Stephen Mejias

Try this:

My interest in New York City salsa and Cuban son was fueled in part by Descarga.comhttp://www.descarga.com/cgi-bin/db/catalog?adYB2HaU;;654">Descarga.com<…;, an impressive resource for all things Afro-Latin. The Spanish word "descarga" means to unload, but, in musical terms, is Cuban slang for a hot and riotous jam session. You'd often hear about guys getting together in the streets or on the beach for a wild, time-stopping descarga. Providing in-depth interviews with musicians and producers, well-informed think pieces, hard-hitting reviews, and tons and tons of great music, Descarga.com is a great destination for music lovers.

Recent CD purchases that I need to buy all over again on vinyl, in alphabetical order (obviously):

On Saturday, I accompanied my 14-year old sister and her friend to the Bamboozle">http://www.thebamboozle.com/home.php">Bamboozle Festival, held at the Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Saturday was cold, windy, wet, and gray&#151not the best circumstances for an all-day outdoor festival. On top of that, I had a shocking hangover&#151a gift from the previous night spent with my 26-year old sister and her husband. I wasn't in the mood.

The 2008 Vacuum State of the Art Conference & Show will take place on May 24-26 at the Hilton in lovely Vancouver, Washington. VSAC was started in 1997 by Dan and Eileen Schmalle of the Bottlehead Corporation, designers of some">http://www.bottlehead.com/et/et.html">some sexy vacuum tube kit amps and preamps. While the Schmalles are no longer involved in managing the conference, they will be on hand as exhibitors, along with many others offering some similarly sexy, tubey goodness (like Experience">http://www.experiencemusic.net/">Experience Music's The Chase amplifier in the pic above).

Perhaps the greatest praise anyone can let loose upon any silly piece of audio gear is that it inspires the discovery of new music. Right? Alright then. The Rega P3, in all its ashen splendor, does this for me. So much so that I'm going broke. I feel as though I'm single-handedly (with one hand behind my weary back, that is) revitalizing the record industry. I've spent so much money on new (used) records that I could've purchased my own P3 by now. In fact, I've decided that that's exactly what I'm going to do. I'm going to buy my own P3. I'm in the office now, wishing I was home with the P3. I'm proofreading Michael Fremer's review of the P3-24, which will appear in our July issue, and I'm thinking, I'm going to buy this thing.