postjack

dude!!! ryan adams is king. You pretty much need to hear Heartbreaker. The MFSL SACD Hybrid is incredible. Hell, you don't even need to hear the whole album, just listen to "Come Pick Me Up" and try not to cry like a baby because its such a perfect song. His albums can be radically different one from the other, and he is insanely prolific. I think it was in 2005 he released three albums. He also had some kind of rap project he did that you can download on his website. I've never been brave enough to listen, but people say it is funny. There is talk that before he ends his relationship with Lost Highway (of course he is a pain in the ass for record companies) he is going to release a box set of all his unreleased stuff. I can't wait. Oddly enough, Stephen King is a huge fan, and he wrote this brief review of the new album, Easy Tiger, which is on amazon: "I think there are really only two kinds of pop music CDs these days. There are the ones you listen to only once or twice, maybe downloading the single good song to your iPod or computer; then there are others that grow stronger, sweeter, and more necessary each time you play them. Gold was that way; Cold Roses was that way; so was Jacksonville City Nights. I won't say Adams is the best North American singer-songwriter since Neil Young...but I won't say he isn't, either. What I know is there has never been a Ryan Adams record quite as strong and together as Easy Tiger; it's got enough blue-eyed, blue-steel soul (with the faintest country tinge) to make me think of both Marvin Gaye and the Righteous Brothers. Probably ridiculous, but true. And the songs themselves are beautiful--the lyrics tightly focused and brief, the feeling one of melancholy calm that will probably be a revelation to fans that remember the old, sometimes angry Ryan Adams. Now there's this, maybe the best Ryan Adams CD ever. And I know you want to listen to it right away. But slow down. Take your time. This album asks for that, and it will reward your full attention. In other words--easy, Tiger." Having dumped all this praise on Adams, not even I like all of his output. I still haven't really warmed up to Rock N' Roll, for example. But anyway, check out Heartbreaker or Easy Tiger, the first album or the most recent. They are probably my two favorites.

My next excuse is I need a balanced source.

http://store.acousticsounds.com/browse_detail.cfm?Title_ID=39925

Excellent point. It would now be just a purchase.

And I'm thinking about making an impulse purchase. I've been wanting to bring my computer/foobar/flac back into the audio family for a while now, and reading iron dreamer's and others' comments makes me think the signature of the aqvox might be too my liking (overall laid back, emphasis on the midrange, decent enough soundstage). Plus it has lots of options to tweak, which is fun, what with the oversampling, filters, and what have you. And I figure I could offload it without losing my shirt if I didn't like it. So should I do it? Is this a decent price? http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?dgtlconv&1189793122

and I thought I had gas.

True, the new headamp sounds interesting. However, small size and transportability are not important to me, and these are some of the selling points of the product. But hey, it could still sound as good or better then an Apogee or Desktop, for all I know.

Has anyone ever done a shoot out between the apogee mini-dac and the headroom desktop balanced? BTW, still waiting for KenW to tell us what he thinks of his desktop. I read some of his impressions over at h***-f*, but I'm feeling neglected as a head-caser.

nope. but i did pledge a fraternity, and when we had to make dinner for the brothers, one of my pledge brothers would pluck his pubic hair and wrap it around the business end of a fork. we called it the "magic fork".

how do you play that game?

more work blues: today i am training a new associate on a system I've only been using for four days. since they are short on trainers. good thing i have such a sunny disposition.

You gunna build it for me? I'm really quite pleased having both the Melos and the Dynahi. I don't know if I would be happy with just one. Strangely, the W5000 favors the Melos, while the W11JPN sings out of the Dynahi. as for balanced amps, personally I don't know if I have a can I like enough to go balanced with. Its almost like once you've invested in a balanced amp, you need to be a one can guy, i.e. this is my favorite can, so it is the one I'm going balanced with! As you can see, I own many cans, still trying to find my favorite sound. Anyone ever balanced an hp-2?

flat sterling silver. it would develop a lovely patina. sterling is my favorite precious metal!

whoops, evening.

Of course it is an arbitrary and ultimately an unimportant question, but it is something I was thinking about today. When do you consider an amp "high end"? I seem to have a pretty firm grasp on what makes a source or a pair of cans high end, but the amplification thing always eludes me. I know when I see the insane Singlepowers like the SDS or Maestro, or a custom job like tkam's, I think that is high end. But what else is out there, really? And then this makes me think, does the law of diminishing returns kick in faster with an amp then a source? Past the $2000 mark, where is there really to go in ampland?

I was delighted to hear a bit on npr on the way home from work this morning: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12037597 The reviewer does a great job of putting down the album while still praising its existence.

http://store.acousticsounds.com/browse_detail.cfm?title_ID=39325 Saint-Saens: Concerto No. 2/Arthur Rubinstein CRCA 08279 SA Berlioz: Harold in Italy/Charles Munch CRCA 08280 SA Mahler: The Song of the Earth/Fritz Reiner CRCA 08281 SA Strauss: Symphonia Domestica/Reiner/Chicago Symphony Orchestra CRCA 08282 SA Schumann: Piano Concerto in A Minor/Van Cliburn CRCA 08283 SA

SACDs: Ryan Adams - Rock N Roll Ryan Adams - Gold Oasis - WTSMG Peter Gabriel - Shaking The Tree Who - Tommy All from markl on ebay! He has a bunch of great hi rez discs for sale. And now I'm only 9 discs away from owning all of the Gabriel sacds. http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZcdnumbertwoQQhtZ-1

i wonder how much of that $10K went into the cosmetics on that unbelievably badass demonstrator transport. wow! totally worth it though.

What the fuck is this? Where the fuck can I get this?

I just got my Oracle cable last week. Been using it with my 650, its great. I got the furutech plug. it makes all my other girlie plugs afraid.

i work for a CORPORATION. recently this corporation MERGED with another CORPORATION. i h8 merger

i've never been a big taco bell guy, but my friend in high school was. at the time he worked for coke, (the company, he wasn't a crack whore), and would always bitch that all they had was pepsi products at taco bell.

only at taco bell.

HAHA JBLoud called it soda. don't you crazy yankees know its called coke?