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Thursday, November 21, 2024

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Shelly Manne & His Men: “At the Black Hawk, Vol. 1”

: Written by: Joseph Taylor; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 15 May 2024

Contemporary Records / Craft Recordings / Acoustic Sounds CR00601
Format: LP

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

I’ve reviewed quite a few of the Contemporary Records / Acoustic Sounds vinyl reissues by Craft Recordings. It would be easy to just say, “Buy them. They sound great.” That would be true, but Craft has made it a point to reissue Contemporary Records LPs that deserve more recognition. Art Pepper Meets the Rhythm Section is well known, but André Previn’s take on West Side Story is perhaps less so. Craft has done jazz lovers a service by casting a wide net.

Read the Instructions! The Perils of Cartridge Setup

: Written by: Jason Thorpe; Category: Opinion; Created: 01 May 2024

It’s a failing of mine. I’m impatient. And even at this stage of my reviewing career, I’m still excited when I receive new gear. Combined, those two traits are a recipe for disaster.

X-quisite Voro Moving-Coil Phono Cartridge

: Written by: Jason Thorpe; Category: Full-Length Reviews; Created: 01 May 2024

Reviewers' Choice This wasn’t how a review process normally starts. I’d just received the Thales TTT-Compact II turntable for review and was rolling up my sleeves to dig right into this fascinating product. According to Wynn Wong, the Canadian distributor, the Thales ships to the dealer, and thus the customer, as a ready-to-go package, complete with their Simplicity II tonearm and—this is what threw me—the X-quisite Voro cartridge.

Musical Fidelity M8xTT Turntable

: Written by: Jason Thorpe; Category: Full-Length Reviews; Created: 15 April 2024

I have a sweet tooth when it comes to turntables, but I’m not stuck on one type of confection. I’m an equal-opportunity fetishist. I love turntables made from solid steel, real wood, MDF painted to look like wood. Piano lacquer, matte paint, or—gasp—clear acrylic.

Bounce with Counce and Mat Matters

: Written by: Jason Thorpe; Category: For the Record; Created: 15 April 2024

Curtis Counce, and that album cover!

I’ve always loved You Get More Bounce with Curtis Counce! by the Curtis Counce Group. It’s a delightfully easy, loping album, full of smooth, juicy lyricism, almost totally absent of the paid-by-the-note speed-bop that often leaves me feeling cold. But it’s not so laid-back that it’s going in reverse. Rather, it’s a midway blend of West Coast chardonnay and Chicago barrel whiskey. There’s some wonderful soloing going on here—Miles meets Ben Webster without the drug addictions. The arrival of the Craft Recordings reissue of this criminally underappreciated album really sent me down a rabbit hole.

The Hardest-Rocking Album Ever—“Van Halen” on Vinyl

: Written by: Jason Thorpe; Category: Opinion; Created: 01 April 2024

Van Halen’s first album is the greatest debut record of all time. Some may well not agree with this.

Naim Audio NAC 332 Preamplifier and NPX 300 Power Supply

: Written by: Jonathan Gorse; Category: Full-Length Reviews; Created: 01 April 2024

Technology and design

The Naim NAC 332 is the second component in the new Naim 300 range to be reviewed on SoundStage! Ultra. The 300 series is only the fourth generation of Naim amplification to be launched since the firm’s inception in 1973. Priced at $10,999 (all prices in USD), the NAC 332 preamp sits in the middle of Naim’s hi-fi separates series, above the new 200-series NSC 222 streaming preamplifier ($8999) and below the existing NAC 552 preamplifier ($32,000), which will continue in production unchanged, save for switching to white front-panel illumination. In effect, the NAC 332 replaces both the discontinued NAC 282 and NAC 252 preamplifiers with a single unit. It’s all part of a simplification strategy that’s admirable, not least because the NAC 332 is priced only slightly above the NAC 282 (currently retailing at $8599) and below the recently discontinued NAC 252 ($12,599).

The Grateful Dead: “Terrapin Station”

: Written by: Joseph Taylor; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 April 2024

Rhino Records R1 516251 / 603497830824
Format: LP

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

The consensus among fans and critics is that Grateful Dead was primarily a live band, and its studio recordings were rarely good examples of its art. There are exceptions, of course. Workingman’s Dead and American Beauty, both from 1970, have long been considered outstanding and are among the best albums in rock music.

DALI Epikore 11 Loudspeaker

: Written by: Jason Thorpe; Category: Full-Length Reviews; Created: 15 March 2024

Reviewers' Choice I feel like I’ve been chasing this speaker around the world.

Back in 2022, I flew to Denmark for a tour of DALI’s headquarters and an in-depth introduction to the company’s new statement Kore loudspeaker. I was surprised to learn that DALI—an acronym for Danish Audiophile Loudspeaker Industries—is the second-largest manufacturer of speakers in the world. I was equally surprised by the depth of DALI’s investment in the infrastructure and technical expertise that went into the Kore project. While the folks at DALI were rather coy on the issue, they did hint that some of the Kore-specific technologies were likely to trickle down to future products . . .