LATEST ADDITIONS

Now that <I>Stereophile</I>'s reporting on the 1985 Summer Consumer Electronics Show has ended (I hope!), I would like to express strong dissent with its style and content. In fact, I believe that most of it should never have appeared in print.

The Consumer Electronics Show begins this week in Las Vegas, and hundreds of new audio products have already been announced. Is there anything you're hoping to see from manufacturers?

I don’t think much about resolutions. One way or another, people do what they <i>want</i> to do, and all too often our desire conflicts with our resolve. But yesterday morning, as I was walking around downtown, waiting for everyone else to wake up, I stopped at Van Vorst Park to eat a banana and watch a father build a snowman for his son.

A freelance reviewer's workload is erratic. On the odd occasion one might have a few moments' respite, while at other times the coincidence of multiple deadlines for copy results in several weeks of panic. As I write this missive I have just completed one such overload period covering so much equipment that I thought that it would be worthwhile to look back and take stock at the audio in the past decade (footnote 1).

When it comes to video, most audiophiles are insufferable snobs. These normally reasonable people, who are among the first to admit that great sound in a motion picture theater makes a great film much more enjoyable, nonetheless. scoff at the very idea of augmenting their own sound with images, or of trying to create the kind of audio-visual experience in their home that they routinely enjoy at the cinema. Doing that involves video, which they equate with TV, which they equate with LCD (footnote 1) dross. This is unfortunate, because visuals can enhance good sound, and good sound can do wonders for non-TV video programs like Hollywood motion pictures.

With Analogue Productions’ new 45 rpm vinyl pressing of Oliver Nelson’s <I>The Blue and the Abstract Truth</I>, we finally have a reissue of this great album that’s worth buying.

For Christmas, I received the new vinyl reissue of Nirvana’s seminal 1991 album, <i>Nevermind</i>. This beautiful thing, mastered by acclaimed engineer, <a href="http://www.stereophile.com/news/102207bernie/index.html">Bernie Grundman</a>, and pressed at <a href="http://www.stereophile.com/features/408rti/index.html">RTI</a&gt; on extremely quiet 180gm vinyl, is brought to us by <a href="http://www.originalrecordingsgroup.com/index.htm">Original Recordings Group</a>. Thank god for them.