Kevin Bresnahan

My audio memory is short - maybe 30 seconds or so. According to many studies, everyone else's audio memory is just as short. What these studies show is that not many people can differentiate slight changes in audio if it takes longer than 30 seconds to compare the two. My audio memory is great for swapping CDs and comparing. It's not great for swapping power cords or speaker wires or interconnects or AC outlets and comparing sounds heard minutes or hours apart unless those differences are huge. Now, I'll grant that some people's audio memory may be exceptional. But for the audio experiment ware are talking about here (swapping your electrical outlet), I would think that the differences in audio would be very slight and I have a lot of trouble believing that anyone can hear such minute differences in the time it takes to make the swap.

In DVD/HDTV, the word you're looking for is upscaling, not upsampling. A good explanation of this can be found here: http://hometheater.about.com/od/hometheatervideobasics/qt/dvdvidupscale.htm

Ted Brown - In Good Company (Criss Cross)

Played last night but couldn't post: Junior Cook - Somethin's Cookin' (Muse). What a nice date. I really like this one for some reason. I have had it on CD for many years and it doesn't get in the player often enough, especially since I started spinning vinyl again, so it's good to have this on record and get back to enjoying it.

I just played this same record yesterday! Now playing: Bunky Green - The Places We've Never Been (Vanguard). Apparently, this was issued on CD but I've never seen it on a shelf, new or used. It's one drawback is the twangy bass sound of the late 70s/early 80s that just drives me nuts. Twang, twung, twang, twung... ugh.

I switched my mp3 rips to VBR Q1 and I really can't distinguish between the source CD and the resulting mp3 file. 256 CBR mp3 files, sure. Even some 320 CBR files have swooshy cymbals.

My total list: Curtis Counce "Landslide" (I would love it if you had "Carl's Blues" and "Sonority" as well) Billy Harper "If Our Hearts Could Only See" (Japanese) Scott Wendholt "Through the Shadows" (Criss Cross) ​Scott Wendholt "The Scheme of Things" (Criss Cross) Clifford Jordan "Highest Mountain" Billy Harper "Somalia" (hole punch in bar code) Billy Harper "Soul of an Angel" Tommy Flanagan "Overseas"

I definitely want this one: Curtis Counce "Landslide" I am going to go through the list for others. Kevin

Horace Silver's final studio album, "Jazz Has A Sense Of Humor" was released on Verve in 1999. It didn't get the greatest reviews, but I liked it.

There may be a problem with Audacity if you are using it for mp3 files. If you open an mp3 file and re-save it as an mp3 file, I am almost positive that it will compress an already-compressed file. The only way I've gotten good results using Audacity is to rip to .wav files, open & edit in Audacity and then "Export" to VBR Q1 mp3. Correct, as usual. You need mp3 audio editing software like mp3DirectCut. It features basic editing functions, including a tag editor, but it doesn't re-encode the mp3 file. I was saving as WAV and then using another program to put it back to MP3. I am confused... so you're opening an mp3 file in Audacity and then saving it off as a wav file then opening that wav file and re-encoding it back to mp3 with a new tag? If that's what you're doing, that's not good either.

There may be a problem with Audacity if you are using it for mp3 files. If you open an mp3 file and re-save it as an mp3 file, I am almost positive that it will compress an already-compressed file. The only way I've gotten good results using Audacity is to rip to .wav files, open & edit in Audacity and then "Export" to VBR Q1 mp3.

I wish I could tell you. I've downloaded several free tag editing programs and not one of them seems to be able to permanently alter my tags. I have a few music files where I accidentally pasted in an Excel spreadsheet into the album's artwork area via Windows Media Player. Now, no matter what I do to the tag, these files have this embedded into it. It's funny when I play one of these tracks in my car and a bunch of numbers show up in the artwork window. Wayne Shorter's "Ju Ju" will forever be 12.24731 12.4322 12.75443 to me.

I saw Roy this past Friday and while the music was very, very good, his age seems to caught up with him. The signs of dementia that I saw when I talked to him a year ago (forgetting shows/places he's played) have only gotten worse. His is on a tour now (at the Blue Note in NYC this week) and if you want to see him play live, I would strongly suggest doing it on this tour.

Bob Mintzer on Don Grolnick's "Weaver of Dreams" and Marty Ehrlich on Grolnick's "Nighttown" are both very good. Issued together as "The Complete Blue Note Recordings". Check out this track: http://youtu.be/6t-wyT3o6pw

I have a local buyer lined up. Thanks for looking. Kevin

RIP Mr. Spock. There goes another slice of my youth. I was major trekkie, going as far as skipping school to see the premier of the first Trek movie.

I offered this up at another forum and thought that maybe someone here might appreciate a good deal so here goes... My wife and I are starting to look into downsizing and one of the things I'll be losing is my separate listening room. Of course, that means that I will no longer need most of the gear in there. First up for sale: $1,400 plus actual shipping VPI Scout SE turntable with Ortofon 2M Black MM cartridge This turntable was discussed in depth on the Steve Hoffman forums: http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/vpi-scout-se-turntable.321690/. VPI only made 25 of these after they found a stash of unused HW19 platters during a warehouse cleanup and I was a lucky guy when my wife decided to buy one for me and give it to me for Christmas. I asked for it because I thought that the HW19 platter on the Scout plinth looked great. I was not disappointed - it does look great. I will be sad to see this go. I've used it about 150-250 hours, all with the Ortofon 2M Black MM cartridge that I am offering it with. It came with an HW19 platter & bearing as well as a JMW-9T Unipivot tonearm and a record clamp. I added a Soundsmith Counter Intuitive to make setup easier. This turntable/cart setup has been a stellar performer since I got it setup last March after several months of back and forth with VPI to get the correct alignment jig. Payment by PayPal only. I would prefer a local pickup but will ship using UPS at actual cost. I live in Southern NH, about an hour's drive from Boston. I want to sell this as a package deal, but I will separate them. If you only want the turntable without the cart, it would be $1,100.00 plus actual shipping. I had a buyer from CA who fell through but I did get an estimate of $88 to ship this to CA. Thanks for looking, Kevin

All the picture links are broken. I guess Seibert left Mosaic and lost the ability to host these pictures? It's too bad. There were some great ones. I saved them all locally but I can't upload them "as is" because there's a file size restriction here.

Snowbanks over my head. Ice dams one foot thick. I am sick of snow. I am sick of the cold. I'm getting too old for all this shoveling. I *am* too old for the roof-raking. I need to move somewhere warmer. Now my daughter just texted me that the town knocked down the snowbanks on the side of our street, burying the end of my driveway again. Ugh.

Best explanation I could find: http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2015/2/2/7962403/super-bowl-2015-patriots-interception-seahawks-play-call

From what I've read, everything seems to point to the Patriots baiting the Seahawks into that throw. They left their jumbo package in after the Seahawks subbed an extra eligible receiver. Also, the Patriots practiced that exact play earlier in the week so Butler knew what should happen when they came to the line with that look. Supposedly, Butler was beat by the practice squad on it. I still can't believe that they threw that ball. And many seem to miss is the other great game winning play in the end. Getting the Seahawks to jump offsides when they had the Patriots pinned on the 1 yard line was huge. You go from a Brady dive to a Brady knee.

On top of that, the snow isn't supposed to stop until late tonight so anyone trying to get up there tonight would have to drive through a heavy snow storm. Also, I don't know if you've ever been up there before, it's really in the middle of nowhere so it's not like it's an exit off of a highway. It's those backstreets that have the most accidents.

That won't be an issue, but thanks for the warning. Scott handled it great. He stopped playing and addressed the guy directly, basically telling him that the university specifically asked if he could do something different. He followed that comment up by pulling out a theremin and soloing on it for about 10 minutes. My daughters were like, "Whaaaaaattttt???" BTW, I was able to buy 2 of Scott's old LPs at that show. He only brought one copy of each and when I saw them in the lobby, these two young girls had them in their hands saying, "Are these calenders?" Ha ha ha.

On the bright side, you do have a captive audience of college students up there. They are stuck up there on campus so maybe you'll get more of these students looking for something to do. BTW, the last show I saw up there, Scott Robinson, was great but he did get heckled a bit by someone in the audience because he played pretty far out on a few songs. I think the guy yelled something like, "Play some real Jazz" (and no, it wasn't me!).

As of today, the roads are horrible. Unfortunately, the forecasters are predicting another 3-6 inches by Saturday morning *and* they're predicting another storm for Monday morning. It's not looking good for me heading up there for Monday night as of right now.