Hasafraker.com

Jan 12
2011

woo another follower!

Wow I picked up another follower! Seems that they’re an Indie artist, I checked out the sample music they have available, pretty decent stuff, give them a listen.

http://migratoryanimals.tumblr.com/

I’m currently listening to a Jazz CD that I’ve had for quite a long time, 3rd Force, Vital Force, now that is definitely worth a listen.

Also worth mentioning, the Bottlehead Crack OTL Headphone amp that I recently finished sounds better every day, the more hours I get on it the better it seems to get. I ordered a Speedball upgrade for it, this is basically an upgraded power supply, I will do my best to document the build with good before and after pictures I promise!

tags: Indie artist Migratory Animals Bottlehead Crack OTL 3rd Force Jazz Music

Nov 23
2010

catching a breath…

I realize it’s been a long time since I made a post, mostly that’s due to the fact that between work, going to the gym 3 nights a week and 2 classes this term… and work, I’m slammed and most of the time can’t remember my own name.

Well in keeping with tradition my wife can’t wait for Christmas and I love her for it lol. So, thus begins my “12 days of Christmas” as my presents show up… I get them hehe. So, tonight a little break from my homework and final projects.

Mingus Ah Um in 180g reissue perfection is spinning on my table and I must say… it’s the perfect addition to my collection and this glass of wine and sharp white cheddar are the icing on my cake.

So kids, you have to from time to time remember to come up for air, take a breath, look around, smell the roses and listen to some good music. If you can only do one of those things, I highly recommend the listening to good music. Music is good for the soul and while it might not be able to fix all that’s wrong with the world, sure can do a lot to help you forget about it for a while and unwind and relax.

tags: life music relaxation jazz

Sep 19
2010

Wooster Jazz Festival - 2010

engaged4good:

Today my husband and I traveled to Wooster for their Jazz Festival. This is our 3rd year and it never disappoints. With the threat of rain in the air, we were determined to get out and go enjoy the event no matter what and lucky for us, the rain stayed away.

Almost 100 artists were expected, but there were noticeably less than that this year. Unfortunately, many probably opted out due to the weather - they also missed out. We saw many familiar faces from other art shows and events we frequent. It is nice to recognize them and to BE recognized by these talented artists.

The music this year was spectacular. This event, without fail, showcases some of the best local jazz artists. Paul and I sat on a park bench and listened to The Ken Weaver Quartet. Then we headed down the street to Tulipan, a Hungarian pastry and coffee shop where we enjoyed a honeycake dipped in a chocolate-rum glaze and rolled in coconut flakes, an obligatory piece of Baklava and coffee. We strolled through a new store - Today’s Kitchen Store, and then to The Urban Cottage, a very cute consignment boutique and then up to The Wooster Gift Corner, one of the city’s oldest downtown retailers. We sat outside on a park bench and listened to the rest of the Ken Weaver Quartet’s set. We were hoping they would have CD’s for sale, but no such luck. The music then transitioned to Jack Shantz and Jazz Unit. We moved park benches and sat people watching. We especially enjoyed this boy who was probably about 10 years old making the most spectacular balloon animals I’ve ever seen. People seemed compelled to join us on the park bench - I got a kick out of two older women on the prowl for a good man. ”Go ask him to dance!” one friend said to the other…”There’s just never any good men at these things!” the other chimed in.

By this time, we were hungry. We headed down to Broken Rocks Cafe & Bakery. Our waitress could have easily been Uma Thurman’s twin sister. Her resemblance was quite uncanny. Paul swears our hostess looked like Jennifer Garner, but I didn’t see the resemblance. I enjoyed a nice smoked turkey sandwich with roasted red peppers, scallions and black pepper cream cheese on house bread. Paul got the Crabcake Po-Boy Sandwich. I really love this restaurant - it has a great atmosphere, nice artwork and a hip urban feel. Always a good time.

After lunch, we decided to head for home. On our way out, we spotted what appeared from a distance to be a very large bear laying ahead of us. Turns out, it was a man with his two purebred Newfoundland dogs. The female was 150 pounds and the male 170 pounds. Both were such docile, sweet animals. Very majestic looking dogs and stunning to see in person - my first time. I can honestly say I have never seen a dog so big in my life. A Great Dane may be bigger in height, but these dogs were huge. I could not believe the size of the feet. Unfortunately, we forgot the camera and our cell phones today, so no pictures. They sure drew a large crowd though. Very stunning to see them in person. It was a lovely day out with my husband. Good thing I took pictures last year so I have some to add to this post! I need to get the camera back in my purse so I don’t keep forgetting it.

tags: Wooster Jazz Festival 2010 Live Jazz in Ohio Jazz Festival Jazz

Jun 23
2010

My latest purchase!

Wow, I had no idea what a treat I was in for tonight! Oh little brown package, what surprise do you contain for me?! I picked this up off eBay last week, it arrived tonight, on the Pablo Live label, Count Basie Big Band – Montreux ’77, as I sit here listening to it for the first time I am just tickled. First off, it’s a live performance, second, I swear this LP is in Near Mint condition, there is almost zero background noise, this is some really good stuff! Just for fun, here’s the track list;

The Heat’s On
Freckle Face
Splanky
The More I See You
A Night In Tunisia
Hittin’ 12
Bag Of Dreams
Things Ain’t What They Used To Be
I Needs To Be Bee’d With
Li’l Darlin’
Jumpin’ At The Woodside
One O’Clock Jump

The style is Big Band and Swing, and I paid $5 for this shipped… yeah I’ll buy that for a dollar! :D Wow the first track on the second side leads off with a Sax solo, this is some really good stuff! I’m seriously diggin the bass player, close my eyes and it’s almost as if I’m there too. I could just sit here all night enjoying this, if it weren’t for my dog jumping on me I might forget that I’m really just at home.

It’s neat hearing Basie at the beginning of each side, and between some of the tracks introduce someone special or just letting the audience know what’s coming up. This is one of my favorite Basie LP’s now. I don’t have a ton of his stuff yet but I’m sure after this one it will surly lead to more!

tags: Count Basie Jazz Pablo Live Vinyl Count Basie Big Band - Montreux '77

Jun 22
2010

Brubeck Quartet in Europe

Tonight I wanted something relaxing, my wife and I just got back from the gym and I haven’t posted anything in a couple days. This album was one of the first Brubecks I picked up, my copy is the Stereo version, on Columbia, it’s an original 6 Eye red label. Released in 1958 it’s no wonder to me that my jacket is pretty trashed, but with the exception of a few scratches, sounds outstanding.

This is very well recorded, it’s also a live performance, you can hear whistles and cheers from the audience during Watusi Drums. It’s really something, the drums are fantastic, at one point of course I don’t know who but I heard someone smack something together that sounded a lot like another set of drum sticks, possibly someone moving a piece of equipment during the drum solo, the amount of detail captured on vinyl just amazes me.

My analogue system is pretty dialed in right now, I switch back and forth between my Nagaoka MP-100 and my Audio Technica AT120E, trying to find the differences and similarities, both are very detailed carts, tonight I’m running the AT and I’m quite pleased with what I’m hearing.

I really love Dave’s playing, this is such a great album. Side one starts with Wonderful Copenhagen which I completely enjoy. Paul Desmond leads off with his sax on this track. Dave finishes the track off and if you listen very closely you can hear him getting into it as he wraps up the last part with his own vocalized “do do doo dow” I had to play it back once again to make sure what I’d heard was really him lol.

Yeah, this one will probably remain one of my favorites for a long long time. Up beat, and yet relaxed all at the same time, very good jazz and well recorded to boot, if you’re a Brubeck fan and haven’t heard this one, you need to go to Amazon and listen to some clips, I still don’t have an easy way to record this stuff yet but I’m getting there!

tags: Dave Brubeck Dave Brubeck Quartet in Europe Jazz Columbia CS-8128

Jun 15
2010

after a long day…

Very tired tonight, was a stressful day. After dinner played some Simply Red, now listening to a fantastic copy of It’s Monk’s Time - Thelonious Monk, I really do enjoy the piano, my mom played pretty much her whole life, she tried to get me interested when I was a kid but it just didn’t take, I sure do like listening tho. This is a pretty laid back album, just what I needed.

If I was grading my copy I would say it’s VG++ play graded of course, no scratches, I have some finger prints on the LP label, my jacket would probably only tip the scale around a G/VG- Mostly due to seam splits but it looks good otherwise, thank goodness I don’t listen to the jackets ;)

On the Columbia label, circa 1964, I have a Mono pressing, catalog # is CL-2184. Even for it’s age it sounds fabulous, very well recorded.

tags: Thelonious Monk It's Monk's Time Columbia CL-2184 Vinyl Jazz

Jun 10
2010

kickin it with Brubeck

Looks like I have a kindred spirit out there, I was sitting here after dinner spinning some vinyl looking over the blog and noticed…I have a follower! Who’d have thunk it!? The cool thing about it, I was listening to a rather fantastic copy of Jazz at Oberlin and Dave was playing the piano solo and I was simply enjoying the music. Doesn’t get much better than that does it?

I have linked the cover shots to my Flickr account should you wish to read the jacket notes. This is one of my favorite Brubecks, I have quite a few of them, this one is in very nearly mint condition and sounds amazing. One of these days when I get my laptop sorted out to convert my LP’s to MP3, I’ll have to put up some of my favorite tracks. For now, I’m going to flip the record ;)

tags: Jazz at Oberlin Dave Brubeck vinyl Jazz

Jun 09
2010

Nagaoka MP-100 Moving Magnet Phono cartridge

After getting into Vinyl just a few months ago I have finally gotten the majority of my vinyl setup all sorted out. My starter table was a Dual CS-530, not a bad table for a newbie. The Dual afforded me the opportunity to hear some LP’s firsthand without a huge outlay of cash. Well I’m way beyond the Dual now. By most audiophile standards I’m sure my current turntable is nothing to write home about but to me it sounds fantastic. It’s a Sansui SR-525, a very solid direct drive table built in the late 70’s. Well the phono cartridge that I purchased for the Dual found its way to the Sansui, an AT92E, and for a universal cart, it sounds quite pleasant, but, I felt it was time for an upgrade to see what improvement could be had over the Audio Technica unit.

I spent several weeks looking at the MM carts in the $50-$100 range before settling on the cartridge that I purchased. I wanted to try something different other than just another Shure or Audio Technica so I opted for the Nagaoka MP-100. I couldn’t find a lot on the Nagaoka but what I did sounded promising and since I found nothing negative about it, I thought it a fairly safe bet.

The MP-100 is Nagaoka’s entry level cartridge. At the MP-100’s price point you’ll find some proven performers, just about every manufacturer has an offering or two. I’ve played a bit of everything through this cart; I’ve got a bit over 30 hours worth of play on it now. The biggest thing I’ve noticed with the MP-100 is how well balanced it is. It’s not overly bright, mids are nice, smooth and full, and bass is excellent. The Nagaoka does well with complicated (at least as complicated as I can provide) passages never seeming to get overwhelmed. I am very pleased with the performance of the MP-100. It’s very detailed, and has good tonal balance. I have yet to find any weakness.

Male and Female vocals are excellent, I played some Sinatra last night and was quite pleased, it sounded almost like he was in the room with me. I did notice the mids are better with the Nagaoka than with either of the other carts I’ve used. Ella Fitzgerald’s voice sounds perfect were before it was a bit hollow. Norah Jones and Melody Gardot sound fantastic. My Brubeck collection is extensive and the Nagaoka does them all justice. Time Further Out is my current favorite, Paul Desmond’s sax sounds awesome. I played a single that a friend got for me of the Gorillaz, Stylo and that sounded exceptionally good over all, bass was very clean and well defined. I pulled out some Talking Heads, Little Creatures; good separation with a wide sound stage. The grin on my face can’t be wrong ;)

I have noted one slight almost non-issue and that is at 1.8g of tracking force the conical tip doesn’t track quite as well as the Audio Technica cart that it replaced. I have a couple LP’s that are fairly scratched up that the AT and even a Shure will track through without skipping, the Nagaoka will skip. Like I said, this is almost a non-issue as it will track through everything else just not the worst scratches.

From Louis Armstrong to Mozart or the Rolling Stones the Nagaoka MP-100 does an admirable job of proving it is quite capable of handling just about anything you want to spin its way, which in my opinion just adds to its value and appeal. This is a fantastic cartridge, and what it does, it does well without breaking the bank.

*minor update to this, I recently picked up a couple new LP’s in fine condition except that they are warped. Normally this would really suck and I’d be inclined to return them, however… the Nagaoka MP-100 can track right through the warps, where as the new AT120E that I just picked up cannot. The AT120E thinks the warp is a Ski Jump and the needle is all over the place skipping every time the warp passes. not only could this damage or destroy my stylus but it does nothing to enhance my mood :P The extra tracking force with the MP-100 is enough to overcome the defective LP which is fantastic, because what would have been a scrap LP I can still listen to!

My system; Turntable – Sansui SR-525, Preamp – VPSP w/separate PSU, Amp – Decware SE84DIY 2.5w Stereo SET, Speakers – Tekton Design 8.1’s, IC’s and Speaker wire all DIY.

tags: Nagaoka MP-100 moving magnet phono cartridge Vinyl Jazz

Miles Davis - Kind of Blue

Well let’s get this off with something that I like. This last weekend I picked up my very own copy of Miles Davis - Kind of Blue, of course it’s a reissue as I have no desire to spend a ton of money on an original or special edition reissue or something silly like that. My copy is on 180g vinyl on the Not Now label, and now I see why this is the #1 selling Jazz album of all time. I’m currently listening to it, this is an outstanding album but I’m sure if you’re familiar and have heard it before you already know that. If you haven’t heard it, if you love jazz, you have to hear this one, you will not be disappointed.

I gotta help out my guy Pete, if you’re near Kent Ohio, visit The Vinyl Underground and buy some records! They have an excellent selection of vinyl considering their limited space. Pete is always bringing in new stuff so check them out.

tags: Miles Davis Jazz Vinyl kind of blue