Reader Service
About six months ago (just before Christmas) I asked for some product information using one of your Reader Service cards. After a couple of months I didn't receive it, so I asked for it again. I still haven't gotten it.
What's wrong with you guys anyway?
ARTHUR NELSON Lincoln, Neb.
The Editor replies: Probably a lot of the same things that are wrong with most people, but not answering our mail is not among them! The Reader Service cards in each issue of STEREO REVIEW are a free service for our readers designed to simplify their obtaining product information from our advertisers (if you are requesting more than one item, it even saves a little on postage). We do not, however, handle the packaging and mailing of the information itself. What we do is supply the reader's name and address to the advertisers whose "bingo" numbers were circled on the Reader Service card so that they can handle their own mailing. Unfortunately, in this as in all else, the world is an imperfect place, and not all advertisers give such requests first priority, delaying the mailing of the information for unreasonable lengths of time or possibly even neglecting to mail it at all. And some advertisers, of course, request that they not be assigned a Reader Service number; if you want to contact them you must do so direct. In defense of advertisers, it must be added that most of them cheerfully process all requests promptly even though they know that some may not be serious inquiries. However, if you have been having trouble getting information from a bashful manufacturer or two by means of the Reader Service card system, try writing them direct.
Giles, Giles, and Fripp
In the April "Letters," Denny C. Lail asked whatever became of Giles, Giles, and Fripp. As any lover of great rock music should know, Robert Fripp and Mike Giles teamed up with Greg Lake to form the precocious and phenomenal King Crimson. Brother Peter Giles joined in on the bass for the second King Crimson album before leaving to be come a computer operator. Mike Giles also left after the second album to join Ian Mc Donald (now with Foreigner) to play music that was "more personal to them." Fripp continued as the bedrock of King Crimson through eight more albums, each employing a different array of musicians. He is now possibly the best studio guitarist in England and has recently been playing with ex-Genesis lead singer Peter Gabriel. Enough?
KENNETH OLSEN Albuquerque, N.M.
Not quite. Robert Fripp is now living in New York and has been getting involved with the production side of records, his latest credit in that area being "The Roches" for Warner Bros.
Dance Rock?
I am a thirty-year-old devout follower of rock-and-roll, and to me the best in rock criticism is represented by Steve Simels and Lester Bangs (who was a high-school classmate of mine). Nevertheless, Steve's response to Tom Ruzga's April letter regarding the Clash's "Give 'Em Enough Rope" is not real ly to the point. If I want to dance I will listen to disco. Steve, stick with Elvis Costello!
CRAIG R. BARTHELMESS; San Diego, Calif.
Craig, see Paulette Weiss' column this month; people are dancing to rock.
Digital Remastering?
I think that Editor William Anderson's "Postponing Life" in the April issue misses an important point. He speaks of digital recording only as a threat to our existing libraries of analog recordings. If and when we get a reasonably priced system of digital home playback, it could breathe new life into sever al decades of analog recordings. I have the impression, mostly from reading STEREO REVIEW, that there is a considerable gap in sound quality between a master tape and the usual disc release. A digital rerelease dubbed directly from the master could bridge that gap, allowing us to hear "classic" recordings as they have never before been heard outside the studio control room. Lots of people would hear for the first time how good an analog re cording can be. I could myself compile quite a list of beloved recordings of which I would eagerly buy digital rereleases.
JOHN NIESSINK Portage, Mich.
The Editor replies: Nice try, but no cigar. Even today's best analog master tapes usually have much more frequency limiting, dynamic compression, and distortion than digital masters, and although there may be something to be gained, sonically speaking, from transcribing some of the better analog masters through this spanking new technology, digital techniques should be considered primarily as a means of giving us something we have not heard before, even in control rooms, not as a salvage for the sinking past. In any case, the very last thing I would want to call them is a "threat!" Simels Zapped
I was going to write a letter praising Steve Simels for his brief but fair exposé on Frank Zappa in the April issue. "What an honest and responsible journalist he is," I thought to myself, "for printing [p. 81] such critical words about his own profession." Then I read his review of the new George Harrison album in the same issue. Alas, how ironic that Mr. Simels should be the exact kind of "literate intellectual" that Frank Zappa was so critical of. The "subliminal attitude that permeates all of rock journalism" makes me sick, too, Frankie! If George Harrison is boring com pared with the Beatles, name me more than a handful of contemporary musicians who aren't. If that is Steve Simels' idea of criticism, please cancel my subscription to the "music" section of STEREO REVIEW (just rip it out; I don't care about the jagged edges, just so I'm not tempted to read such pompous trash).
ROBERT ASH; Atlanta, Ga.
As a subscriber to STEREO REVIEW for several years, I have observed that the favorite targets of those who write letters to the editor are the record reviewers. This, of course, indicates that little criticism of the magazine's format, feature articles, product reports, and advertising is needed. I agree.
But we in the twenty-to thirty-year-old age bracket must find fault with everything, from our sex lives to the color of, our money. (Failure to find fault does not prove a lack of fault, only our ignorance of it-which works out fine because we can then berate ourselves for our ignorance.) A negative review may bring out almost animalistic reactions from some readers, but this is a positive result from the magazine's perspective, since it shows that the reviewers are reaching the readers (any reaction beats no reaction).
What this is leading up to is that I have as signed myself the burden of defending Steve Simels. His writings seem to annoy many STEREO REVIEW readers. But I find his humor enjoyable, his writing style interesting, and his many "reflections" into the past stimulating to my own memory. Steve's job is to entertain readers, and, in approximately four years, I have yet to read an unentertaining article by him. It isn't important if he likes the artist or music he is writing about; most people who invest substantial money in stereo systems trust their own opinions in these areas.
DONALD F. LARGE; Liverpool, N.Y.
Cassette Portables
Although I enjoyed Ivan Berger's March article on portable cassette recorders (having recently gone through the process of choosing one for myself), I would like to suggest some additional points worth considering by potential purchasers and also make a couple of small corrections.
In order to save on size and weight, some units have a separate a.c. power pack, which is fine if most of your recording will be done using batteries. If, however, you need portability mainly to get the deck from one place to another and plan to use available a.c. outlets at your recording locales, the a.c. power pack becomes a necessity rather than an option. In that case, you should consider not only its additional weight but also the inconvenience of having an additional piece of equipment to carry around.
Battery life is an important consideration, [poor / missing content, begin ] but so is the number of batter takes. The Nakamichi 550 may [...] life, but it requires eight D eel Sony TC-1.58SD has a 10-ho quires only four D cells.
Another weight-and cost-s taken by some manufacturers plastic parts in the switching/tr anism. The life span of such pa ably shorter than that of metal [poor / missing content, begin ] erally failure will require repla [poor / missing content, begin ] mechanism rather than an indiv There were two errors in tI scription of the Sony TC-15' "memory" light on the VU [poor / missing content, begin ]
The 'battery mode light switch will cause them to gl Sour seconds and then fade ou, stay on continuously during a.,1 Second, the unit does have a br with surprisingly good fidelity.
[...] not good enough to judge rec unlike headphone monitoring playback to more than one it; [...] without separate playback equ', M Sr Ivan Berger replies: Mr. Lia for the most part, well taker, them were omitted from the 't reasons of space. In the matte; [...] metal parts, I wasn't able to apart to check this, and I don't prospective buyer could either. Th the description of the Sony deck we, ambiguities in the manufacturer's h, as with some of the other units [poor / missing content, begin ] prticle, I was not able to make any personal examination of machine.
1979 Chipmunks
Steve Simels is warped for comparing Bee Gees to the Chipmunks. I'm embarrassed.
for them should they happen to catch up with this unjustifiable criticism (April 1979). You see, I adore them. I own all but two of their al bums and cherish each ballad and "crying song." Okay, okay, I'll admit that not all their songs are A-1, but even the lesser ones were a foundation for their current hits.
JOANNE M. BUDZIK; Coatesville, Pa.
I accidentally tuned in the wrong FM station the other evening at midnight, and after recording what I thought was the Chipmunks I replayed the tape. Well, I wasn't too disappointed, for at either 3 3/4 or 7 1/2 ips what I had recorded sounded very much like David Seville and his Chipmunks. Unfortunately, it was the Bee Gees.
EDWARD L. DWYER; Manahawkin, N.J.
Design Relevance
Regarding Julian Hirsch's article in the March 1979 issue, "Distortion, How Small Must It Be?", and Larry Klein's response to the dual-power-supply question in the same issue, I want to tender a corporate "right on" from the folks in the Phase Linear engineering department.
Design philosophy at Phase Linear dictates tat our products deliver optimum value, performance, and reliability in all respects. Practically, this means that several parameters of aeration must be evaluated to make a proper gment as to required slew rate, harmonic distortion, TIM, and so forth. Without such evaluation, many dollars can be poured [...] a product without any necessary improvement in sonic performance.
The importance of direct-current handling vability in audio is questionable, at best: [...] ears, tape heads, phono cartridges, and broadcasts ignore d.c. The necessity for y high slewing rates is also questionable, for the very same reason. The fact that recording media cannot handle these two sects of the much-misinterpreted square ,e is not as important as the fact that we [...] !ply can't find d.c. or very large, very fast [...] 'salons in any live audio source. However, hese non-relevant performance criteria [...] -le free, so to speak (they usually do not), v should be passed along to the consum if for no other reason than to keep these [poor / missing content, begin ] at a minimum so we may more fitably spend our time designing products at deal perfectly with the relevant aspects udio we can hear.
TERRY L. PENNINGTON Design Engineer, Phase Linear Corp. Lynnwood, Wash.
Toscanini's Franck
In his April review of the Guido Cantelli recording of Franck's Symphony in D Minor, I Kresh committed an error in saying that intelli conducts it as his mentor [Tos , to . . . ." Between 1930 and 1946 Tos "condescended" to play the Franck symph. at least eleven times with the New k Philharmonic and the NBC Symphony. [...] reover, I have heard a tape of the 1946 performance (the one with the NBC Symphony) [...] -yes, Mr. Kresh-it is much like Centel- [...] -eading.
EDWARD SICHI JR. Monongahela, Pa.
Paul Kresh replies: My casual remark about Toscanini and the Franck symphony was based simply on the fact that no commercial recording of the work by him was ever re leased. I am happy to learn that he conducted it so many times and would 'love to hear a tape.
Third World
I was somewhat surprised and slightly offended when I read the February 1979 re view of Third World's "Journey to Addis" and saw them described as a "Bahamian" group. Being an avid fan of theirs, I must correct this error, which I'm sure was not deliberate: Third World is a wholly Jamaican group.
RAYMOND A. DONALDSON Kingston, Jamaica
Popular Music Editor Paulette Weiss replies:
We regret the error. The press release on Third World described them as a Caribbean group, which somehow got translated into Bahamian. They are indeed Jamaican; right neighbor hood, wrong address.
Also see:
KEEPING IT CLEAN--RECORD HYGIENE: The scanning electron microscope reveals some fascinating secrets, by GEORGE ALEXANDROVICH
TECHNICAL TALK: Fuse Distortion? by JULIAN D. HIRSCH
BULLETIN, by WILLIAM LIVINGSTONE
Source: Stereo Review (USA magazine)