A new Robbie Basho recording re-appeared...

Thanking Kyle Fosburgh and Grass Tops recording...

"Single from our compilation entitled 'Portrait Of Basho As A Young Dragoon', which documents some of Robbie's most exploratory early career live material.

Date and title written on tape : 5-13-67 (Santa Cruz, CA) "Ives Paints Modern America"

PLEASE NOTE : This recording was sourced from Robbie Basho's personal collection. Assembled throughout his career, our archive of live performances were documented by amateurs and were never intended for commercial release. The most sophisticated technology has been carefully applied to reveal the music and minimize the inherent shortcomings of tape almost 50 years old. Our mission is to let you enjoy and appreciate some of Robbie's greatest early performances.

It'll be released on the compilation mentioned above as part of a CD/coffee table book set, featuring a collection of early photographs of Robbie from 1967. This track alone, however, is far too long for a 7 inch single. Otherwise we'd consider that too. Max length for a 7 inch is about 6 mins.

Composed by Robbie Basho
Mastered by Joe Churchich
Sound Engineering by Radiance Recordings and Kyle Fosburgh
Cover design by Kyle Fosburgh

You made my day, Kyle.

Giorgio Foschi and his reel-to-reel recorders Man's Cave

Yesterday evening I brought my Studer B62 - needing some attention - to Giorgio Foschi, the italian Gran Mogol and maven of everything open-reel tape recorder.


I know Giorgio since a long time and every, EVERY tape machine passing under his careful, skilled  hands has a sort-of added value - i.e. the machines he overhauls are given a brand-new status, up to factory specs, and everything shines, again.


Everytime I enter his workshop and studio, I feel me blessed, as have the rare opportunity to touch and appreciate the details of a long-gone era of care and dedication.


Looking to a Stellavox TD9 or that super exotic, sought-after Philips EL3501 (used in Polygram and Decca Mastering facilities, where only THE VERY BEST counted)  makes me almost uninvolved at looking to the several Studer A820s!


The machines in the studio, including tons of Telefunken 15s' and smaller Studers' are nothing compared to the pleasure of chatting with Giorgio... himself is a Living Treasure, he worked knee-to-knee with George Quellet and m. Kudelski and Gurtner, his training was at Studer in Switzerland and his holy hands are at the service of corporates and private people with the passion.


Music-wise - as let's do not forget, these amazing machines are after music - he's going ahead with his mastertapes 1:1 projects...  Hemiolia and 4AP (aka Analog Four Phases) are the new home for accurately engineered and dubbed mastertapes!


I listened to Daniele Mencarelli's Originals tape and... folks, my jaws dropped at the superb, SUPERB recording quality and beauty of music.


You cannot own a Ferrari without good quality gasoline... owning a Studer C37 or a Telefunken M15A or a NagraT without such a tapes is... senseless!


Stay tuned with yours truly as on next September a new crop of freshly produced mastertapes will be available...




Thanking Giorgio for hosting, empathy, skills and... for being Giorgio Foschi.




     

The Golden Ear Award

© Thanking Petr Davydtchenko... the prize goes to Nattawoot Aumkruer.

Love it!

Summertime Musings?

... already a reality these days.

Inside Abbey Road Studios

An interactive opportunity to do not be missed...

The Ultimate Cassette

I already wrote about this one-of-a-kind Sony's premium quality cassette, but... cannot resist: it's such a sexy little thing that everyone owning a Nakamichi Dragon or 1000 or a Tandberg 3014 will love and want to have!

It would sure be a MUCH better world if everything would be this quality and care for details.

Cassette is NOT dead.

WJAAS - An audio report from Japan by Nattawoot Aumkruer

A quick but juicy and well conceived and planned Japanese adventure for Nattawoot Aumkruer, a good fellow and FB pal from Bangkok, Thailand...

Very, VERY nice pixies and thanks for paying kudos, mate.

Self-healing detoxing computer-less vacation

... well, almost computer-less... yet, soaking in sun and wind and sea... 

... and enjoying real life, these days.

Hot, hot, hot…

… yet in my studio, natural old building air conditioning is greatly mitigating the outside 35 degrees Celsius…

Wishing to share a for free lesson I had only a couple days ago: my Gotorama uses 2 x Hiraga's Le Classe A 30W amps and 2 x Class A 20W… the golden 1,5 Farads 30Ws' on mid-lows and mids and the black 600,000 mF 20Ws' on lows and highs…

Also if I own another 30W power amp, I sort of privileged the aesthetics to sound integralism, as the two pairs of side-by-side matching amps looked prettier to my eyes…

The oldest 20W - the first one I bought 20+ years ago and still in my possession -  recently began buzzing, so in need of my pal and Hiragas' wizard Francesco's gifted hands and care.

It was the 20W I used with Elodis TGE bass-horn… I took from a shelf the 30W back-up golden-faced amp and swapped the ill 20W for its 30W big bro amp.

So, summing now three 30W Le Classe A on lows, mid-lows and mids and only a 20W on Goto SG160s' tweeters…

Most important - now - was having music and not a bottom-less system… more than aesthetic, I had music.

… and what music!

I realized almost immediately that the overall balance was more right and sound quicker… in a word: better, much better... and I only changed the power amp devoted to frequencies between 30 and 220 hz…

How is this possible?

Naturalness of the whole four-ways behemoth clicked playing with very same texture, like the - must now say - lesser 20W Hiraga's was slowing down bass response and overall presentation, and NOT only in its frequencies range BUT of the whole speaker system.

Oh my God… never ending being surprised in this passion… yes, I'm deeply ignorant, but my honesty is immaculate and senses pristine, so… well, happy of the find, indeed!

Only regret: I could have tried this before, as many years ago, when playing with my (now gone) Pioneer D23 crossover and badly mixing triodes, pentodes and solid state amps, different sensitivities and sound characters… yes: the whole no, no, no plethora of wrong experiences, all by trial and error old school!


Nonetheless, I already was aware of low-end paramount weight on great overall sound... I only, sort-of, forgot it.
 

I still well remember the surprise and HUGE improvement I heard when I throwed away the old Quad 405 I used with my previous bass enclosures, using Altec 416A or Altec 813 15 inchers… when I brought home the first of many Hiraga Class A amps… namely the above mentioned one guilty of making me to experience the above described swap and all.

Bass frequencies are... ahem: were less important than, say, mids or mid-lows, so a silly me was thinking when deciding to use 20W on lows and highs and the way-better 30W on more sensitive mids... so I was (wrongly) thinking.

Back to memory lane: the (someway) slow bass was gone… the blanket-in-front-of-speakers sensation was gone… to same extent, what I recently experienced.

Exactly!

The wheel of knowledge is spinning, endlessly, folks… the prize of trial&error is the beauty I'm sipping right now…

… and who cares if I'm such a slow-minded assohole, an audio S.O.B. who must crash - literally - his nose into things… yet, randomly, as best things happens... as life is.

So I like things going and so I live.


P.S. - I'm now chasing for the fourth Hiraga Le Classè A 30W golden-faced, and one pair (i.e. two) Hiraga Class A 20W will be for sale, soon.


Anyone interested on both deals?