Archives: Columns

Blog No. 14: An LS3/5a For the Ages

Consider this a Public Service: you are being warned, before the release date of June/July 2019, of a run of only 50 pairs of speakers guaranteed to become collectors’ items. Falcon Acoustics’ Jerry Bloomfield told me they’re making the finest … Continue reading

Natural Born Kessler (No. 1): The Paul Klipsch Biography

Pretend just for a moment that you’re a civilian, not a savvy audiophile. What exactly would you know about the following?: Single-ended triodes. SACD. Cable directionality. Speaker spikes. VTA. The answer is … precisely nothing. We function in a self-contained … Continue reading

Mondo Audio: Digital Standards, ARA and AAHEA

  Consumer Electronics Shows might rightly be all about new products ready for the shops, but an aspect that’s rarely covered in the hi-fi magazines is the industry manoeuvring. Whether or not it means anything to you if you don’t … Continue reading

The Kessler Column

Still don’t believe we have a serious problem on how high-end audio and home entertainment equipment is perceived? Then try this on for size:   From the Daily Mail, 1 Sept 2004, about a report on the alleged spending habits … Continue reading

Headroom: Cables

‘Time flies when you’re having fun.’ If that’s true, then trick cables must be an absolute barrel of laughs because – believe it or not – it’s well over a decade since Saburou Egawa in Japan and Jean Hiraga in France introduced to … Continue reading

Kessler Column: The Vinyl Revival

One insight, after visiting a recent spate of analogue-laden hi-fi shows, was enough to turn any Baby Boomer sullen with thoughts of mortality: the current (and huge) revival in interest in the black vinyl record is due in no small … Continue reading

Natural Born Kessler: Surround Sound Matters

So all is well in Surround-Sound Land, eh? For once, the home entertainment merchants have standardised, right? Not. Huh? Isn’t the world of home cinema already and emphatically Dolby-Surrounded? Stop and smell the matrices, or at least look at the … Continue reading

Mondo Audio: CE Regulations and EU Meddling

Global “size reduction” is something we’ve been taking for granted for years. I mean, the popularity of Baywatch has probably done more to convince the world that all American women have D-cups than anything since Jane Russell in The Outlaw, … Continue reading

Hi-Fi News Back Page – Multi-Channel

To demonstrate that multi-channel sucks for pure music, just pull out any studio albums mastered for the original 4-channel formats, circa-1970. You and I know that this is fraudulent, though, because those recordings have the same validity relative to modern … Continue reading

Headroom: Lumley, Cremonese Cloth

One has to admire Raymond Lumley for plugging away with his eponymous valve amplifiers because, on the surface, his company looks just as quivery as the next. Yet despite a split with his original partner (Roy Grant, when the company … Continue reading