LATEST ADDITIONS

I woke up this morning with the sun in my face and Heather Duby's "<a href="http://blog.stereophile.com/stephenmejias/031908heatherduby/">Places Shape Lives</a>" churning through my mind. I heard the old moan of cello and the aching melody, the hypnotic precision of the just-tuned drums, the constant trembling of the strangled guitar, and I knew it would be a good day.

Wye Oak is a sort of American folk duo. Andy Stack plays drums and keys (at the same time), while Jenn Wasner sings and absolutely wails on the guitar. This is a video for their song, "Please Concrete," from their 2008 debut <i>If Children</i>.

Tell the truth, now: When you're traveling on vacation, and supposedly engaged only in the normal tourist activities of seeing the sights, visiting museums, etc., aren't you also on the lookout for interesting audio stores?

For 14 years, <A HREF="http://www.thecableco.com/">The Cable Company</A> has been running its annual Summer Against Hunger campaign to raise money for those in need. As was the case last year, The Cable Company says they "are again able to guaranty that 100% of purchases of sponsored products in August will benefit CARE!"

For most, being an audiophile is a hobby. But for some, it becomes much more—and might even support a family. If you could start your own audiophile company, what would it be?

Rather a mouthful, the name of this digital decoder is derived from that of the designer, Robert Wadia Moses. The "computer" part of the title relates to the custom digital filter function generated by a set of 32-bit microprocessors: for simplicity's sake, I shall abbreviate the name to "WD1000." A more expensive version, called the '2000, sells for $6995, and carries some additional features and details. The resampling rate is increased to 64x in the '2000, with the additional optical and digital input switching and the main power supplies each contained in separate additional enclosures.

A reader who asked to remain anonymous wrote to tell us the results of some tests he saw conducted on one of our top-rated loudspeaker systems. Frequency-response checks showed that the system had virtually no deep bass, a midbass peak, a midrange slump, and a high-end rise. Further checks had shown gross distortion at input levels of over about 6W, and a definitely limited (although adequate for Row-M listening) maximum output-level capability. Said reader then went on to ask how we could possibly consider such a speaker to be one of the best available.

Can a piece of studio gear find happiness on an audiophile's equipment stand? More important, can an audiophile derive satisfaction from its sound?

New York’s outdoor concert season is in full swing and I happened to catch a couple pretty wonderful shows, one free and just the opposite the other night.

Hey everybody! As we like to say around here in the office, it's "Happy Friday!" For alliterative purposes, let's call it "Fiery Furnaces Friday." <a href="http://www.thefieryfurnaces.com/site/">The Fiery Furnaces</a> have something up their sleeve, and I don't know what it's all about, but I'm betting that's it's good. I bet there are a lot of words involved. But, perhaps, no sound. A lot of alliteration, too. The Fiery Furnaces are good at that.