Zappa 💫 (the movie)

 

Saw on YouTube and it’s a labor of love.

… and Ruth Underwood’s tears at the end of the movie made me emphasize a lot… same as with Ensemble Modern rehearsing for The Yellow Shark album… and the concert in Munchen… and in Prague… and… and… 

He was a genius, period… and a brave man, indeed.

❤️

Tom Verlaine’s Records collection is for sale 💫

 

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Disc of the month - Irmin Schmidt - Requiem (2026)

 

From the founder of CAN, an amazing record,.. classical music for 3rd millennium and a recording 2die4!

On vinyl and CD… 

💫

We’re fucked

 

P.J. Harvey’s Voyager 💫

 

PJ Harvey announces 'Voyager', her first new music following the release of  ‘I Inside the Old Year Dying'  in 2023. Listen, watch and pre-order the limited edition 7" vinyl https://pjharvey.lnk.to/voyagerFA. 

Recorded with a full orchestra at Miraval Studios in Provence, 'Voyager' takes its name from the NASA probes launched in 1977, still travelling through interstellar space nearly 50 years on.

Polly says, "The song had already started life as part of my work towards my new album, so when Professor Brian Cox invited me to write a piece for his new show, I sent him the voice memo of this song to see if it resonated. It immediately made him think of the Voyager craft and the sound of its signal being sent back to Earth. 

I have long been fascinated by the spacecraft and its journey, and asked myself what it might say to us if it could? This was an inspiring route to take to develop the song.

I'm very happy with the end result, and it's wonderful to hear the orchestral score bring such expansiveness to my music. I thoroughly enjoyed researching the history and journey of Voyager 1 & 2, and was glad to be able to quote the great Carl Sagan within the song, and his famous description of our fragile and beautiful 'pale blue dot'." 

Listen to Polly's voice note https://pjharvey.lnk.to/voyager.webFA

Clamps - Audio Technica AT-618 and the others 💫

 

 

This precisely manufactured, made in Japan clamp, sure not hideously priced like others, has a cool characteristic: its underside is flat, not recessed like most of other designs… this feature easily and brilliantly solved an issue on my Garrardzilla as I’m currently using an isostatic-graphite mat 10 mm thick, which leaves the spindle protruding only 6 mm… the nice Audio Technica’s clamp brilliantly works while others wobble a bit due to spindle dome-shaped tip.

 

Last but not least, it’s cool using an AT-618 clamp while simultaneously using a WE-618B MC SUT… but I’m just kidding.

😉

Then, the others:

Comparing different bottoms: all the below showed clamps are made like the red one!

AT-618

A self-made anodized aluminum 

A cheap, China-made aluminum 

A self-made ebony/bronze: don’t try to use on a Garrard 301 with its stock-bearing 😱

A self-made lignum-vitae wood/bronze: again, don’t try to use on a Garrard 301 with stock-bearing 🫣

A self-made leather pouch with lead shots

A Japanese isostatic-graphite 

Nipper 

🤣

10” records galore 💫

 

Some random pictures of my 10” discs collection I took while tidying up the records shelves… have many others, including a sought-after John Fahey’s double 78 RPM, a Leon Redbone’s “Champagne Charlie” promotional-only 78 RPM and some Robert Crumb’s Cheap Suits Serenaders 78 RPMs’… then a mother-load of classical mono 78 RPMs’  but this is a different story.

This is a limited edition reissue… I also have a mint original Fontana 10” I bought at Disk Union in Ochanomizu, Tokyo.

💫