Above photo credit: Ana GibertShow business is packed with success stories born not just from talent, but also by being in the right place at the right time—backed up by a relentless work ethic. That’s how Joe Chiccarelli got his audio engineering start, setting him on a path to become a Grammy-winning producer. As the story goes, when Frank Zappa’s regular engineer couldn’t make a Sheik Yerbouti session Joe was called in as the backup and grabbed on to the... 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

The legendary Strata-East label started by Charles Tolliver and the late Stanley Cowell recently signed a long-term licensing deal with Mack Avenue Music Group, now owned by Exceleration Music. (L-R in photo: Kevin Gray, former Mack Avenue CEO Denny Stilwell and Charles's son Ched Tolliver, who is also the company's CEO).The label asked me to help co-ordinate the all-analog vinyl reissue process utilized for the first four titles, and to offer the label... Read More

Teamwork - as they say - makes the dream work. Over the last several years, Org Music has been quietly amassing a catalog of well-produced reissues and original recordings in all genres. On the reissue front, however, the label has reached its goals by employing a select group of audio specialists all working toward the same goal: to find forgotten music deserving of a second chance to reach an audience, and to approach its restoration with straightforward respect and... Read More

Blondie released its fourth album Eat to the Beat in 1979. No way then could the band have known that nearly a half-century later it might be possible to press beats onto records made of beets that, at least theoretically, one could actually eat! Thermal Beets Records is a partnership founded by Larry Jaffee, the author of "Record Store Day: The Most Improbable Comeback of the  21st Century" and co-founder of the Making Vinyl conference, and Kevin DaCosta, a vinyl manufacturing consultant and the technical director for Evolution Music.

The top photo was taken back in 2005, at the Stereophile Home Entertainment Show, New York Hilton Hotel, where Garth Leerer raffled off this swell Clearaudio turntable and I hosted the giveaway. Beginning in the late 70s/early 80s, Musical Surroundings' Garth Leerer has been an eye witness to and participant in the growth of high performance audio. I've known Garth for more than thirty years but mostly we're like two ships passing in the day and night... Read More

Patrick Leonard's new "prog rock" extravaganza It All Comes Down to Mood, released at the end of August is now on sale at www.acousticsounds.com, www.elusivedisc.com and at www.musicdirect.com. It's a double LP 180g vinyl set with cover art by Storm, which did DSOTM all those years ago, and features Tony Levin and John Patituchi on bass, plus Martin Barre, Ian Anderson many other greats and of course PL himself is a multi-instrumental keyboard wiz.... Read More

An exclusive transatlantic video discussion including an essential new historical video covering the original DGG production of Herbert Von Karajan and the BPO's Bruckner Symphony cycle, hosted by Deutsche Gramophon's Johannes Gleim with Emil Berliner Studios' Tonmeister, mastering engineer and Managing Director Rainer Maillard, cutting engineer Sidney Meyer, Tracking Angle's contributing writer Mark Ward and editor Michael Fremer. This box set is... Read More

Our friend Charles Kirmuss appeared on The Audiophile Junkie YouTube channel recently and claimed the superiority of tangential tracking arms without explaining the negatives. There are positives and negatives to everything in this hobby so J.R. and I asked to make a joint guest appearance to "cavitate" the situation.The video is below. The comments so far are interesting. My favorite is this one: "Excellent information. Very enjoyable. I sent this... Read More

Tracking Angle west coast correspondent Michael Trochalakis recently visited Levi Seitz's Seattle based Black Belt Mastering where the new Because Sound Matters Linkin Park "One Step" released were cut. Olivia Rodrigo's "Sour" and Beyonce's "Renaissance" are among the many other well regarded vinyl issues and reissues Seitz cut at Black Belt. Seitz gives Michael a tour of the facility and discusses his three lathes, then... Read More

Musician, recording artist, label owner, Gillian Welch partner in life and in the studio, and all around analog aficionado Dave Rawlings invited me to visit his Woodland recording Studio during last June's Making Vinyl where we finally sat down face to face to talk about the things we both know and love. This meeting—something we both talked about doing for almost five years now—was worth the wait as you'll see and hear. Over the past almost half-decade... Read More

I figured it was a good time to catch up with Steve Westman and his community. I wanted to check the reaction. It was mostly good. Read More

The plan was an on-stage interview with Patrick Leonard, whose new double LP album "It's All Comes Down To Mood" is due end of July. Patrick produced all of Madonna's early Warner Brothers Records, Amused to Death for Roger Waters, two of the final three Leonard Cohen records (he wrote or co-wrote songs on all three), as well as Elton John's Songs From the West Coast. There's more but that's enough! I wrote an essay published in the... Read More

Every properly overseen vinyl record reissue series should have a gatekeeper/curator like Blue Note's Tone Poet series Joe Harley. Craft Recordings has brought on board for its new Bluesville series, Scott Billington, clearly the best possible individual for the job. Scott is a Grammy winning producer, musician, writer and record executive who's produced more than 150 records, even playing on a few. He's produced records by, among others, Charlie Rich,... Read More

(I conducted this interview with the great Steve Albini way back in 1993, before MP3, before the iPod, back when all but a few outspoken critics like Albini, Neil Young and a few others had anything negative to say about the digital recording revolution. Albini died today at age 61 from a heart attack at his Electrical Audio studio in Chicago. It's fascinating to read Albini's thoughts from back then today. He was right on target then and now, but of course... Read More

I once had an Uncle Louis, who as far as I know, I’d only met as an infant. He and my dad had a complicated relationship and, unfortunately, over the years they drifted apart. Louis died unexpectedly sometime in the 1990s; I don’t think my father ever made peace with the estrangement. Though I have no personal memory of Uncle Louis, I do have some interesting familial folklore.My dad used to tell a story about Louis moving from NJ to Las Vegas during the late... Read More

Had it not been for Paul McCartney’s drug bust, all four Beatles might have been together in the studio for the first time since the group broke up, recording engineer Bill Schnee recounts in this interview, referring to his time recording Ringo the Beatles drummer’s third solo album and first rocker following albums of standards (Sentimental Journey) and C&W (Beaucoups of Blues).If you’re familiar with Ringo you know it’s a spectacularly large, generous sounding... Read More