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August 2021

Love Conquers All, Even Love at First Sight

The Criterion Collection 1072
Format: BD

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Love at first sight, lasting or not, is a fairly common theme, especially in film, where rules can be easily broken. The romance in the 1937 film History Is Made at Night presents a telling example. It’s the type of movie you can expect from director Frank Borzage, for whom love conquered all. Though not on the level of the director’s other work—A Farewell to Arms (1932), No Greater Glory (1934), or the somewhat revisionist Billy the Kid (1941)—the film is nonetheless an interesting testament to love and features splendid performances by its leads.

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August 2021

In 1940, Chicago was home to 278,000 black residents. Twenty years later, that number had climbed to 813,000—the result of a massive northward migration of African Americans, largely from rural parts of Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee. The institutionalized racism in the South was at the root of much of this migration, but intertwined economic factors also shaped the movement.

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August 2021

It’s back to the familiar JBL cylindrical design this month with their newest addition to the Flip series, the Flip 5 Bluetooth speaker. As you might have guessed from the number, this popular series has been around for some time. The new model comes with a few improvements over the outgoing Flip 4, although it loses a few features as well. Still, at $119.95 (all prices USD), it’s one of the best little Bluetooth speakers around.

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August 2021

Blue Note B096C185JM
Format: 8 CDs

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Like me, you probably have a few recordings you’ve played so many times you know every note, every nuance.

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July 2021

Pristine BD Transfer of a Classic Film Noir by Samuel Fuller

The Criterion Collection 224
Format: BD

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The title of this 1953 thriller rolls easily off the tongue, crackling with the promise of adventure and excitement. The film itself provides that and much more. In writing the succinct, hard-hitting screenplay, director Samuel Fuller used his background in journalism to bring to life Dwight Taylor’s original story, based on a rejected filmscript. In my opinion, it’s one of Fuller’s best films.

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Note: for the full suite of measurements for the iFi Audio Zen Phono from the SoundStage! Audio-Electronics Lab, click this link.

July 2021

When the stars align, the intersection between art and commerce can benefit both artist and audience, but the meeting is never anything but unpredictable. Sometimes, the two forces collide with terrible results.

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July 2021

Last time in “Fix It in the Mix,” I talked a lot about planning a recording session. I’ll talk a bit more about that here, but this installment is mostly about the process of recording itself. I don’t focus too much on precisely where to place the microphone(s) for any given instrument—there are countless sources for the best way to mike, for example, a drum kit or an acoustic guitar (all of which are both right and wrong). This series is more about giving you the most basic tools for translating what you hear in your head into something playable on a stereo. And in this installment I talk about how microphones “hear,” and give you some basic techniques for getting them to give you the sound you want.

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July 2021

There’s no beauty contest for outdoor Bluetooth speakers, but if there were, JBL’s Pulse 4 would win. The cylindrical Pulse 4 has many LEDs distributed all over and around its single curved vertical/longitudinal surface that can distribute patterns of light through 360°. And it sounds good. It might seem costly at a list price of $249.95 USD, but it’s more than a portable Bluetooth speaker—many would consider the Pulse 4 a work of electronic art.

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July 2021

BAG Production BAG018
Format: CD

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I credit my father for indoctrinating me with a love for the clarinet. As a young man, long before my time, he immersed himself in the music of Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw the way I would later cleave to Jimi Hendrix and Duane Allman. And before either of those guitarists were making records, my father was filling my ears every Sunday morning with the sounds of Goodman, Shaw, Jimmy Dorsey, Woody Herman, and others who had made the clarinet the equivalent of the Fender Stratocaster or Gibson Les Paul in his day.

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June 2021

A Memorable Descent into Hell in a Pristine BD Transfer

The Criterion Collection 1078
Format: BD

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In Nightmare Alley, Stanton “Stan” Carlisle is a self-proclaimed selfish heel—but, as played by Tyrone Power, you can’t take your eyes off him. Power took on this complicated character in an effort to prove that he could be more than a matinee idol. He succeeded—his multilayered performance was worthy of (though didn’t win) an Oscar. But Darrell F. Zanuck, then head of 20th Century Fox, didn’t like the film, didn’t promote it, and let it die a box-office failure and a write-off. Now it’s recognized by many film critics as a masterpiece, an A-list film disguised as a B movie, the darkest of films noirs.

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