This interview with recording engineer Shawn Murphy originally appeared in The Tracking Angle print magazine published right around this time 30 years ago. This weekend, the L.A. & Orange County Audio Society will present Shawn with a "Record of the Year" award for his recording of Yuja Wang performing Shostakovich's Piano Concertos 1 and 2 reviewed on this website. More significantly the recording is up for a Grammy Award. We published it back in September, 2022 as the new website was going live but I thought it a good idea to bring it now to the front page.

Back in 2019, Crosley and Record Store Day revived the 3” 8ban records originally developed in Japan by Bandai and Toyokasei. These 33rpm single-sided 3” singles did okay as a collectors’ novelty, with one main problem: some of the spindle holes aren’t the standard size, so one must spend $70 on the special Crosley player (fitted with an Audio-Technica AT3600L cartridge) to play them.Now, Tiny Vinyl aims to replicate that novelty value with wider compatibility.... Read More

It was one of those steamy July days in Manhattan when everyone looks and feels like a damp hot dog that’s just been pulled from a street cart. Piling on to that discomfort are the handcuffs Arthur Baker is being fastened to after being slammed up against a wall near the corner of West 37th Street for supposedly hitting a traffic warden with his car. The false charges are eventually dropped, but the memory of missing out on reuniting with Bob Dylan after one of his... Read More

This year's Black Friday RSD titles aren't the greatest but there's still many worth considering and I've played the ones I'm recommending so there won't be any sonic surprises. I've found that some of the most desirable will later be found on Discogs and Ebay for premium prices but many that are out of the way and ones you might want will be offered at the "list" price.

Mack Avenue Music Group and Strata-East Records recently announced the physical release of four legendary albums from the Strata-East catalog. Celebrating the revolutionary spirit of one of the most influential artist-owned independent jazz labels in history, Strata-East titles from Charles Tolliver & Stanley Cowell, The Heath Brothers, Cecil McBee, and The Descendants of Mike and Phoebe will be released on CD and 180-gram vinyl, with audio cut directly from the... Read More

The third and final video coverage of the Capital Audio Festival 2025 features mostly "room walk ins" plus a few interviews. You'll walk into rooms featuring Acora, VPI, VAC, ,EMM Labs Credo, Aequo, Trilogy, Burmester, Audience, Martin Audio, Luxman, Estelon, Vitus, Crystal Cable, Sonorus, SAT, Lyra, Lampizator, Tidal, REL, Turnbull, C.A.T., Göbel, EMM Labs, Revox and THRAX.Because of technical issues related to a truly stupid function on the DJI Pocket... Read More

Capital Audio Festival Part 2 coverage begins with the final room I visited on Sunday thanks to a tip from Stereophile's Herb Reichert. A chance lobby encounter had Herb going on about the goings on on the 8th floor in the La Dolce Audio room. Herb's tastes run to esoteric tubey stuff, just as he insists mine are towards "oligarch" products. I plead guilty, though I also try to review affordable stuff. Fortunately I took Herb's word for his... Read More

Capital Audio Festival 2025 was the largest ever and perhaps the most unusual, starting with a manufacturer greeting me by grabbing my junk. Not kidding. I've been described as being "a handful", but this was too literal for my liking. I didn't give him the pleasure of a reaction. Just glad to be wearing my Tommy Johns, which put everything in a neat package. Ok, enough of that. This was the largest Cap Audio Fest ever in terms of manufacturer... Read More

The "Studio Confidential" event announced a few weeks ago had a pre preview last night (Nov.18th) at Technica House in Manhattan and it was well-worth attending. On hand with entertaining anecdotes were Niko Bolas, Frank Filipetti, Jimmy Douglass, Chuck Finlay, Sylvia Massy, and Elliot Scheiner. George Massenburg did something he never does while working: he "phoned it in" because he was working on the west coast.This was not a tech-based... Read More

You'll note that this press release is authored by me and not by "Tracking Angle" as most pressers are. That's because I took original promo copies of both of these early I.R.S. records (I.R.S. was a record label founded by Police drummer Stewart Copeland's brother Miles and Jay Boberg, distributed by A&M) to the Capital Audio Festival and played them for a room full of people, all of whom thought the new One-Step Murmur absolutely crushed... Read More

GIG HARBOR, WA (November 13, 2025) - Intervention Records will continue its Sun Records Hi-Fi Series—featuring classic titles from the Memphis label, mastered to vinyl from original master tapes in the Sun vaults—with a brilliant new pressing of Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar!, the first long-playing record from one of country music’s most enduring icons. The album, featuring “I Walk The Line,” “Cry, Cry, Cry,” and “Folsom Prison Blues,” has been given the ultimate treatment for this 180-gram, 45 RPM mono release, featuring audio from original master tapes mastered to vinyl in an all-analog process, plus restored artwork featuring new liner notes.

(November 13, 2025 - Los Angeles, CA) Since its original release in 1988, Talk Talk’s critically acclaimed fourth album Spirit Of Eden has grown to become one of the most influential albums of the 80s. A step away from its hugely commercially successful predecessor The Colour Of Spring, Spirit Of Eden is steeped in legend for its long and improvisational recording sessions that created a body of work that would go on to be vital in the creation of post-rock as a... Read More

(November 12, 2025 - Los Angeles, CA) John Coltrane’s impact on modern music is immeasurable. The saxophonist’s groundbreaking work at Atlantic Records in the early 1960s helped expand the language of jazz and redefine the possibilities of improvisation. In honor of Coltrane’s upcoming centennial next year, Rhino is starting the celebration early on November 28 with a vinyl boxed set featuring six albums in mono, reissued as part of the acclaimed Rhino High Fidelity... Read More

The British prime minister Harold Macmillan, who was known as Supermac during the 1950s, once famously declared, “you’ve never had it so good.” Something similar could be said about vinyl lovers. As several listening events at Innovative Audio, a carefully curated store located underground in midtown Manhattan, demonstrated over the past several days, vinyl has returned to the heart of the high-end audio hobby.The first event featured two stars in the vinyl firmament,... Read More

Blue Note Records has announced the 2026 line-up for the Tone Poet Audiophile Vinyl Reissue Series. The acclaimed series is produced by the “Tone Poet” Joe Harley and presents definitive audiophile quality vinyl reissues that are mastered all-analog directly from the original master tapes by Kevin Gray of Cohearent Audio, pressed on 180g vinyl at Record Technology Inc. (RTI), and packaged in deluxe tip-on jackets. The Tone Poet Society subscription service also... Read More

I spent all of day 3 at the Golden Tulip and Sobieski hotels. Golden Tulip has the bigger rooms but far fewer systems, located in the hotel's second floor exhibition space. This year there were many show highlights at the Golden Tulip including the "thumbnail" photo showing the Danish Zikra Audio room featuring the company's mono single-ended triode tube amps, preamp and Technics SP-10 based turntable. Company founder Michael Zingenberg brought his... Read More

Get the full breakdown on what promises to be a landmark series of classical vinyl reissues from the legendary DECCA label.

press release: (November 5, 2025 - Los Angeles, CA) One of the most ambitious albums in rock history, Yes’ Tales from Topographic Oceans arrives February 6 from Rhino as a Super Deluxe Edition boxed set.The massive collection spans 12 CDs, 2 LPs, and a Blu-ray and features a newly remastered version of the original double album on both CD and vinyl; rarities; previously unreleased studio and live recordings; and several new mixes by Steven Wilson, including a Dolby... Read More

(Press release)-- Studio Confidential - a new intimate, on-stage discussion series - will make its NYC debut this February, bringing together a group of music luminaries behind the boards for music’s most iconic recordings from Neil Young, James Taylor, Johnny Cash, Van Morrison, Timbaland, Jason Isbell, The Mavericks, George Michael and many more. Through candid, and often hilarious personal reflections, these legendary engineers and producers offer audiences an... Read More

New York City's Innovative Audio hosts a "Meet the Innovators" event this Friday November 7th at its East 58th Street store featuring TechDAS's Motofumi Hirata, who will spin vinyl on an Air Force One Premium turntable fitted with the new Air Force 10 Radial air bearing tonearm. Also on display will be the Air Force III Premium and Air Force V turntables.Maier Shadi of The Audio Salon, Santa Monica, California will also be on hand to talk TechDAS... Read More