September 2021
This month in “Fix It in the Mix,” I’ll focus on recording music, like modern pop and electronica, that’s primarily non-acoustic but may have one or a few acoustic instruments thrown in (including vocals, the original acoustic instrument).
Blue Note Records BST 84338
Format: LP
Musical Performance
Sound Quality
Overall Enjoyment
The true geniuses of contemporary music—Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, Jimi Hendrix, to name just three—have had a tendency to flame out like supernovas. Like the massive astronomical objects that become supernovas, these musicians have also tended, at their peak, to obscure anyone else in their immediate orbit. From bassist Tommy Potter—at Parker’s side for his finest recordings—to bassist Noel Redding—one of Hendrix’s two closest collaborators—those who play alongside the biggest stars have struggled to establish their own musical identities.
September 2021
Back in 2013, I had a strong relationship with Logitech because I was reviewing most of its pioneering Bluetooth speakers. Somehow, likely due to a change in personnel, I regrettably lost touch with the company. My first impressions of its products were highly positive, and I followed their progress online as the firm re-established itself as Ultimate Ears. Recently, I made contact with them again, and I’m happy to review the Wonderboom 2, the smallest Bluetooth speaker in the manufacturer’s line-up. At $99.99 (all prices USD), it’s an attractive, affordable companion for outdoor activities.
August 2021
The Criterion Collection 1072
Format: BD
Overall Enjoyment
Picture Quality
Sound Quality
Extras
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.
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.
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.
August 2021
Blue Note B096C185JM
Format: 8 CDs
Musical Performance
Sound Quality
Overall Enjoyment
Like me, you probably have a few recordings you’ve played so many times you know every note, every nuance.
July 2021
The Criterion Collection 224
Format: BD
Overall Enjoyment
Picture Quality
Sound Quality
Extras
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.
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.
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.
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.
July 2021
BAG Production BAG018
Format: CD
Musical Performance
Sound Quality
Overall Enjoyment
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.
June 2021
The Criterion Collection 1078
Format: BD
Overall Enjoyment
Picture Quality
Sound Quality
Extras
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.
Note: for the full suite of measurements for the KLH Albany II loudspeaker performed in the anechoic chamber at Canada’s National Research Council, click this link.
June 2021
Everybody Digs Bill Evans—the name of a recording released in 1959—seems like little more than a hip album title until you reflect on the broad admiration the late jazz pianist engendered in most of the people who encountered his playing. Even in the atypically aggressive performances toward the end of his life, listeners could hear his sensitivity and heart, to say nothing of his deft touch and ability to find original ways of phrasing—even with a hoary chestnut like “Danny Boy.” So outsized is his influence it’s actually possible to make the case that Evans played a disproportionate role in making Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue the album that many people—including those who generally dislike improvised music—cite as their favorite jazz recording.
Page 13 of 35
SoundStage! Xperience is part of
All contents available on this website are copyrighted by SoundStage!® and Schneider Publishing Inc., unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved.
This site was designed by JoomlaShack, Karen Fanas, and The SoundStage! Network.
To contact us, please e-mail info@soundstagenetwork.com
