Paul

Author's details

Name: Paul
Date registered: March 13, 2013

Biography

More about me, me, me: I’ve been working in music retail and wholesale — buying, writing and selling — since 1980. This does not necessarily make me a smart person, I know. Among my hobbies are vinyl, computer audio, high-fidelity audio equipment, and Macintosh futzing, plus digital photography, cat herding, DIY landscaping and trying to keep orchids and tropical plants alive. I live in the eastern realm of the San Francisco Bay area with my girlfriend Kate, our cat Punker, and far too many external hard drives, LPs, CDs and plants. I work full-time for an independent music distributor. I buy and sell music on Discogs. Occasionally I contribute to PS Tracks. About this site: I will be obsessing over the minutiae of LPs – mastering quality, surface noise, packaging…and sometimes — are you sitting down? — even the music. Despite the title of this blog, I occasionally list links to MP3s, AACs and streaming media. I would always prefer to link to high-resolution digital files (he said, his nose in the air) but these formats are, unfortunately, not always available for recordings I love. I figure the most important thing is to share information about music that appeals to me and get the word out, rather than proselytize and evangelize (not that I won’t still do those things, mind you). I try not to get too hung up on transcribing artist’s biographical info into blog posts; I’ve seen far too many onesheet regurgitations from the music press over the past 30 years to want to participate in that kind of monotony. If you need additional historical background on an artist, there’s always the internet, right? Regarding “buy” links: I urge you, discerning consumer, to please buy as directly from the artist as you can. For this reason I’ll only post Amazon links as a last resort. Giving your money to the top of the music food chain doesn’t always mean that your hard-earned nickels and dimes are going to drop down through the gears of the machine to the source of the music you love, mixed-metaphorically speaking. A portion of a few dollars for, say a A Wizard/A True Star CD on Amazon isn’t necessarily going to mean even 25 cents for Todd Rundgren. I suppose myself and my music-biz and creative brethren should just be content to have music lovers pay ANY money at all for recordings, but please remember that your dollar (or quarter. or dime. or nickel) is a vote. Consider the concept of buying direct from an artist analogous to buying locally-grown fresh food. It matters. —————————————————————————————————————————- Labels/artists: I like to review recordings sent to me when I feel they fit in with the general spirit of my blog. I tend towards the modern classical/electronic/Americana portions of the genre spectrum, but I’ve been known to be open-minded about other pigeonholes, as well. I can be reached at paul at limahuli dot net. Thanks!

Latest posts

  1. AnythingButMP3 Has Moved URLs — July 26, 2015
  2. Meridian’s MQA demo at Audio High in Mountain View, CA — April 23, 2015
  3. Amazon Cloud Drive — April 4, 2015
  4. Monday Telecommute — March 30, 2015
  5. Tangerine Dream SACDs from Japan on Confessions of a Part-Time Audiophile — March 29, 2015

Most commented posts

  1. Daniel Lanois “Acadie” 2xLP (Record Store Day reissue, Diverse Records UK) — 2 comments
  2. Pono – Part One: The Unboxing — 1 comment
  3. Pono – Part Four: Followup — 1 comment
  4. PonoPlayer Cometh – with JRiver as an Interface — 1 comment

Author's posts listings

AnythingButMP3 Has Moved URLs

I’ve moved everything to: www.anythingbutmp3.com New RSS feed is http://anythingbutmp3.com/?feed=rss2 Please update whatever you feel is in need of updating. And thank you.

Meridian’s MQA demo at Audio High in Mountain View, CA

On April 16th Audio High was the location for was the first publicly-hosted demonstration of Meridian’s MQA (Master Quality Authenticated) high-resolution digital audio format. There was lots of music, great food and drink, very comfortable surroundings and many friendly and knowledgeable people. Audio High and Meridian did an excellent job of making everyone feel at …

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Amazon Cloud Drive

Amazon is offering a free three-month trial of its “unlimited” Cloud Drive service. I put that word in quotes because there always seems to be a catch down the road somewhere. My guess is the gotcha might come after your first three months are up and you shift to paying $60 for a year for …

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Monday Telecommute

Timmy, 11 months old tomorrow, stakes out territory.

Tangerine Dream SACDs from Japan on Confessions of a Part-Time Audiophile

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I wrote something about something and Part-Time Audiophile went ahead and put it out there again. The latest example of this is my review of four Tangerine Dream SACD reissues from Japan.

Busy

I’ve been doing stuff. I went to Mono Lake for a four-day retreat earlier this month. Had a huge Eucalyptus cut down in the backyard last week. Trying to get plants to finally grow beneath where the Eucalyptus used to drop its toxic waste. Working the day job. Relaxing, or trying to. Catching up on …

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Music Lovers SF Burglarized for Second Time This Month

Stereophile has details on the latest high-end audio store burglary in San Francisco. I shop at Music Lovers’ SF and Berkeley locations and have always found their selection and service amazing; they’re knowledgable, friendly people with a lot to offer the high-end community. Let’s hope they, AudioVision and Mountain View’s Audio High (also hit recently) …

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Burglary at Audeze — $250,000 Worth of Headphones Stolen

UPDATE 3/4/15 11pm: Audeze has set up a serial number checker. UPDATE 3/1/15 12:55pm: Stereophile has posted more details about the Audeze caper and the burglary at AudioVision SF last week. There’s also security camera screencaps on Audeze’s Facebook page. _________________________________________ From Audeze’s Facebook page: Last night, February 28th, there was a break-in and robbery …

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Review: AKG K7XX (Massdrop first edition)

My pair showed up today. Massdrop quickly sold 1000 of them at $200. Ultimate retail price will be around $650. I spent the afternoon and most of the evening playing a lot of CD-res FLACs from the iPad. The K7XXs sound excellent directly out of the box, but I assume they’ll benefit from a few …

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Review: Acoustic Zen Crescendo Mark II speakers

I’d been enjoying Acoustic Zen speakers at California Audio Show rooms over the past 3 years. Adagios, Crescendos, and, more recently, the towering Maestros. Three years ago I wanted the Adagios. A year later I pined for Crescendos. I had some serious ‘Zen envy. Late last year I finally resolved to exile my loyal pair …

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