Michael Fremer

Okay, the photo has nothing to do with the text but I thought you might enjoy it and it's possibly good clickbait. This little dust up with Mike Esposito was really me doing what I've been doing since calling out the B.S. that was the compact disc revolution when the industry, both on the hardware and software side, was insisting that this new format sounded better than the old one when in fact it clearly did not, especially at that time. As Chad Kassem pointed out in the stream, we and others were subjected to major levels of abuse and told to "get with the program" and that we were just used to, and preferred distortion. You still get that today but it's easier to ignore.

Vladimir Lamm took me through his new 3 box LP 1 Signature phono preamplifier. Each channel has its own power supply. The all-tube design uses transformers for the first MC stage. There are three inputs: two MC, one MM.

In an ideal world, I'd have every phono section I've reviewed in the past 16 years on hand to compare with these three and with all that arrive in the future. But because I have a life, I don't, and I wouldn't even if I could, though some readers (and one retailer) have insisted that that's the only way that I could possibly be of any use to them. Ha! And for those who are concerned that I've neglected the Manley Steelhead, not so! It's still my reference.

A collection of songs mostly written by fellow-Canadians is kind of a thin album concept in my book. Frank's Come Fly With Me-now there was a concept album! And Lang hasn't exactly chosen adventurously-you can probably name them all without having read the credits. Can it be that there are no obscure Canadian singer/writers worthy of our attention?