RIP Dolores 15Jan18

WTF, not Dolores. Cranberries have the greatest of the coolest Irish songs... err of the world's songs. Zombie, Linger, & others. Such a great voice with Nigel, lost at 46 - why? The Cranberries were awesome... just one brief here - dive on their work, as it is spectacular. I chose Woodstock 'cause it's epic despite LoFi - Zombie unbelievable.

Zombie - Cranberries - Woodstock - 1994

Pow' @ The Legend & Hoisting Fridge du Vin With DD 12Jan18

DD came to Summit for a working lunch. We awoke to find the storm had favored A-Basin with 7" of newfallen so we headed over mid-day. We arrived with the upper lot 2/3 full, plenty of snow still falling and shuttled down to base. I was on Liberty Origin 124s and DD had his Vokl 108s - we were all rockered up for some freshies. We enjoyed the best conditions of the season. Ultimately The Legend likely pulled another 7" as we were plowing through over a foot in places; it was a blast. Of course we stopped for liquid lunch, a portion of which I tossed on DD before he had to get back to work.

That night after some product marketing work to ensure his millions, DD and Yvette stopped over for manual labor. They helped me hoist a GE Profile Wine Cooler into place at The Nest. I'd rigged a scheme with rope and rugs which worked fine. The unit is sweet - quiet, cool, matches and hopefully will last many years (unlike the Chinese junk it replaced). Woohoo. Unfortunately at our celebratory dinner afterward the DeBalskis learned Becca crashed her car - fortunately for all she was safe.

Drat You Drought 11Jan17

Despite a decent 5" of new snow Keystone was super cold (10° arriving early) and blown off in most spots. Gondola wasn't open till later so had to ride the lift up. Drat you 30 year drought for making this a good day this season. Still, I was skiing and I did find a couple of blower spots left along the sides but conditions had me leave pretty early.

Skiing With Friends 06Jan18-07Jan18

I was able to capitalize on a thin day and a stormy night to ski with Jim Yohanan & his kid Mitch and follow that up with runs with DD, and that same team. Mitch & I grabbed several descents off T-Bar on Fri and rides with Jim were very welcomed. Though we did get into some too thin runs off E Chair. We hit Sauce on the Blue with the whole team on Fri night. Today, DD & I were able to find the early powder runs on the sides of runs and an early run on Horseshoe's barely tracked stuff (though the wait at T-Bar was tough; the snow was some of the best so far in this drought season after ~6" of new at Breck. Great times.

Super Comfort - Super Musical Mods 04Jan18

As I await the big Schiit and I spend time in Summit, I made comfort and equalization adjustments to my headphones there. My Audeze LCD-2 open back planar magnetic driver cans are great but the single padded top band wasn't as comfortable as some of my others. I fashioned a new interior headband from a leather sample we had from prior furniture samples. There are "expensive" commercial alternatives but mine's cooler, homemade and feels great.

The ghetto repair on my AKG K702 open back dynamic headphones (previously described - using a rubber band to provide renewed elasticity to the headband) failed when the regular rubber bands decayed in ~1 year. I modified the ghetto fix to use black ranger bands instead. These blend in better and will last much longer.

The musicality & fidelity of both of these as well as my other cans are exceptional, but each displays it's own unique inherent biases and equalization. That's often why headphones are sold for folks who like a particular style of music (often an EQ curve they are targeting really). For instance House and EDM folks typically listen to bass heavy headphones. I prefer flatter, unadulterated sound - which in part has guided my own headphone choices. So, I dove for equalization software that would work in my Mac and Win10 sound chain environments - both of which include external DAC/AMP setups. I think I've found the best in Sonarworks... they make a couple products which caught my ear and they have a noteworthy augmented service. They measure a dozen samples of particular headsets from top vendors, they use these measurements to apply corrections to the digital music which flattens the response curves of the headphones. I first tried their Tru-Fi, easy to install, few dials, etc. but it worked as advertised (to my ear) for the headphones above and made them sound even better. This led me to try their "pro" offer called Reference 4 for just $20 more (I'm just trialing right now). Similar awesome result but more dials and feedback, which I like... I will buy Sonarworks Ref 4 Systemwide... worth it and I expect results will be even more pronounced on cheaper headphones really. I doubt it'll work on MQA or DSF files given how it funtions but no matter - I've largely put these aside for now.

Pulled the trigger on Ref 4. Sweet. I can't wait to invoke the corrections on stuff in COS too. The custom services I referenced are one off calibration curves for particular headphones - send 'em in and get 'em measured and receive perfect corrections. I dunno if I'll try it our use the averages - they don't have my MrSpeakers cans in the average list so...

The Re-Rippin' Project 01Jan18

HNY all. I am embarking on a re-rip project for all CDs in house. Yea, that's ~430 albums with prob 10% double discs so it could take some time. In the old days I ripped to mp3 with insufficient resolution. I use XLD on a mac; it can assure a bit-perfect rip by check-summing against known data. Sheesh - prior I had a 400 disc carousel controlled by a Win machine through which I could automate the ripping process - now I'm manual. I am going to release the CDs once completed (I can't do better from these sources than full FLAC) so check the collection below - I will let them all go for $200 total local pickup - I spent more than that on the more recent discs right of the demark. Too, I'm selling the Sony carousel - it's awesome but I don't need it if I don't hold the discs.

Beer & Gear and Notable Noob 29Dec17

I headed to Summit on a false alarm for an appliance delivery and got a few grim runs in at Breck while there paying my tax bill. Sure it was gorgeous weather but recent snow had mostly been knocked down, lines were long, and the meager amount of open terrain was pretty crowded. I did find some stuff on Peak 7 below T-Bar but left early.

Kala got me a big lens Daylight for my desk in Summit Co. Sweet.

Jason bought some Oppo PM3 closed back, planar magnetic cans to mate with the tubes & Schiit he bought from me. It's cool it all gets used forward; I just wish my new stuff would come.

While observing a TCU comeback, a shootout in TX, a squeaker for Northwestern, and a drubbing of Trojans by Buckeyes I enjoyed some new IIPAs/DIPAs. We tasted Asterisk at the GABF and I was pleased, and its now available in some stores - good. SKA, who makes a nice Modus Hoperandi has brought out a dubl, also tasty.

I found a notable noob on the music front. A 12 year old singer-songrwriter won the America's Got Talent competition and I stumbled on the winning video and then dove on her work some. This is just crazy; she can be bigger than Taylor S with unique voice and penchant to do her own writing. Her covers are OK but I prefer the original works. Listen to Grace VanderWaal - chosen here are some live, decently produced, unadulterated pieces... including her originals from AGT.

I Don't Know My Name

Clay

Moonlight

A Team