02009-07-21 | Jon Gagan, Music, Studio
Our monsoon continues and we had another fine rain storm this afternoon.
In the morning Jon and I compared AIFF, FLAC and 320kbps mp3 files in my studio, using Stax Earspeakers and a Stax tube amp. The FLAC files had been encoded and decoded using xAct, which is a fine FLAC app for Macintosh. The 320 mp3 was made with Peak Pro, which uses a LAME encoder – the same encoder we use for the ListeningLounge.
The result was what one would expect: AIFF, followed by FLAC and mp3. What we did not expect was how very close the quality between these formats was. Unless you have a great set of headphones or speakers – and the ears and experience to process what comes through them – you will not hear a difference. Another interesting point was that the treble side of the music was indistinguishable, it was the bass where one could detect shades of difference.
02009-04-07 | Uncategorized
Drove to the Southside, down Rodeo Road to S. Richards Ave. Followed the little blue ball on the map of my iPhone to 6401 S. Richards Ave. and ended up at the mark for 6401 – which turned out to be wrong and in the middle of nowhere. Called the radio station KSFR and confirmed that I had over-shot the address by more than 200 street addresses… Turned around and headed back towards town. KSFR is located inside a large campus that also houses the Community College of Santa Fe and the Northern New Mexico Extension of UNM. Called KSFR again and a woman came out to guide me through the endless hallways. She introduced me to the person that was going to facilitate the interview with Ken Bader from The World.
I had assumed that I was asked to drive out here because the interview was to be conducted via a satellite hook-up or some other high-tech I could not do at home… but they had me answer a regular phone and simply placed a small mp3 recorder in front of my face. I could have done that at home – while wearing pyjamas and drinking a nice cuppa tea.
The interview turned out interesting. This was no college kid pretending to be a journalist, this was a guy who had listened to the album (The Scent of Light) AND had read up on me. In fact his bio says Ken has been in radio for more than 30 years.
You will be able to listen for yourself when the interview is broadcasted in early May. I will keep you posted.
In the evening I walked to the studio and tried out an idea I had. A friend is looking to buy loudspeakers, but the ones he really wants are quite expensive. Since he loves the low frequencies, he doesn’t think headphones would work for him. My idea was to match a pair of nice headphones with a subwoofer – great imaging from the headphones and the physical experience of bass from the sub-woofer. I hooked up my Stax and the studio sub-woofer to a CD player and the resulting sound was quite remarkable. In fact, it was so nice that I ended up standing there and listening to quite a few tracks from the album Opium, which sounded wonderful.
