Kevin Bresnahan

The first Japanese Blue Note CDs were given a catalog number of CP35-XXXX and done in the mid-eighties by an engineer in Japan. They had a unique mastering. There were only a few titles... maybe 6? The next batch of 50 CDs, called "The Best 50 Series" had a CP32 prefix and as I understand it, used Ron McMaster's digital master. These should be digital dupes to the US CD. In fact, many of the first "US CDs" were pressed in Japan and only differentiated by the paint job. The TOCJ-15XX, 42XX and 43XX series started as 16 bit and switched to 20 bit very early on. As far as I know, these masterings are unique and were done in Japan by a Toshiba engineering team. However, there were a few TOCJs, mostly in the 16XX series, that consisted of unissued or rare titles. Some of them used Ron McMaster's digital master. I believe they listed this on the back of the CD. I have TOCJ-1616, Tina Brooks' "Minor Move", and it lists McMaster on it.

My feeling on these two audiophile reissue series is this: If I have the title on a Japanese TOCJ-4XXX CD, I'm not ordering the new remaster. I prefer the sound of these mid-90s TOCJ CDs. Quite frankly, the XRCDs of two of them that I already had on a TOCJ CD sounded almost identical. As for RVG CDs, there are some clunkers and some beauties. Some need no replacement like the Japanese RVG CDs of LaRoca's "Basra" or Morgan's "Search For The New Land". Kevin

Back up to a hard drive and then shut it off and store it somewhere. Only pull it out if you need it. It should last a long time with no wear & tear. BTW, I would stay away from DVD media for long term storage. I have had several that stopped reading after a little over a year on the shelf. Scared the heck out of me. I'm glad I did not delete what I had burned onto these DVD-Rs. Kevin

I don't know why you would expect anything different. Why do you think I posted what I did here instead of there? It's because if I had posted this, not only would they have deleted it, they likely would have banned me. If you want to talk about it, do it here not there. If you keep bringing it up there, you'll just wind up being banned. Kevin

Story link not requiring a login: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100216/ap_en_mu/eu_britain_abbey_road One line in this article got me to chuckle: "Abbey Road is one of the company's most high-profile assets, as both a recording studio and a tourist attraction for Beatles fans." Tourist attraction? They've obviously never tried visiting this "tourist attraction". I took the Tube to Abbey Road Studios during a London vacation in 1998. It was not a short trip. All the way there, my wife was telling me how much time we were wasting to see a "stupid recording studio". We had trouble finding it too. There are no signs directing you there and when you finally find it, it looks like a regular house in the middle of a neighborhood. I went in the front door expecting some kind of lobby/shop where I could buy a coffee mug or something and instead I was faced with a very snotty receptionist who basically kicked me out. She wouldn't even let me take a picture of the front desk. "We are a working recording studio, not a tourist shop". No souvenirs. No pictures. No nothing! Well, not nothing: I did get a picture of me in "the crosswalk".

It turns out that it was the gayest Super Bowl ever! :lol: :lol:

If you want to dupe a CD using EAC: Click Action-> Copy Image & Create CUE Sheet-> Uncompressed. Note the file name of the .cue sheet you're creating. After the disc is backed up to the hard drive, put a blank CD in your burner and then select Tools-> Write CD-R... This will bring up the CD Layout Editor. In this window, click File-> Load CUE Sheet and click on the CUE sheet you created with the first step. After it loads, click CD-R-> Write CD... Remember that EAC does not remove files after you make your dupe. You have to go and manually delete them.

Talk about hijacked... a few weeks back, I went to ronniecuber.com and was shocked at what came up. His domain name was taken over by some company selling rape tapes! I had to run a virus scan after that.

I really like "The Antidote" on Arabesque, but then again, I'm probably digging it because I really like Ron Blake.

Well, I don't think Masada "Beit" would go over too well.

I like the ballad compilations and play them frequently during meals. They are usually a hit when we have company. It seems that most of them prefer mellow jazz for "dinner music".

Minus 4 days of posts! Two posts since it's gone back up asking what happened have disappeared too. Stalin-esque is a very apt descriptor of that place.

I think it's hilarious what just happened over on the Steve Hoffman forums. Someone who does publishing for a living commented that he felt the artwork, both the cover scans as well as the typography, could have been done better. After two days of pretty interesting comments wondering if Audio Wave was trying for something different and then today *poof*... all gone. Scrubbed for your benefit. Joe, I hope you'll read this and maybe give us a comment. No matter how you slice it, poster deanswift58 had some very credible points, particularly about the quality of the cover scans, with actual pictures to highlight what he felt could have been done better. I didn't think it was that negative. In fact, it seemed like he was offering up his professional help, going so far as letting you know he'd do it for free. I really hope you didn't ask for that mass deletion. Kevin

The two CDs are sold. Thanks for looking. Kevin PS. If anyone else is thinking about selling, I got a lot of pms asking for them. I couldn't keep up. I guess a lot of people are looking to buy these XRCDs.

I bought all 4 of the AudioWave XRCDs of Blue Note titles when they came out. After a couple of comparative spins, two of them sound similar enough to their Japanese TOCJ counterpart that I see no need to keep both versions so.... Shipping in the US is included. International shipping is actual cost. Payment via PayPal or money order. International payments must be via PayPal as I've had a lot of trouble with other payment types from outside the US. Post here or PM me. First PM gets it. $23 shipped to a US address Tina Brooks - True Blue AudioWave AWMXR-0004 Disc is pressed in Japan. Disc and Artwork are M: It looks like new. $23 shipped to a US address Horace Parlan - Speakin' My Piece AudioWave AWMXR-0002 Disc is pressed in Japan. Disc and Artwork are M: It looks like new. Thanks for looking, Kevin

Oh, don't get me wrong, HDCD discs rip fine. The problem I have had is that sometimes, the resulting audio files sound like there's some extra high frequency info that can sound like fingernails on chalkboard to me. The worst case was a private recording of my niece's choir. I was asked to make a dupe. The CD was HDCD encoded. The only way I could get a good-sounding dupe was in my audio replicator (that works in analog). Every digital dupe I ripped sounded terrible. Sibilance dominated the vocals.

Shows how to use EAC to copy a CD.

My search for a decent commuter car has not ended. I am leaning away from a simple car and toward a small SUV. I will have two daughters in college next year and moving them back and forth to school requires a vehicle with some space in back. At the moment, I'm leaning toward a used Toyota Highlander Hybrid, which is about the only way I can afford one (new ones run over $30K). If I do buy a Toyota, and it's certainly not a done deal yet, I expect it will be a great car. It may have problems that will be fixed, either by a recall or simply by me finding something wrong. All car makers have problems and it's how they handle those problems that makes the difference. FWIW, I hope the bad part, which seems to be on US made Toyotas, is not due to a US manufacturer screwing up a spec. If they do find that out, that company will be locked out of future Toyota builds. My company does business in the automotive industry and they insist on zero defects. It is VERY hard to make ANYTHING with zero defects for life. Kevin EDIT #2: I just read that the part in question is supplied by a US supplier. Well, they're probably out of business now. More headed for unemployment. EDIT #1: I just got a call from my sister-in-law. A few years back, she called me for advice on how to get out of her 2007 Toyota Camry that stalled on the highway in rush hour traffic. She was terrified that she was going to die driving that car. I told her to bring it into the dealer and if they came back with the expected "there's nothing wrong with your car", demand a new car. She did, and wound up paying a bit out of pocket for a new Honda Accord (which she hates - handling's too stiff). She is wondering there will be a class action lawsuit. I told her it's probably already in the works but the end result would probably be a coupon for $2000 a new Toyota.

The rule making it illegal to hit a quarterback at the knees was put into effect after the Steelers' Kimo von Oelhoffen rolled into Carson Palmer's knee and knocked him out of a playoff game in 2006 so technically it's "The Palmer Rule". When Brady got injured, it was from a player who, after he was blocked to the ground, got up and dove at his knee. The NFL added a restriction to the Palmer Rule making that move illegal as well.

Rock & Roll day.... Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band - Live Bullet Up next: 'Til Tuesday - Voices Carry folowed by: Sting - Dream of the Blue Turtles All of these are from Stereo Jack's dollar bin!

And this will make me want to buy a GM vehicle at full price why?????? Wake up GM. It's people like me that GM NEEDS to gain back, not people who already have their stuff. The last 5 or 6 GM products I've owned had huge maintenance costs. From what I'm hearing at work, Ford isn't any better these days. A friend's F-150 is costing him about $2,500 per year in maintenance costs. So I'm supposed to switch back to GM why? Ford? Tell me what are my incentives? Sorry Lon, but Saturn's going the way of the Edsel. If you want one, buy it now. In a few years, it'll be a "collectible" and that almost always equates to "big bucks". Kevin

Here I am thinking about possibly switching back to an American car after many carefree years in several Toyotas. I go back & forth on this, mainly because in the end, I have to pay for the decision and my last few American cars have cost me A LOT. However, I do want to support American workers. So as I have looked at the (mostly expensive) American car offerings, I have visited several dealers and gotten on some E-mail lists. The offers come fast & furious. The latest from GM really has me scratching my head. To wit: It pays to be loyal. We're giving you Owner Loyalty Cash good toward almost every new 2009 and 2010 GM vehicle. As long as you or someone in your household owns or leases a 1999 or newer model year GM vehicle, you can redeem your Owner Loyalty Cash and use it toward an eligible, new one. But act quickly — this exclusive offer ends February 1, 2010. To see the list of eligible vehicles, or to get more information, click here. Your discount pays off. Want even more great savings? It's easy. Combine your Owner Loyalty Cash with your Credit Union Member Discount from GM,² plus most current incentives. Duh. Why on earth would you limit it to current owners?? Wouldn't it make more sense to try and give people incentive to SWITCH BACK to GM car rather than try and tap current owners? What incentive do I have to switch? None. Screw these guys. I'm going back to Toyota! :) BTW, since I started this thread, I found out that the Ford Fusion is 100% Mexican made. So much for buying an American made Ford. Later, Kevin

I've traveled to the Vanguard on several occasions and every time, I've tried to drag along a friend of mine who lives in the area. Every time I ask, he says, "I'm not going back to the Vanguard until the bitch dies". Later, Kevin

No. Exact Audio Copy does what it says - it makes exact audio copies. Windows Media Player does not make that claim because it doesn't. It'll rip right through read errors and let the error correction worry about it. As CJ mentions above, this is especially important with damaged discs. BTW, copying HDCD encoded discs is even trickier. I have had a lot of trouble, even with EAC. I get some high frequency distortion with some HDCD encoded CDs. Quite frankly, EAC can be daunting for someone who just wants to copy a CD. If you want a nice easy ripper, try CDex. Kevin

Unless another player has added it, Windows Media Player is the only media player with a graphic equalizer. While some might not care for this or feel that they have to listen to their music flat, I find a lot of today's rock CDs sound like crap without rolling off some of the highs. I use it for almost all playback situations. I would NEVER use it as a ripper. Shudder. wma files suck. I use Exact Audio Copy (EAC) for all of my ripping. Unfortunately, I have been told that it is not supported on Vista (another reason why I never upgraded). Kevin