Troppo 💫

 

One of the most sought-after discs in my collection.

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The Thiele TWD-01 double idleer-wheel turntable in Wien

 

My pal Jaap Pees collaboration with Helmut Thiele.

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Sage 💫

 

Schooldays 💫

 

Red ❤️

 

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93 Current 93

 

A new David Tibet’s disc is always a noteworthy event…

I ordered my copy.

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Peter Hammill & a Gibson L5 💫

 

Any idea, folks?

 

That’s history!

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Riding the wave 🥳😉

 

Only one in the world!

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100% handmade, Finemet transformers, 1.700 mW per channel stereo amp with Alps RK-50 potentiometer and vintage PCL82. 

Diamond-polished volcanic obsidian cabinet (~ 300 kg), massive bronze knob from Agamemnon’s helmet, hard-wired and soldered by Albert Einstein’s nephew.

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Is it possible?

 

Is it what’s only important, nowadays?

World is celebrating highest price-tags and never, ever a word about the musical performances of these amazing, impressively built gears.

Is it a lack of descriptive and argumentative abilities or an intellectual and cultural drift, now more than ever focused on money and the power that this implies and intends?

Status symbols, adult-toys for distracted, annoyed Julio Iglesias’ fans billionaires?

Do these machines play music or are just a show-up of the technical bravery and skills of their makers?

The arduous sentences to posterity.

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Low level/High resolution 💫

 

It’s all here, much better than the obsolete, abused and overused “High Fidelity”…

My system truest raison d’etre is the following:

• Low-Level Reproduction: Unlike many horn-based systems designed for high volumes, Kato's system was optimized for reproducing the finest details at realistic, home-friendly low volumes, allowing subtle nuances such as the musicians' breathing or the touch of their fingers on the instrument to clearly be audible.

Thanking to Hideo Kato-san for the above illuminating definition: I realized, to my surprise - thanks to Quad ESL and  Gotorama 2.0 - that I don’t need high SPL to enjoy my music of choice, but I sure need a breathtaking resolution, silence among notes and awesome detailing, which I get a-plenty.

 It’s really so simple, but worth insisting: not deafening SPLs or belly shaking low frequencies, but low level resolution; if your system is able to resolve the tape-hiss, the hum of a vintage guitar amp, the ambient noises, the musicians breathing, etc. the music will fully blossom in all its beauty… and won’t be by chance!.

Everything else is BS and musical illiteracy, as only a natural neutrality allows any music to blossom and be nourishment for the soul and the mind. 

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HBD, Anthony Braxton 💫🥂🍀💫🥂

 

Happy 81st birthday to Anthony Braxton 

Photo: Cody O'Loughlin for The New York Times

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Tono visits Tomohiro Kawakita-san 💫

 

Tomohiro-san’s company, Amitechs Corporation in Osaka, represents Goto Unit outside Japan; I spent with him and Shinichi Tanaka-san, some wonderful hours at Kato-san’s place, in 2017.

 

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Something rare, indeed 🍀

 

… not the Garrard 301 or the (black) Ortofons’, but that modified “soap” butter-color Ortofon cartridge 

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Pegheads 💫

 

Robbie Basho’s 12 strings guitar 

My Harmony H1260 “Sovereign”

A marvelous unknown classical guitar 

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Kato Labs from Japan 💫

 

Hideo Kato-san personal mono system 

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The mythological “Mushroom Bell” drivers… a Jean Hiraga’s fave.

H.Kato Lab Inc. (加藤研究所, Katō Kenkyūsho) was a Japanese audio research company and laboratory founded by audio engineer and researcher Hideo Kato (加藤秀夫). Operating primarily from the 1950s to the 1980s in Setagaya, Tokyo, the company became legendary in the Japanese (and international niche) audiophile scene for its handcrafted production of extreme horn speaker systems, phono cartridges, and ultra-precise audio components. Kato was known for his radical approach to sound reproduction, championing the absolute superiority of monophonic sound and implementing cutting-edge technologies such as MFB (Motional Feedback) control on horn drivers. 

His products, particularly the "Mushroom Bell" and "Maxim Bell" tweeters, are now considered rare collector's items and "holy grails" of vintage Japanese audio.

2. Hideo Kato and Audio Philosophy

Hideo “Ken” Kato was a multifaceted figure of profound culture: an engineer, but also a scholar of politics, history, languages, and classical music. His approach to audio was guided by an obsessive pursuit of absolute fidelity, which led him to develop very specific and sometimes counter-current technical beliefs:

• Absolute Monophony: Kato rejected stereophony. He believed that stereophonic reproduction (with its phase and artificial spatial synthesis problems) compromised the coherence and naturalness of sound. 

His personal system, legendary among visitors to his laboratory, remained strictly monophonic throughout his life. He maintained that true "depth" and realism were achieved by perfectly reproducing the distance from the microphones, not by dispersing the sound across two channels.

• Artisanal Construction and Research: Kato personally built every component, from turntables to tonearms, from cartridges to speakers. He began modifying existing designs (such as the Westrex cartridges) and then created his own, dissatisfied with commercial compromises.

• Motional Feedback (MFB): He pioneered the use of MFB to control the spurious movements of speaker cones. He successfully applied this technology to giant woofers (up to 80 cm) to achieve tightly controlled bass and even attempted to apply it to horn-based midrange and treble drivers, albeit with enormous technical difficulties.

• Low-Level Reproduction: Unlike many horn-based systems designed for high volumes, Kato's system was optimized for reproducing the finest details at realistic, low volumes, allowing subtle nuances such as the musicians' breathing or the touch of their fingers on the instrument to clearly be audible.

3. Mushroom Bell Tweeters

The Mushroom Bell series tweeters are H. Kato Lab Inc.'s most iconic product. The name comes from the characteristic mushroom shape of the horn, designed for optimal acoustic dispersion and controlled resonance.

3.1 Technical Features and Design

The design philosophy behind the Mushroom Bells aimed for maximum lightness and fast response, to reproduce female voices (such as that of Maria Callas) and high-frequency instruments with absolute naturalness.

• Ultra-Thin Diaphragm: Kato's main innovation was the development of an incredibly thin diaphragm (vibration board), only 4 microns thick (thinner than a human eardrum). This extremely low mass ensured exceptional transient response..

• Low Power Handling: Due to the delicate nature of the 4-micron diaphragm, the Mushroom Bells were not designed to handle high power. Kato recommended driving them with very high-quality amplifiers rated at just 1 watt. Many inexperienced users burned the voice coils by applying too much power, but Kato always refused to use thicker wire or tighter tolerances, as this would compromise the smoothness and precision of the sound.

• Materials and Construction: The horns were made of solid metal (often brass or heavy alloys) and machined on a lathe with absolute precision. The magnetic assembly was oversized. The physical production of some components, according to some sources, may have been outsourced to high-precision external companies such as Murata Manufacturing (Kyoto) based on Kato's specifications.

Kato-san, like other seasoned audiophile and purists, argued that acoustic depth (the perception of the distance of instruments from the microphone) is a property of the recorded signal, not of stereo. 

A well-designed mono system reproduces this depth perfectly. Stereo, on the other hand, adds an artificial lateral localization that doesn't correspond to the way one listens to live music in a concert hall, where the entire room is a diffuse source and no clear left/right separation is perceived.

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The Ducks meet Kraftwerk 💫

 

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