Uberwaltz, confirming something long imagined: Just been experimenting with speakers position as the Spatial have been in pretty much same place as every other speaker.
3" one way and 2" the other and quite a difference in presentation. "Pretty much the same place as every other speaker"?! Pretty much??!?! Freaking hilarious. Hey Uberwaltz, how many times have you heard me say PRECISELY and then just to be clear for the hard of learning (case in point) say that means not even 1/16" difference? Precisely means precisely! Not somewhere in the ballpark. Two inches! No, wait- 3"! No wait! You said "3" one way and 2" the other" that’s five! Crikey! By that standard I guess "pretty much the same as every other speaker" means they were all in the same room? Probably? Maybe? "Pretty much"?! But really, not in the least bit surprised. Just letting you know. Wow. I mean, what you just did, is the equivalent of trash talking Michael Jordan for years and then one day Gosh I put air in my basketball, quite a difference! Have you checked to see if they are in phase? That’s where the black goes to black, red goes to red. Hilarious. |
|
The New Basement Tapes
Year of the Cat
Honky Chateau
Les Brown and his Band of Renown (direct to disc)
Fly Like an Eagle
Book of Dreams
The Ghost of Tom Joad |
Madman Across the Water
Aja
Mel Torme and Friends Live at Marty's
|
Gary Wright, Dream Weaver
John Stewart, Bombs Away Dream Babies, Dream Babies Go To Hollywood
Elton John, Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only The Piano Player
Sting, Dream of the Blue Turtles
R.Daneel Olivaw
|
Demons and Wizards
Taproot Manuscript
City to City
The Way It Is
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road (shootout)
Year of the Cat
New Favorite
|
Hotel California
The Dream Weaver
Between the Lines (Janis Ian, with a rare hit, Seventeen)
Aja (Shootout. Mo-Fi got hammered. By a totally random average used LP. Not even close. And they charge a premium for this crap!)
The Ghost of Tom Joad |
The Wizard was to see if my German Import is good enough to keep. It is. Taproot I played the whole thing. ND was ahead of his time in going to Africa, and of course Done Too Soon is a one of a kind. [Edit: There've always been a few names there I didn't know. I just looked them up. This song is even more impressive now than ever.]
City to City, there was a time you couldn’t open your window at WSU without hearing that Baker Street sax coming from some dorm somewhere.
YBR was a shootout between two copies. One turned out to be quite a bit quieter, more detailed and 3D than the other. Amazing since I started doing this almost every time one turns out to be much better than another. Sometimes dramatically so! If a record doesn’t sound good I no longer blame the recording, I blame the pressing!
Year of the Cat by now its late and I always go to the really good stuff, but I just can’t quit the 70’s. Some of it like Silk Degrees just sounds so dated. But On the Border, you just want to keep playing it over and over....
New Favorite, what a mix of styles, all superbly recorded, ending with the sublime title track. What can you do? Wash down the last of the Makers Mark and call it a night. |
@millercarbon
I have a used copy of Aja, just an original pressing and the SQ is sublime, right up there with some of the best I have, cost was $1.....
For years I went along with the assumption or conventional wisdom that what was on the recording was on the vinyl, that the only real difference between any two pressings was ticks and pops and noise. That all changed recently when I began comparing different copies and not for noise but for SQ. Case in point, couple nights ago I opened a brand new 200g Analogue Productions copy of Linda Ronstadt What's New. Right away I was disappointed by it having just as much surface noise as my ancient $4.99 used record bin copy. That was nothing though compared to the sound. Within a few minutes I was uncomfortable enough to pull it and drop the needle on my old copy. The ordinary old one was MUCH BETTER! No more syrupy strings, they had just the right amount of bite and body and focus. LR's voice was present and emotive and enveloped in the ambience of the hall. The Analogue Productions, festooned with stickers bragging how good it is, comes nowhere close. It is frankly pure pabulum and crap! Ditto the MoFi of Aja. Ordinary cheap used record bin LP positively trounced the MoFi. On deck for shootouts are several copies of Crime of the Century, Dark Side of the Moon, and Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. I can already anticipate its gonna be a blowout because when I recently compared two ordinary copies of GYBR my sonic spider senses were telling me the better one sounds better even than my MoFi. I actually hate having to do this- take up space in a thread, take up my precious listening time. But people need to know. This is not bargain hunter braggadicio. This is a whole industry of fake audiophile pressings that sound like crap! Okay there are exceptions. My Reference Recordings pressings are universally excellent in every respect. Probably there are others like this too. But this is different. There is nothing to compare them with. I'm talking about audiophile reissues, remasters, half-speed masters, heavy vinyl reissues, yes even 45s. Every one of those I have compared so far is bested by whatever came out of the record bin. "just an original pressing and the SQ is sublime" -uberwaltz Pin it. |
I her you slaw but its not a matter of VTA or thickness. The MoFi and regular pressing of Aja are standard thickness. The APO of What’s New is a lot thicker, but anyone who’s spent much time adjusting VTA by ear will be familiar with the sonic signature, and this ain’t it. |
Mel Torme Swings Shubert Alley
Rhythm of the Saints
From the Age of Swing
|
Wish You Were Here
City to City
Exactly Like This
The Well
Famous Blue Raincoat
|
Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
|
|
Francis A and Edward K Equinox Boston Violation Year of the Cat Equinox it turns out was mastered by the great Doug Sax at then called Mastering Labs, later known as The Mastering Lab. As far as I can tell this may be the first time my young ears were introduced to his work. The best of my three pressings reveals his trademark sonic signature even that far back. Lorelei, damn https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srEP-vvhTvY |
Okay off-topic (technically this was last night)-
Year of the Cat - just On the Border. Love that one.
Rhythm of the Saints - the first of 3 Side two's I will play tonight where the SQ on that side is so much better you can't believe it.
Mel Torme Swings Shubert Alley - The Velvet Fog in his prime. Gives The Voice a run for his money, and then some.
Fleetwood Mac - The White Hot Stamper. Only the 2nd time I have played this. Was frankly on the fence ready to send it back for a refund. Can any pressing really be worth $300?? After Side 1: Well, yeah, maybe. After Track 1 Side 2: Okay, yeah, I guess. After Track 2 (Landslide): Well, I'll be damned if it isn't a bargain!
Nothing gonna top that. Not tonight anyway. Swirl the last of the cab, drink it down, tenderly tuck the Mac back in, off to bed. Happy dreams. Got that White Hot Stamper in The Room.
|
Doug MacLeod Exactly Like This (the 45)
Brothers in Arms (the 45)
Holly Cole Temptation, Don't Smoke in Bed
Peter Gabriel So, a Super Hot Stamper, would be on there but its sitting in a FedEx semi trailer somewhere in Redmond, waiting for the snow to melt I guess. |
First up was a Reference Recording 45 of Mickey Hart "Rafos" one of those odd audiophile deals in plain white with only a little sticker on the cover, with some of those culturally odd mostly instrumental arrangement kind of things where sounds keep coming from all over almost enough to make you think its pure audiophile porn except it somehow manages to be involving and musically compelling in addition to being exceptionally well recorded.
And that was just the warm up.
Next up was my Super Hot Stamper of Peter Gabriel So. Damn these Stampers are amazing! Played both sides, even tracks like Sledgehammer and Big Time, heard so many times ought to be tiresome but not when they sound this good. Gabriel anguished over song order feeling that musically the album should end with In Your Eyes. But the album would play better with all that bass modulation further from the spindle. So we get it on the first track. Whatever. I'll take it.
What in the world can follow a Super Hot Stamper? A White Hot Stamper! Only one I have is the eponymous Fleetwood Mac. Side One is awesome, if uneven. Side Two is even and beyond awesome. On Landslide the guitar and vocals are so present and full and real you can't believe it.
Nothing I have to follow that. Good night.
|
Avalon
The Ghost of Tom Joad |
Seal
Regatta de blanc
The Grand Illusion |
Claire Marlo "Let It Go"
Pink Floyd "Wish You Were Here"
Dire Straits "Brothers In Arms" (the MoFi 45)
Harry "Belafonte at Carnegie Hall"
With a pitcher of Pina colada and some sweet Seattle green.
|
Queen Jazz
Doug MacLeod Exactly Like This (Reference Recording 45)
Gerry Raferty City to City
Seal Seal
Santana Abraxas
Jennifer Warnes The Well Limited Edition boxed 45 (the additional songs on the 45 are outstanding!
Fleetwood Mac Fleetwood Mac (A++, A+++)
Harry Nilsson Nilsson Schmilsson (A++)
Jimmy Buffet pina colada. Okay technically that went in me not on the platter. One hell of a fine afternoon/evening of listening.
|
Two new near-White Hot Stampers arrived, Elton John Honky Chateau and Fleetwood Mac Rumours. Not a lot of time last night but you don't just play one of these its a production so a little Al Stewart goes on to warm things up. Then I got some cool high voltage ceramic insulators off eBay to help route cables. Same as Cable Elevators only a lot cheaper. Compared with and without and sure enough they work just like the Cable Elevators and so with the system warm and tuned up its time for.... Honky Chateau! This nearly White Hot Stamper (both sides A++ to A+++) has a sticker saying its from England. Whatever. The cover like all my Hot Stampers is pristine. The LP so crisp and clean it has an almost otherworldly look to it. Packaged in the best sleeves on the market its an experience just pulling it out and putting it on the platter. Carefully. Very, very carefully! LOL! And I know what you're thinking: its freaking Elton John? How good could it be???! Which is what I thought too. Never known for SQ, Elton. 'Cept, turns out the brilliant Ken Scott (The White Album, Crime of the Century) was on it. Which each side, damn, from the very first note you feel it. The piano, the bite of the violin, the way even the loudest most crowded passages that everywhere else you have heard it congeal here each and every instrument and voice stays clear and unmolested in its own right. What an experience. But oh, sorry guys, "This item is no longer available." lol! https://www.better-records.com/product.aspx?pf_id=john_honky_1903That was last night. Tonight: Rumours! |
|
The Ghost of Tom Joad, the exception to the Springsteen Rule (Great music, bad recording).
Michael Ruff Speaking in Melodies, the Sheffield LP, 1299 of 5000. Always forget the name of the Swedish guy on trombone which is a crime, as he delivers two of the best trombone solos ever.
All I got to follow Sheffield is Hot Stampers:
Fleetwood Mac Rumours
Fleetwood Mac
Honky Chateau
Oh, and all on new tubes. Life is good.
|
Satchmo Plays King Oliver last night. Forgot just how good this is.
Elton Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, first the best of my 2 MoFi copies, then the best of my 2 original issues. What happened? They all suck. At least now they do. Now that I'm used to how Elton sounds on my Hot Stampers. Where is the bass? Where is the slam? What happened to the dynamics? Why is it all congested, congealed, softened, rolled off and lifeless?? Learn from this guys. Don't fall for it. Don't even get started. The whole Hot Stamper thing is a one-way ticket to audio nirvana, er, I mean Hell. |
|
Sam McClain Sledgehammer Soul and Down-home Blues
Nancy Griffiths Storms
Sinatra Live at the Sands |
Weak. Not pathetic weak. Not totally ignore it weak either. Just your ordinary garden variety weak. |
Satchmo, King Oliver
Mel Torme Swings Schubert Alley
Nilsson, A Little Touch of Schmilsson in the Night (White Hot Stamper)
|
Yeah, its almost closed in sounding. Pity. Great music.
|
I like this thread. But whenever something is on my turntable tonight I am in there listening to it. By the time I get done it's time to go to bed. By the time I can post it's no longer tonight. Last night was, uh let me think, oh yeah Super Hot Sting Ten Summoners Tales.
|
City to City
Wish You Were Here
Sinatra-Basie |
Smart move. First mod I ever did was to the motor of my Basis, and that led to the Teres Audio Motor Pod which was a significant upgrade. Then a whole series of upgrades to the motor power supply, motor, housing, controller. Its nice having a modular sort of turntable design that allows these kinds of projects. I'm sure Max put a very good motor in the Rock but experience has taught me they can all be improved upon. I bet you will be impressed with significant improvements in the power and drive of your music, with better bass, greater detail, and a more powerful yet more relaxed less fatiguing sound.
That is a pretty cool table. You should write it up and let us all know how it goes.
Okay, okay last night it was:
The Final Cut
Puttin' It Down
The Hunter |
|
Storms
Sinatra-Basie
Year of the Cat |
|
Silk Degrees
Book of Dreams
Sinatra-Basie
So
|
|
Silk Degrees
Holly Cole, Temptation
Year of the Cat
|
Niel Diamond, Serenade
Avalon
1812 with Cannon
Jennifer Warnes, The Well
The 45, with extra tracks like Born in Time available nowhere else. |
|
slaw, if you have 1.5ml of TC that will go a long way! Use the thinnest film you can manage and cover more than just the contact area because it is far more than contact enhancement. Cartridge pins, tube pins, and even the outside of the cartridge and around the base of tubes. Just be real careful not to create a short, that is the main reason it is no longer sold, too many people screwed themselves not paying attention. The tiny amount you have will do your entire system with plenty left over to hit a good deal of your panel - if you are up for that.
Sorry. Okay back to topic-
George Thoroughgood and the Destroyers
Head East Flat as a Pancake
Tom Petty Southern Accents, Damn the Torpedoes (White Hot Stampers, both!)
Tchkaivosky 1812 (Another White Hot Stamper) |
|
Terry Evans, Puttin' It Down |
|
