Michael Fremer

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Features
Two Weeks With ZVOX’s VB20 VoiceBud
Michael Fremer  |  Dec 31, 2018  |  First Published: Dec 31, 2018  |  11 comments
An elderly gentleman wearing a pair of high tech digital hearing aids accompanied his wife to a kennel club meeting at my home a few years ago. He had little interest in the dog doings upstairs so I invited him downstairs into my listening room. It allowed me to conduct an experiment of sorts. Did he like music? Yes. Had he ever heard or seen a big high performance audio rig? No, he hadn’t. Would he like to hear some music on it? Yes he would: jazz or classical. I obliged, curious to find out what exactly he heard listening through digital hearing aids to a high-resolution audio system. The look on his face told me he was hearing plenty.

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Analog Corner
Analog Corner #105
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 01, 2019  |  First Published: Apr 01, 2004  |  1 comments
"Attention K-Mart shoppers! America is open for business." With the dollar sinking to record lows against foreign currencies and deficits rising to record highs, overseas buyers looking for bargains flocked to the 2004 Consumer Electronics Show in larger numbers than I've seen since I began attending the show in 1978. I have never seen the Alexis Park Hotel as crowded as it was on the show's first day. Usually, attendance is sparse the first two days as West Coast dealers stay away, preferring to tend to retail business. But this year Thursday was packed, and the following days even more so.
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Album Reviews
"Gary Burton Take Another Look A Career Retrospective" 5 LP Mack Avenue Box Set
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 01, 2019  |  5 comments
This recently released 5 LP Mack Avenue Records box set celebrates Gary Burton's incredible six decades of outstanding music making, organized chronologically and by label, beginning with his earliest and arguably best sounding recordings on the RCA Victor label where he began recording, first as a sideman, during the summer between high school and his enrollment at The Berklee College of Music. The Indiana native was first "discovered" by "Yakety" saxophonist Boots Randolph at an Evansville, Indiana club and made his way to RCA through Chet Atkins and fellow guitarist Hank Garland.

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AAA Vinyl
Blue Note Launches Joe Harley Curated Tone Poet Series AAA Vinyl Releases
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 07, 2019  |  First Published: Jan 07, 2019  |  4 comments
Blue Note Records just announced a new "Tone Poet" Series of all analog vinyl jazz reissues curated by Joe Harley, who co-produces with Ron Rambach the Music Matters Blue Note vinyl reissue series. These records will be produced the way those are: mastered cut directly from the original analog tapes by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio and plated and pressed at RTI and deluxe gatefold packaged.

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Analog Corner
Analog Corner #106
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 08, 2019  |  First Published: May 01, 2004  |  2 comments
Sonus Faber's graceful-looking factory.

"Do you want to see how they build Pro-Ject turntables?" It was Sumiko's John Hunter, phoning me out of the blue.

"Sure!" I've reviewed a few Pro-Ject designs over the years, along with the Music Hall 'tables, which are built in the same factory, and I've long wondered how one small company in the Czech Republic can manufacture such a wide array of products while making almost every part in-house. When Hunter added that the visit to Pro-Ject would be bracketed by stops at Vicenza, Italy and Vienna, Austria to visit (respectively) Sonus Faber and Vienna Acoustics, I was ready to pack. Besides, between the lunacy of January's Consumer Electronics Show and the assembly line of products arriving at and departing from my listening room, I needed a break, hectic though the five-day trip would be.

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News
Watch John Atkinson Give Michael Fremer the Founder's Award at the L.A. & Orange Co. Audio Society's 25th Annual GALA!
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 08, 2019  |  First Published: Jan 08, 2019  |  12 comments
Here's the first in a series of videos Ben Williams produced and edited over the weekend's festivities last November 30th through December 2nd as the L.A. & Orange County Audio Society celebrated its 25th anniversary and presented its Founder's Award to AnalogPlanet editor Michael Fremer.

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Analog Gear News
At CES 2019 Technics Introduces Elegant SL-1500C Coreless Direct Drive Turntable
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 09, 2019  |  First Published: Jan 09, 2019  |  29 comments
At CES 2019 Technics expanded its turntable line with the introduction of the SL-1500C "complete" turntable with built-in MM phono preamplifier as well as a new SL-1200MK7—the company's first new standard DJ turntable in approximately 9 years.

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Phono Preamp Reviews
Cambridge Audio's "Duo" Phono Preamp/Headphone Amplifier Outperforms Its Low Price
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 14, 2019  |  First Published: Jan 14, 2019  |  15 comments
Cambridge Audio's Duo is a compact, attractive, lightweight (2.1 Lbs) low priced phono preamplifier that will surprise you with its solid sonic performance as well as its low price. It certainly surprised me! It also features a headphone amplifier so it makes for a great desktop or dorm room accessory.

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Analog Corner
Analog Corner #107
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 21, 2019  |  First Published: Jun 01, 2004  |  2 comments
reviewed in this column: Clearaudio’s Emotion turntable and Satisfy tonearm.

A friend of one of my wife's high school friends e-mailed recently asking for help in setting up his turntable. The guy, in his early 40s, is not a hardcore audiophile and doesn't read the magazines. He just got it into his head one day not long ago that he'd like to start collecting vinyl. So he went to eBay, got himself a Thorens TD-165 for $150, and started buying LPs online. Now he's hooked.

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Album Reviews
The John Lennon "Imagine" Box Set On Deluxe Blu-ray (Also Double LP)
Michael Fremer  |  Jan 24, 2019  |  14 comments
Former N.Y.C. Deputy Mayor Edward Morrison's obituary appeared in today's New York Times. Morrison was instrumental in helping John Lennon remain in America at a time when Richard Nixon was trying to deport him. Lennon's anti-war political agitation bugged Nixon. The deportation was going to based on an old pot bust. Morrison intervened and helped Lennon to remain in America by having him declared a "valuable cultural asset to New York City".

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