Author Archives: Alan Taffel

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Lord Huron’s Long Lost

Posted on by Alan Taffel

Due to a glitch in my car’s audio system software, the first time I cued up Radiohead’s recent Kid A Mnesia (review forthcoming), the center-console screen incorrectly displayed the cover for Lord Huron’s latest, Long Lost. The mix-up turned out to be prescient: there’s a lot of Radiohead in Lord Huron, though much of it is below the surface. 

The cover image depicts an upright man holding a guitar. His body is intact, but his head has dissolved into a haze. The implication is that the album will contain some spacey aspects, but that the music will also be grounded in the familiar. Both of those suggestions turn out to be true.  

Lord Huron is an indie-rock foursome led by singer/guitarist Ben Schneider. The group is known for its catchy melodies and for mixing many genres into a unique stew. Long Lost is no exception. You’ll hear a confluence of rock, pop, country, folk, and surfer influences, yet the songs are carried primarily by Schneider’s rhythm guitar and accentuated by the twangy lead guitar work of Tom Renaud. Whatever goes into it, the sound Lord Huron achieves is immediately appealing—a paradox of nostalgia and cutting edge. 

Once you’ve accepted the invitation to the party, you’ll be rewarded with a generous batch of well-crafted, impeccably-played, hook-laden songs. After playing them a few times, I dare you to kick them out of your head. The lyrics, too, are both approachable and rewarding. 

Schneider’s focus on this, the group’s fourth full-length release, is relationships—with others, with places, with oneself—that only look good in the rearview mirror, and maybe weren’t so great even back then. On Twenty Long Years, for instance, Schneider captures this viewpoint concisely: “I made a promise when I left for the coast/Twenty long years ago/I made a life out of chasin’ a ghost/Twenty years takes its toll.” 

So far my description of Long Lost could apply to any number of solid, satisfying recent alt-rock releases. But that’s because I’ve only covered the album’s “grounded” elements. What about the spaciness? Well, that’s where the Radiohead analogy comes in. 

Like Radiohead’s music from the OK Computer/Kid A/Amnesiac era, Long Lost has a larger purpose and is willing to deploy an arsenal of effects to achieve it. Radiohead used snippets of noise, electronic manipulation, synths, and dissonance to transport listeners to a dystopian future. Lord Huron’s goal is also temporal disassociation, though in the opposite direction: to a past that’s only superficially idyllic.  

Accordingly, the band uses variations on Radiohead’s trippy techniques. On Long Lost we get incongruities such as snippets of voices reminiscent of a carnival barker, lots of heavy reverb, and “bent” strings reminiscent of “I Am the Walrus.” Not to mention the 14-minute closing track, “Time’s Blur,” which consists of a chord progression slowed down to unrecognizability. Now that’s spacey. It’s also a track that could have come straight off Radiohead’s Kid A. (Fun fact: if you go to YouTube and search “Radiohead Pyramid Song 800% Slower” you’ll hear the inspiration—and a dead ringer—for the Lord Huron track.)

Together, these manipulations of reality are remarkably successful at conjuring a bygone past that long ago started to rot. The entire effect is similar to watching the late, great director Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show, which dwelt on similar themes. That film’s soundtrack featured 1950s-era country music, yet despite being psychedelically-tinged and decidedly not a country album, many tracks from Long Lost would fit in seamlessly. 

That’s not to say that Long Lost is a downer of an album, for it certainly isn’t. The double-edged words are carried along on uplifting melodies and tap-along rhythms. The playing is passionate, and the gestalt is never dark.     

I wish I could say otherwise, but the sound is mediocre. Disappointingly, in this day and age, the digital downloads and streaming options are all no better than CD resolution. Upper-octave extension suffers, leaving the album sounding a tad muted. Dynamics, as well, are subdued; this music could use a lot more “pop.” I haven’t heard the vinyl, but it’s probably worth exploring. 

But don’t let sonics put you off. Try this music. Its blend of the unexpected and the comfortingly familiar makes Long Lost an album that holds up under heavy rotation. 

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World News

Building a Compact Reference System | Part 2: Implementation

Posted on by Alan Taffel

Part 1 of this article described the demographic changes driving audiophiles of a certain age to seek smaller, more manageable, and more urban living quarters. These downsized dwellings impose a surprising number and variety of constraints on an audio system—a fact I learned from my own experience when moving from a single-family home in the suburbs to a city townhouse. Building a reference-class audio system in my new environment meant hewing to a set of requirements that, in many ways, ran afoul of today’s reference gear. This gap is what makes it challenging to build a compact reference system. But just how hard is it, and what options are available to down-sizers? That’s the subject of this installment. 

Requirements Refresher

First, let’s briefly revisit the requirements that an audio system must meet in order to fit and function comfortably in a home whose list of luxuries, while potentially long, does not include a dedicated listening room:

•Modestly-sized components. Most reference gear is unapologetically—even proudly—gargantuan. But in this new context, where systems will be located in shared-use spaces like family and rec rooms, there’s no place, physically or aesthetically, for such extravagance.    

•Multi-functionality. Modestly sized components only get us half the way there; due to space constraints, we must also limit the number of components that comprise the system. Separates, normally the coin of the reference realm, are too space inefficient. The more functions a given component can perform well, the more suitable it is for use in a compact reference system. 

•File-based sources. Physical music libraries are space hogs. There’s no better way to save space on source material than to replace a wall of CDs and SACDs with their streamed or NAS-based equivalents, which take up virtually no room at all.   

•Near-wall speaker placement. No more can speakers be a third of the way into the room. In a downsized home, the multi-purpose nature and typically smaller dimensions of the listening space will relegate speakers to a position near the wall behind them. They need to sound good there.  

•Performance at low volume levels. Higher-density urban homes typically have shared walls. Since adjacent neighbors don’t take kindly to bleed-through, playing-volume will have to go down. Yet performance shouldn’t suffer at these lower levels.        

•Décor-friendly aesthetics. Because our new listening space will be shared with other people and purposes, the system needs to blend in with the room’s furnishings and be pleasing to the non-audiophile eye. Further, components are more likely to find themselves in an attractive media console than on a row of equipment racks.  

•Intuitive ergonomics. Due to its central location in the home, a compact reference system will beg to be used by all members of the household. Therefore, rather than a bank of intimidating controls, the system should offer an intuitive user interface, preferably on a handheld touchscreen device.

If you’re thinking about building a compact reference system, this list of requirements could be initially discouraging. After all, few audiophiles would describe today’s reference gear as modestly proportioned, multifunctional, décor-friendly, and intuitive to use, with speakers designed to work best against a wall. Yet that doesn’t mean it’s impossible to build a compact reference system; you just have to shift your notion of what a reference system looks like.  

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World News

Paul McCartney: McCartney III

Posted on by Alan Taffel

There are Paul McCartney albums, and then there are self-titled Paul McCartney albums. The latter are his DIY projects. On these releases, Paul writes the music, sings the songs, plays every instrument, and handles production chores. Until now, there were only two: 1970’s McCartney, which was Paul’s first solo release, and 1980’s McCartney II. Now, 40 years later, they are joined by McCartney III.  

Recently, it’s become fashionable for critics to look back on the first two McCartney releases, which originally received mixed reviews, with a forgiving eye. The albums, these critics say, weren’t sloppy; they were a refreshing break from the perfectionism of the Beatles. They weren’t self-indulgent; they were boldly personal. Hogwash. McCartney and McCartney II were half-finished, poorly performed, lazily produced, self-important affairs. Time hasn’t changed that.  

Indeed, listening to the first McCartney today is every bit as unsatisfying as it was 50 years ago. This isn’t an album of songs, it’s a collection of musical doodles. Tracks start promisingly, then simply trail off. Or they’re instrumentals that don’t go anywhere. Or there are just a few lyrics, repeated over and over. Or there are plenty of lyrics, but they’re nonsense. The playing is merely adequate, save for the drumming, which is embarrassingly amateurish. The exception to all these failings, of course, is “Maybe I’m Amazed,” a song that hit it so far out of the park it single-handedly rescued the album and catapulted Paul’s solo career.

Ten years later came McCartney II. After the success but ultimate dissolution of his band Wings, Sir Paul was feeling experimental. So instead of doodles, we get dabbles in genres ranging from blues to New Wave to big band jazz. Yet, except for “Blue Sway,” which benefits mightily from Richard Niles’ orchestration, these forays feel unconvincing. More successful are the opening pop hit, “Coming Up,” and the catchy second track, “Temporary Secretary,” which features a synth backdrop straight out of Kraftwerk. After that, the album goes downhill precipitously. 

Understandably, then, I greeted McCartney III with trepidation. My worst fears seemed realized with the very first track, “Long Tailed Winter Bird.” The instrumental is dominated by a repeated acoustic guitar riff that Sir Paul seems to find absolutely fascinating. It’s mildly appealing the first couple of times, significantly less so by the 25th.

But the second track caught my attention in a far more positive way. By the sixth track, the album had won me over completely—and it never let go. Unlike its predecessors, McCartney III is a batch of real songs—fully realized, proficiently played, and confidently produced. Furthermore, they’re uniformly pleasing songs, encompassing a wide variety of styles, moods, and subjects. In that respect, the album carries echoes of the Beatles’ White Album.

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World News

An Ode to Audio Shows

Posted on by Alan Taffel

In these pandemic-riddled days, most of us long for the same sorts of things: the comfort of hugs, the camaraderie of a welcoming bar, the communal experience of going to movies in an actual theater. But recently I found myself yearning for something less general. I realized that I desperately missed audio shows. 

At first, I assumed this feeling was merely a wave of nostalgia, one that would fade like a winter flush on my cheeks. But this age of isolation has now hit the one-year mark, and my trade-show pangs haven’t abated in the least. Indeed, they grow more acute with each passing month. 

This longing for audio shows took me by complete surprise. After all, for the press those shows are a lot of work. They consist of non-stop days moving between rooms that all begin to look the same—mostly because they are pretty much all the same. Yet, each requires intense observational concentration and copious note-taking. Evenings, thankfully, are more social. But the omnipresence of industry reps requires that a reviewer must still be “on.” Fatigue, both physical and mental, quickly sets in. 

So, why on earth do I hunger for these shows? After mulling it over, I hit on several reasons. For one thing, there’s the travel. Obviously, you first have to get to the show, and that often means a journey. Even in normal times, I love journeys. Whether the destination is appealing or not, travel unfailingly provides a change of scene. Amid these days of unrelenting house-boundedness, what could be more tempting than that? 

 Another element of shows that I dearly miss, and which occurs approximately never when you’re in isolation, is the excitement of discovery. For an audiophile, the findings made at trade shows—an incredible value, a sonic triumph, a new technology that foreshadows improvements, or anything that makes high-end sound accessible to more people—are every bit as exciting as finding a good neighborhood restaurant that rocks or finding a new piece of music you adore.

Speaking of which, I now realize that trade shows have consistently been one of my best sources of exposure to new music. You see, not only do audiophiles love to listen to music; they also love to share music, none more so than the folks who make and sell hi-fi gear. Over the years, I’ve fallen for a lot of the music exhibitors have shared with me. Even in the Age of Covid, there are still many, worthy new music releases, but they lack the personal, often-eccentric element of a show recommendation. 

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World News

Building a Compact Reference System | Part 1: Requirements

Posted on by Alan Taffel

Robert Harley is one lucky fellow. He got to build a custom, dedicated, no-holds-barred listening room in his new house. As Robert chronicled in these pages, he selected every element of the room—from proportions to materials to electrical power—expressly to optimize audio performance. What a luxury! Robert could let his sound system dictate his listening room’s parameters. Most of us live with the exact opposite situation: Our listening rooms dictate many of the audio system’s parameters.  

Fortunately for Baby Boomer audiophiles like myself, and most TAS readers, listening rooms haven’t posed many constraints lately. That’s because as a demographic group, we’ve done pretty well for ourselves, allowing us to live in homes with listening rooms that, while not custom-built, are at least audio friendly. As our families and material appetites expanded, most of us bought single-family suburban houses with plenty of room for kids, cars—and a high-end audio system.  

That roomy lifestyle has had a direct impact on high-end manufacturers’ offerings. Boomers are, after all, their core market. So manufacturers know where and how we live, and they’ve been designing products accordingly. Bulky separates? No problem! There’ll be dedicated equipment racks on which they can perch. Monoblocks with footprints that would embarrass Sasquatch? Perfectly fine! There’s plenty of floor space. Speakers optimized for placement well into the room? No issue whatsoever! The listening room can easily accommodate them. Besides, what else would you put there?     

The thing is, all of these previously safe assumptions made by manufacturers about Boomer listening spaces are in the process of being rendered moot. Why? Because the traditional Boomer lifestyle is undergoing a dramatic, once-in-a-generation transformation. It’s not just me saying this; this is a verified sociological phenomenon. That transition is creating a disconnect between what the industry has historically offered and what Boomers now need.      

Shifting Demographics

So what’s changing, exactly? In short, we Boomers are downsizing. Our kids went off to college, leaving us with empty nests. We no longer need that big suburban house, with its surfeit of now-vacant bedrooms. Two or three will do just fine. And at this stage in our lives, we’d rather be near cultural and recreational attractions than now-superfluous grade schools. Finally, instead of having to drive to do practically anything, many of us would prefer to walk, which is healthier and easier on the environment. 

Put these criteria together, add the perquisites to which we’ve become accustomed—hey, we’re downsizing, not downgrading—and they add up to luxury apartments, amenity-rich condos, and upscale townhouses located in walkable, culture-rich, urban settings. That, sociologists confirm, is precisely where Boomers are moving.    

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World News

Jeff Tweedy’s Love is the King

Posted on by Alan Taffel

Being stranded courtesy of the Covid-19 pandemic has a way of stripping life down to its essentials. Your social circle shrinks; your creative, cultural, and hedonistic outlets are sharply curtailed. What’s left is time to mull that which is missing—and to appreciate what remains. 

Wouldn’t that be a great subject for an album? Jeff Tweedy thought so. Best known as the frontman and creative force behind the indie band Wilco, Tweedy spent the better part of 2020 writing a set of thoughtful, elemental songs. He then culled them into an album that mimics today’s stripped-down yet somehow self-sufficient feel. The result, Love is the King, is both the perfect descriptor of inner life—the life of the heart and mind—during this pandemic, and a grace-infused antidote to our trials.

The songs that make up this remarkable collection are models of craft and wit. Though they encompass the same signature styles, chords, and progressions Tweedy’s been mining for years, each takes at least one unexpected turn that makes it unique. Further, every note, whether melodic, foundational, or a flourish, makes a critical contribution to the whole—or it wouldn’t be there. This lack of the expendable and gratuitous is both refreshing and, in these times, resonant.

 The lyrics, too, are beautifully forged. Their subject is what Tweedy sees as the central lesson of the pandemic: what you miss the most is love and connection; yet, paradoxically, those very elements are what get you through. Every track, no matter how far-flung its outward subject, comes back to this theme. Again, Tweedy offers reassuring constancy, but also keeps things fresh by conveying his theme through an ever-changing stream of metaphors.

I fear I’ve depicted an album that’s somber and humorless. Let me assure you that Love is the King is neither of these things. Some songs are indeed thoughtful, but they’re also relatable and infused with a stark honesty that’ll grab you by the throat. “Even I Cajn See” begins, “If I may have your attention please/To tell you about my wife/And what she means to me.” Then, in an ode teeming with admiration, respect, and a touch of envy, he proceeds to do just that. On the other hand, tracks like “Natural Disaster” are upbeat and playful: “I’ve never been blown by the winds of a hurricane/Never been in a flood/I’ve never been buried up to my neck in mud/But I’ve fallen in love/And that’s enough/Of a natural/Disaster for me.” 

Most of these songs are acoustic, mid-tempo folk-rockers, though Tweedy spices things up with country inflections and tasty guitar solos. Normally, Wilco members would provide these embellishments, but that obviously wasn’t possible here. So Tweedy did what so many pandemic-isolated artists have done: he played most of the instruments himself. Fortunately, he’s plenty proficient not only on his mainstay acoustic guitar, but also on bass, pedal steel, and electric lead. Indeed, among the album’s highlights are the cocky solo in “Natural Disaster,” and the poignant, acoustic duet in “Even I Can See.” 

The only elements Tweedy himself couldn’t supply were drums and harmonies. Unable to turn to his band, he enlisted some musically-adept family members. Conveniently, among his isolation “pod” are Tweedy’s sons Spencer and Sammy, who contribute drums and harmonies, respectively. The outcome is as organic as you’d expect a family-based band to be.  

Appropriately, given the subject matter and circumstances, the production is unprepossessing in the extreme. There is nothing artificial on the album. The benefit is not only a supremely relaxed listening experience, but sonics the likes of which we’ve never heard from a pandemic-era release. Most of those were recorded amateurishly, at home, and at a paltry 44.1k sampling rate. 

In contrast, Tweedy and company could walk over to The Loft, the private, professional recording studio that he and Wilco built twenty years ago. In addition to keeping the signal path clean, Tweedy chose a native resolution of 24/96. If you listen to it that way, you’ll hear stunningly pure sound. Add that to one of Tweedy’s best batches of songs, and you have the perfect soundtrack for these reflective times. Highly Recommended. 

Coming Soon: Fans of George Harrison’s All Things Must Pass are about to finally get a version that gives the masterful album its sonic due. For its 50th anniversary, the recording is being reworked from scratch under the guidance of George’s son Dhani. How good will it be? To find out, go to Qobuz and compare the teaser title track, “All Things Must Pass (2020 mix),” to any other version and you’ll be as giddy as I am about what’s coming. 

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World News

Perfecting American Utopia

Posted on by Alan Taffel

The story of the fruition of David Byrne’s  American Utopia begins, ironically, with what you’d expect to be the endpoint: the album’s release in 2018. Debuting at number 3 on the Billboard 200, American Utopia owed its success to Byrne’s return, after many years of soundtrack work and musically-experimental collaborations, to the crisp song structures and askew sensibilities that characterized his years with Talking Heads. Further, Utopia boasted some truly standout tracks. Exhibit A: “Every Day is a Miracle,” which, with its irresistible singalong chorus, ranked alongside Byrne’s best. 

Lyrically, American Utopia continued Byrne’s fascination for seemingly-insignificant slices of American life. However, this time out, he traded cynicism for a notably sunnier outlook. “We’re only tourists in this life,” he sang in “Everyone’s Coming to My House.” “Only tourists but the view is nice.”    

All that said, several factors kept American Utopia from reaching its full potential. The credits listed no fewer than 27 musical contributors, an assemblage that at times proved unwieldy and plodding. Then there was Byrne’s singing, which was uncharacteristically but consistently out of tune. An equal-opportunity intonation violator, Byrne was sharp as often as he was flat. That didn’t exactly ruin the music, but it sure was annoying. And while half the album featured undeniably worthy songs, the other half was subpar. 

As it turned out, though, Byrne was just getting started. In late 2018, he took the Utopia material on a month-long international road trip. For that enterprise, Byrne slimmed the band down to 12 musicians. That change, in turn, called for more streamlined arrangements. Byrne obliged, and in doing so found the emotional heart of each song. Meanwhile, the set list culled out the weaker Utopia material and supplemented it with astutely-curated selections from Byrne’s rich Talking Heads and solo-career catalogs. As you might imagine, the tour was a smash.

Next came a year’s hiatus, during which Byrne further tweaked the set list, arrangements, and staging. Then, in his boldest move yet, he took the revamped show to Broadway. Unfortunately, Covid-19 forced an end to the sold-out run. But there was a consolation prize. Later in 2020, we learned that Spike Lee had directed—and HBO had produced—a film version of the Broadway show. In conjunction with the movie’s release, along came American Utopia on Broadway (Original Cast Recording). And that’s how we can finally hear this music in full flower.  

The album is many things: a retrospective of Byrne’s prolific career; a chronicle of a unique performance; a live recording that gets the sound just right; and a showcase for the stupendous 12-piece band that Byrne assembled with musicians from all over the world. All of them, particularly the six drummers Byrne deploys to faithfully create his trademark polyrhythms, are simply non pareil. They can sing, too, as you’ll well appreciate on the a cappella renditions of “One Fine Day” and the opening to “Road to Nowhere,” both of which are spellbinding.

One obvious question about the Broadway version of American Utopia is whether it’s redundant of Talking Heads’ celebrated Stop Making Sense soundtrack. Both are live recordings, both have accompanying films made by noteworthy directors (Jonathan Demme, in the case of Stop Making Sense), and there is even some overlapping material. However, the two albums are very different. The premise of Stop Making Sense was that a band could be mutated—shrunken or expanded—in order to perfectly fit any song. In contrast, the American Utopia show illustrates how a broad range of material can be shaped to take advantage of one stellar ensemble. Also, David Byrne has written a lot of great material since Stop Making Sense was made, and Utopia covers the highlights.     

I’ve already alluded to the album’s excellent sound. While the studio version’s sonics are quite respectable, they can’t touch the Broadway recording. It’s one of the fullest and most present-sounding live recordings I’ve heard in some time. I especially recommend the LP, with its quiet vinyl and natural tonality. But if you’re going digital, be sure to bypass the CD and opt for the excellent 24/96 downloads and streams. They offer impeccable openness and unforced detail. In any format, the original cast recording of American Utopia is a treat you don’t want to miss. Highly recommended. 

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World News

The Three Sides of Sufjan Stevens

Posted on by Alan Taffel

There are at least three Sufjans. There’s Folk Sufjan, epitomized by early albums like Seven Swans and, more recently, 2015’s haunting Carrie and Lowell. Folk Sufjan is characterized by all-acoustic instrumentation, personal lyrics, and straightforward, melody-focused arrangements. 

Then there’s Classical Sufjan. In this guise, Sufjan Stevens is a master of interlacing classical techniques (theme and variation, counterpoint, polyphony) with rock elements to create complex, remarkably satisfying music that’s built to go the long haul. Classical Sufjan employs instruments ranging from solo piano, as in 2019’s The Decalogue, to staples of both acoustic and electric rock melded with orchestra, brass, and chorus. The ultimate Classical Sufjan release is his masterpiece from 2005, Illinois.  

That leaves us with Techno Sufjan, who has a penchant for highly-electronic musical settings and pervasive vocal processing. Generally speaking, I’m not a huge fan of Techno Sufjan. I find his synthetic arrangements at odds with the intimacy and honesty of Stevens’ vocals. Further, he often slathers the electronica so thickly it obscures the melodic line, which is heresy. Finally, Techno Sufjan has trouble with moderation. Unlike, say, Radiohead or Kraftwerk, he hasn’t learned that less is usually more. At its worst, the result can be cacophonous, bombastic, and grating. To be sure, Techno Sufjan has his moments, such as the gorgeous standout “I Walk” from 2010’s The Age of Adz. But these flashes of brilliance always seem to come tethered to tiresome filler.  

Which brings us to Ascension. The album, available in LP, CD, and download format from vancamp.com and streaming from Qobuz, is unquestionably a Techno Sufjan release, but the story is more complicated than that. Yes, the instrumentation is completely artificial; in this case, it’s a stack of 80s-era drum machines and Prophet synths. And, yes, the arrangements sometimes verge on—and occasionally veer into—self-indulgence. There’s not an unprocessed vocal to be found. Meanwhile, the sonics are typical for a Techno Sufjan release, which is to say muddled. A good system will at least reveal the layers in these very deep mixes.   

Yet despite all that, Ascension has greatness. 

Start with the lyrics, which are unlike anything this or any Sufjan has sung before. In the past, no matter what the song’s particular subject matter, Stevens always imbued his words with two unwavering elements: spiritual devotion (sometimes explicit but more often as subtext) and personal optimism. Here, both of those qualities are called into question. This lends Ascension’s lyrics both freshness and a newfound profundity. 

In the matter of faith, Stevens has clearly undergone a crisis. He confesses that he no longer believes, though he desperately wants to. He despairs of the time and energy he put into his faith, confident it would deliver redemption. Now, he’s not only uncertain that God will come through, he’s not sure who will. On the title track he sings in a strained falsetto: “But now/It strikes me far too late again/That I was asking far too much/Of everyone around me.” Contributing to his philosophical straits, Stevens finds himself dismayed at what he sees happening to the earth, to America, and to humanity itself.

To be sure, these subjects do not lend themselves to an upbeat album, and Ascension isn’t one. Nor is it a downer, however. Stevens never abandons his warmth or sense of humor. He’s questioning his surroundings and himself in ways most of us can relate to. And many of the lyrics describe the comfort he seeks, which renders them comforting in and of themselves.  

On the musical front, Ascension is replete with the uncannily-memorable and beautiful melodies that Stevens fans live for. At first I couldn’t hear some of these gems, so deeply buried in the mire are they. After about the third playing, though, each delicate line emerges. And unlike The Age of Adz, Ascension has no filler—in spite of its 80-minute length.   

Would I prefer that these thoughts and music had been appropriated and delivered by Folk or Classical Sufjan? Without question. Either one, I believe, would have provided this material with a more sympathetic setting. Nonetheless, now that I’ve unlocked Ascension’s multitude of enchantments, I can’t imagine being without them. This is Techno Sufjan’s best album by far. So good, in fact, I expect it’ll make the other Sufjans proud. 

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World News

The Band: 50th Anniversary Edition

Posted on by Alan Taffel

The Band: 50th Anniversary Edition

What makes an album timeless? I’d argue it’s the ability of the music to constantly reveal more subtleties, delights, surprises, and emotional shadings. Even as the years and decades go by, a timeless album will continue to engage and move you. That’s unquestionably the case with the Band’s self-titled second release. Fifty years on, the album continues to bedazzle. Which is ironic, since initially it seemed so unassuming. After all, there aren’t any flashy displays of instrumental or vocal prowess. Nor do the songs hit you over the head with hummable hooks and sing-along lyrics. Indeed, after the first few …

World News

B&W Introduces New Signature Models for 700 Series, Hints at Acquisition

Posted on by Alan Taffel

B&W Introduces New Signature Models for 700 Series, Hints at Acquisition

In 2017, Bowers and Wilkins held a major press event in Boston to trumpet the latest iteration of its 700 Series speakers. As the pre-audition briefings made clear, the new models shared many design approaches with the brand’s significantly more expensive 800 D3 Series. Further, in an effort to match the 800’s performance as closely as possible while still hitting a more affordable price point, B&W had given the new line’s parts and materials a serious re-think backed by a significant investment. The result, evident to all attendees, was that B&W had succeeded brilliantly. Each new 700 model made an …