trip, capped off by these two evenings,... Read More

Press conferences are generally off limits to consumers, so I thought I'd "invite" you to this one hosted for the press by Marten Audio the Swedish loudspeaker manufacturer—one of the few press conferences I managed to attend. Why? There was so much new and exciting analog gear to cover, I hardly had time for press conferences—I'm working on another all-analog gear video.At High End Munich 2025 Marten introduced two limited edition loudspeakers:... Read More

Music review of the 2025 Craft Recordings reissue of the introspective Bill Evans Trio album Moon Beams with Paul Motian and Chuck Israels. Motian and the late Scott LaFaro were in the famous trio that recorded with Riverside just before Moon Beams was recorded.

As part of their OJC Series, this brand new Craft Recordings reissue of Moon Beams is pressed at RTI on 180-gram vinyl with all-analog mastering from the original tapes by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio.  

Late '60s British rock bands had to fit themselves into a specific mold, whether it was a psychedelic uniform of flared pants and satin shirts, or the presence of a guitar god and wailing vocalist. In the case of Jethro Tull, when audiences saw a scruffy Ian Anderson wearing an overcoat, standing on one leg, face twisted into possessed expressions, blowing excitedly into a flute, eccentricity worked in the band's favor . Jethro Tull's fit into the scene... Read More

The Audio Salon, Santa Monica, CA hosts Chad Kassem for two evening listening sessions celebrating the Acoustic Sounds catalog, Wednesday, May 21st, and Thursday May 22nd, from 6:30 to 9:30PM. Kassem will play his latest releases on tape, LP and SACD and no doubt regale the attendees with tales of his record business adventures.Please RSVP maier@theaudiosalon.com as space is limited. Read More

2025 was the final Munich High End show. The MOC convention center is going to be "re-purposed" or torn down so following 21 great years, the show next year will be moving to Vienna, Austria. Everything all of us did had that "this is the final time" feel about it that at times felt sad and at other times felt like relief. Instead of comfort, next year will be an adventure.Munich High End 2025 was a feast for analog lovers. New turntables,... Read More

The Absolute Sound review of the Original Live Sovereign S turntable and Agile tonearm that I wrote will soon be published, but before publication, in the embedded video below you'll see what makes this turntable arm/combo special.The combo costs around $25,000 so it's pretty costly but its design features are unique and while I'm not putting up an actual review here, when you see what's going on "under the hood" the design is sure to... Read More

I’ve conducted over 2,500 interviews with musicians, songwriters, poets, actors, movie directors, documentarians, authors, record producers, sound engineers, and novelists. Every year since 1975 I’ve talked to or emailed an interviewee about Bob Dylan.

As Bob’s 84th birthday looms on May 24th, I thought it was appropriate to display their reflections, observations and excerpts from emails in my archive, which houses a signed copy of Dylan’s Chronicles: Vol One.

Leroy Robert "Satchel" Paige, an American professional baseball pitcher who first played in the Negro Leagues, and then in the majors, in a 1953 Collier’s magazine article quipped, "Don't look back. Something might be gaining on you." A reminder to live in the present. Oscar-winning filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker would title his 1967 Bob Dylan documentary "Don’t Look Back".

(lead photo: Bob Dylan, Robbie Robertson, Sandy Konikoff, Santa Monica Civic Center 1965—Photo by Rodney Bingenheimer)

By Harvey Kubernik © 2025

George Brown was affectionately known as George “Funky” Brown and provided drums and percussion to Kool and the Gang’s many funky forays. He co-wrote some of the band’s hits which have woven themselves into the greater musical consciousness such as “Too Hot,” Summer Madness,” “Celebration,” “Jungle Boogie,” and “Ladies Night.” Of course, his musical influence did not end with Kool and the Gang’s releases, some of his drum samples became staples on many hip-hop and pop... Read More

That's my plane and I'm flying out of Newark, not concerned about the problems. Life's too short, and flying out of Newark, it could be further shortened! Not worried. This should be a great show if AXPONA is any indication of the industry's vibrancy and I believe it was.Pre-show press releases are packed with interesting new products including a turntable from Soulution in which the platter moves and the arm is stationery. I hope the head shell... Read More

As part of the roll out process for Strata-East's new vinyl reissue series, I again visited RTI (Record Technology Incorporated) to show new vinyl fans how lacquers are plated, processed and then pressed. In this video you will see the entire chain from lacquers arriving at RTI's plating facility to the plating itself, followed by stamper forming—in this case one of Strata-East's new reissues.Under one video post last year a reader said "once the... Read More

As the late Pete Silverton tells it, he and Joe Strummer were sItting in a pub less than five miles away from where “London Calling” was written when told his pal that it was recorded within weeks of “Theme from New York, New York” being put to tape. The reaction from The Clash guitarist was somewhere near mild disbelief. That was the fall of 1979. And as it turns out, the band had recorded the song in a studio less than five miles away in the other direction. But... Read More

Michell is a name that’s primarily associated with turntables, John Michell was the engineer who made turntables for Transcriptors in the early days and started building his own models in 1976. Michell remains one of the longest running independent turntable companies but it has plenty of experience with electronics. The first example was the Michell Iso distinguished by a black acrylic case and a distinctly fast and engaging sound, that phono preamp was designed for... Read More

Press release: LP box set featuring five original studio albums from 1965 (AAA) Remastered and cut directly from the original analog mono tapes by Kevin Gray. Manufactured on 180gm vinyl and housed in reverse-board deluxe sleeves. Expansive book with liner notes from GRAMMY® award nominated James Gavin, interviews with Chet Baker, George Coleman, Kirk Lightsey, Herman Wright, Roy Brooks and previously unseen photographs. Housed inside a secure, heavy lift-off lid box... Read More

Does anyone enjoy the hassle of unscrewing a chassis top to access resistive and capacitive loading DIP switches, or to adjust phono preamplifier gain? It's a royal pain. Placing the DIPs on the chassis rear is a step up (no pun intended) but for many that means shutting the unit down, unplugging the cables and turning it around to access the DIPs. When you're trying out different loads and or gain settings, this becomes annoying to where maybe you just find... Read More

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Wilson Benesch Unveils GRAVITON® Ti Tonearm at HIGH END Munich 2025. Wilson Benesch is proud to announce the launch of the GRAVITON® Ti Tonearm, the latest addition to the company’s acclaimed GMT® Analogue Collection. Evolving from the armwand variant provided with the iconic GMT® One System Turntable introduced in 2023, the GRAVITON® Ti Tonearm is a standalone tonearm system, developed for compatibility with the Dohmann Helix One Mk3... Read More