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Monthly Spins: August

by Joe Surdna in Music

July slipped by rather quickly and here we are with a new edition of Monthly Spins for August 2018. A rather light month compared to those recently. Still, a great deal of lovely music for you to check out. Enjoy. Chancha Via Circuito: Bienaventuranza File Under: Cumbia and electronic wizardry This is what you want when someone decides to honor a traditional art form like Cumbia or Andean folk music, not a slavish field recording but bringing to a joyous and upbeat sound and taking it a few [...]

3 Comments

Zoho Rising: Jazz Label as Creative Force | The Deep End

August 3, 2018 // 1 Comment

Zoho Music, a contemporary jazz record label you've never heard of, is producing some fantastic new music. [...]
Monthly Spins: July

July 8, 2018 // 2 Comments

A lot of rock this month, in various forms. I have to admit that finding new music each month has been something of a relief, given the relentless onslaught of obfuscation and horror in the news, but the search has given me the calm to face those things I can change and endure those that I cannot. My hope is that you’ll find some things to renew yourself on this month’s list, like the wonderfully upbeat and unique rock sounds of Flasher’s Constant Image. One note of regret is that I [...]
Chasing, and Finding, the Dragon in Venice

June 15, 2018 // 0 Comments

by Darryl Lindberg Every year-and-a-half or so, Catherine and I retreat to Venice for about a month both to enjoy a significant change of scenery and to recharge our batteries—such are they are. We have no substantive agenda other than to wander around in this fascinating, charming, culturally rich, and timeless city. Of the few activities we do plan, music events are high on the list. Venice is a city with a spectacular musical history, a tradition of great music and great music-making [...]
Deep Into Jazz in Texas: Selections from UNT’s Division of Jazz Studies

June 9, 2018 // 2 Comments

By Marc Phillips “The truth is, Andrew, I never really had a Charlie Parker. But I tried…and that’s more than most people ever do. And I will never apologize for how I tried.” –Terence Blanchard By now I assume that most jazz aficionados have watched Damien Chazelle’s 2014 film Whiplash. I’m a fan, especially of the final heart-pounding musical sequence, but after watching it for the first time I came away with a couple of interesting questions. First, are university jazz [...]
Monthly Spins: June

June 2, 2018 // 3 Comments

by Joe Surdna Quite a list for June. There is just so much amazing new music being made and recorded that it really makes me grateful because I can concentrate on listening instead of watching the steady drip, drip, drip of byzantine mindlessness and nincompoopery coming out of the airwaves and the internet. Take a break from the corporate truth and fascist vaudeville and let the news fade into the background and lose yourself in some amazing music. Enjoy and please leave [...]
Review: Brian Eno “Music For Installations” 9 LP box set

May 20, 2018 // 1 Comment

by Paul Ashby After the piece had been running for about a week, I decided to do a bit of customer research and I went to the park with a translator and asked the old guys how they liked it. One of them said it was possibly a bit too loud. That’s my kind of listener. I turned the [ten CD] players down a little. Another said “I want this to be here all the time.” — Brian Eno Eno has been exhibiting immersive video, light, and sound installations since the mid-80s. Much of [...]
Monthly Spins: May

May 5, 2018 // 13 Comments

I want to thank Scot for bringing me onboard after having written for Audiostream for a year and a half. I have a simple set-up with a pair of AudioQuest Nightowl headphones and Schiiit DAC and preamp. When I’m out and about it’s Tidal driven iPhone run through an RHA DACamp L1 and a pair of RHA 20i but I’m not really a hardcore audiophile, although I would be if I could afford it. My thing is the music itself. Call me a musicphile and I have been one since I was about ten years old. The [...]
Jimmy Smith: DVL Album of the Month for April

May 1, 2018 // 2 Comments

This is a monthly series of album reviews I will be doing for DVL Audio here in Canada. I’ll be heading out to a local record store in Vancouver, digging through the bins, and coming up with an intriguing LP to discuss here on Part-Time Audiophile. I’ll never go out with something in mind beforehand, and there is no criteria for whether it’s a new album, an old album, an out-of-print LP, electronic, classical, jazz, punk – whatever – it just has to sound good to me. I’ll come up [...]
DVL Album of the Month for March: The Bee Gees

April 6, 2018 // 3 Comments

This is a monthly series of album reviews I will be doing for DVL Audio here in Canada. I’ll be heading out to a local record store in Vancouver, digging through the bins, and coming up with an intriguing LP to discuss here on Part-Time Audiophile. I’ll never go out with something in mind beforehand, and there is no criteria for whether it’s a new album, an old album, an out-of-print LP, electronic, classical, jazz, punk – whatever – it just has to sound good to me. I’ll [...]
RIP Maestro Jose’ Antonio Abreu

March 26, 2018 // 0 Comments

Sad news, one of the most influential personalities of the music world, maestro Jose’ Antonio Abreu of Venezuela passed away yesterday, at the age of 79. He might not be as famous as other orchestra directors but he has been way more important for many, many young children as he invented the “Sistema”, a publicly financed voluntary sector music education program, consisting of more than 400 music centers and 700,000 young musicians who got educated through music. His vision [...]
DVL Album of the Month for February – Traffic

March 3, 2018 // 3 Comments

This is a monthly series of album reviews I will be doing for DVL Audio here in Canada. I’ll be heading out to a local record store in Vancouver, digging through the bins, and coming up with an intriguing LP to discuss here on Part-Time Audiophile. I’ll never go out with something in mind beforehand, and there is no criteria for whether it’s a new album, an old album, an out-of-print LP, electronic, classical, jazz, punk – whatever – it just has to sound good to me. I’ll come up [...]
DVL Album of the Month for January – Arum Rae

February 4, 2018 // 1 Comment

This is a monthly series of album reviews I will be doing for DVL Audio here in Canada. I’ll be heading out to a local record store in Vancouver, digging through the bins, and coming up with an intriguing LP to discuss here on Part-Time Audiophile. I’ll never go out with something in mind beforehand, and there is no criteria for whether it’s a new album, an old album, an out-of-print LP, electronic, classical, jazz, punk – whatever – it just has to sound good to me. I’ll come up [...]
DVL Album of the Month for December – Murray Head

January 1, 2018 // 3 Comments

This is a monthly series of album reviews I will be doing for DVL Audio here in Canada. I’ll be heading out to a local record store in Vancouver, digging through the bins, and coming up with an intriguing LP to discuss here on Part-Time Audiophile. I’ll never go out with something in mind beforehand, and there is no criteria for whether it’s a new album, an old album, an out-of-print LP, electronic, classical, jazz, punk – whatever – it just has to sound good to me. I’ll come up [...]
Part-Time Audiophile’s favorite albums of 2017

December 31, 2017 // 2 Comments

You’ll note that we’re not calling this the Best Albums of 2017. There are plenty of those lists out there, and they are pretty much dominated by this year’s critical darlings with some heavily promoted mainstream names thrown in. Instead of repeating that, Part-Time Audiophile asked its writers to share their favorite releases. Some of our recommendations indeed may show up on a few of the other rankings, but many are farther off the beaten path. They are not all audio spectaculars, [...]
Review: Getting my groove on with one-step vinyl releases

December 17, 2017 // 2 Comments

In business, it can be advantageous to cut out the middle man. In vinyl record production, too, less can be more. The latest mini-trend in the audiophile world is one-step recordings, which eliminate two parts of the manufacturing process. Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab dropped its first one-step record in 2016 with Santana’s Abraxas, followed early this year by the Bill Evans Trio’s Sunday at the Village Vanguard. Both quickly sold out. This fall, MFSL added Donald Fagen’s The Nightfly and [...]
David Bowie “A New Career In A New Town (1977-1982)” 13 LP box

December 2, 2017 // 3 Comments

by Paul Ashby In late September Parlophone and Rhino partnered for release of a Tony Visconti-remastered box set of Bowie’s “Berlin Trilogy” (and beyond) albums, and the project’s been getting a lot of press — and not all of it good. In the remastering process, certain risks (and, some might venture, liberties) were taken. Anytime anyone messes with original Saint Bowie recordings, a certain amount of blowback is a given, and public reaction to an album or two in [...]
DVL Album of the Month for November – the dub god King Tubby

November 25, 2017 // 2 Comments

This is a monthly series of album reviews I will be doing for DVL Audio here in Canada. I’ll be heading out to a local record store in Vancouver, digging through the bins, and coming up with an intriguing LP to discuss here on Part-Time Audiophile. I’ll never go out with something in mind beforehand, and there is no criteria for whether it’s a new album, an old album, an out-of-print LP, electronic, classical, jazz, punk – whatever – it just has to sound good to me. I’ll come up [...]
Direct from the Masters: Analogy Records

November 19, 2017 // 0 Comments

Carlitos Guzmán comes to us by way of Puerto Rico. An unabashed fan of analog tape, we hope he will be joining us more regularly once the US Government remembers that PR is actually a US Territory and restores power to the island. In the meantime, please check out his recent audioimpressions blog post on Analogy Records, an analog tape outfit coming out of Italy (note: they have really nifty take-up reels for sale, too). Yes, analog tape is expensive and hard to find. But for those with the [...]
DVL Audio Album of the Month for October – Jazz legend Wes Montgomery

October 22, 2017 // 1 Comment

This is the fourth in a monthly series of album reviews I will be doing for DVL Audio here in Canada. I’ll be heading out to a local record store in Vancouver, digging through the bins, and coming up with an intriguing LP to discuss here on Part-Time Audiophile. I’ll never go out with something in mind beforehand, and there is no criteria for whether it’s a new album, an old album, an out-of-print LP, electronic, classical, jazz, punk – whatever – it just has to sound good to me. [...]
DVL Audio Album of the Month for September – Cheap Trick

September 16, 2017 // 7 Comments

This is the third in a monthly series of album reviews I will be doing for DVL Audio here in Canada. I’ll be heading out to a local record store in Vancouver, digging through the bins, and coming up with an intriguing LP to discuss here on Part-Time Audiophile. I’ll never go out with something in mind beforehand, and there is no criteria for whether it’s a new album, an old album, an out-of-print LP, electronic, classical, jazz, punk – whatever – it just has to sound good to me. [...]