Category: Audio Gear

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Monday Morning Ambient

Loscil/Lawrence English – Colours Of Air (2023)

I’m slowly backfilling my Loscil catalog and this has become one of my favorites.

And in case you haven’t noticed, this particular player, the D-EJ915 has also become my favorite portable. The overall design and choice of materials used, the build quality and the sound all contribute to that. Yeah, it uses rechargeable gumstick batteries, but even the crappy ones made nowadays still manage to keep it happily powered for a couple days’ listening sessions. And if those run out, I have the external AA battery case to connect in an emergency. (Can your music player running out of juice really be called an emergency?)

The 915 doesn’t have a built-in display but that’s proven to be less of a liability than I initially thought. The display on the supplied inline remote [one of Sony’s worst designs IMHO] supplies all the info and frankly after living with this player for a couple months now, I think if they’d designed a built-in display on the lid it would’ve really destroyed the aesthetics.

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In Honor Of Dolly

This record is among the half dozen or so pieces of vinyl in my collection at the time that survived “the great purge” in the late 80s. I never thought it was a particularly good record, but it still held some sentimental value that caused me to keep it back then and even today I remember the afternoon I bought it—and where.

It was sometime in the fall of 1978. As is typical with Phoenix that time of year, it was balmy. The extreme heat was gone for the season but it hadn’t yet turned cold. I’d gone to Odyssey Records on the southeast corner of Camelback and 12th Street in search of something else, but this record was prominently displayed in the store’s 12-inch singles section. Naturally I’d heard it in the clubs by this point, but it hadn’t grabbed me enough to actually rush out and get a copy. It seemed that Dolly—like Rod Stewart—had been pushed in the disco direction unwittingly and it showed.

But then I saw it…the pink vinyl peeking out of the center hole of the sleeve.

I had to get it if only for that one aspect. Finding colored vinyl in the wild back in the day was a pretty rare occurrence. Would I have gotten if it were standard black vinyl?

In all honesty, probably not. This was years before 9 to 5 or Best Little Whorehouse in Texas or Fried Green Tomatoes. Naturally I knew who she was and I was familiar with many of her songs, but Dolly really hadn’t made an impact on my consciousness yet. Of course, all that changed over the next 40 years and while I considered Baby I’m Burnin’ more of a novelty than anything else at the time, it’s become one of my most treasured records.

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Tonight’s CD To MiniDisc Dub Session

Saint Tropez – Belle De Jour (1979)

I’d been a fan of Saint Tropez since their initial release, Je T’aime in 1977. It was sexy, slow-dancing disco, and in fact the main track from that album, Violation was the first time I’d ever slow danced with another man, David Martinez.

Belle de Jour is one of my favorite disco records from 1979 and one of only two album covers I have framed.

After I heard Belle De Jour the first time that night back in ’79, I left the club, gave up my prime parking spot and drove downtown to Circles Records. Firstly because if anyone in town had this record, it would be them, and secondly—well, they were open until midnight…

Sadly, they didn’t yet have it in stock, so I drove back to the club and was rewarded later that evening by the DJ playing the track a second time.

I did finally get a copy not too long after that and—like J’Taime—acquired a copy of its own translucent pink vinyl version via Discogs about ten years ago.

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Morning Tunes

Sade – Love Deluxe (1992)

Sade has been such an integral part of the soundtrack of my life since she first burst on the scene in 1984. One of my fondest memories of listening to her music was one afternoon when I was underground, waiting on MUNI at the Van Ness Station and I was plugged in and walk-dancing along the edge of the platform while listening to Stronger Than Pride. I knew I looked ridiculous, like a scene from an as-yet unreleased iPod advert with the black figure dancing with the white headphones, but I didn’t care. I was in my happy place.

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Mellow House Morning

David Visan – Buddha Bar V (2003)

This is an interesting series. All of them are different, but Disk 1 always has a kind of a mellow, laid-back, coffee-in-the-morning vibe, while Disk 2 is 80 minutes of hard core dance.

This one in particular has a decidedly middle-eastern flavor.

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Oh Wow…

I’ve never dubbed this way before. Probably because I didn’t have the proper cable. Digitally dubbing via portables is easier than deck-to-deck. (That’s deck, you perverts!) Transfers track marks and everything.

I found a brand new, unopened original Sony OEM optical cable on eBay for less money than buying an Amazon Essentials.

And I’m loving my new desk mat.

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Morning Tunes/The More You Know

Dire Straits – Brothers in Arms (1985)

Playing on my period-specific Discman.

I learned that this particular CD was the very first that was digitally recorded from beginning to end, in other words a “DDD” recording (digital recording, digital mixing, digital mastering) and is considered one of the best-sounding CDs out there. I can’t attest to that personally because my copy is not from the original 1985 run, but a reissue and who knows what’s been done in the interim, but it does still sound good.

Sonic excellence aside, Brothers in Arms has always been a problematic album for me, mainly because of the “little faggot” lyrics in Money for Nothing, but like a lot of other artists with problematic catalogues I can force myself to turn a blind eye. Does this make me a bad person?

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Afternoon Tunes

Cerrone – Cerrone’s Paradise (1978)

Still coming off the high that was Cerrone’s debut, Love in C-Minor, the year before, when Cerrone’s Paradise appeared in 1978 I was less than impressed. I wouldn’t say I hated it, but it most definitely wasn’t Love in C-Minor.

It was only years later that I realized Love in C-Minor was a heavy collaboration with disco daddy Alec Costandinos of Romeo & Juliet fame. All of Cerrone’s releases subsequent to his first were his own work; his own sound. And over the years I came to love it.

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Afternoon Tunes

Cindy & Roy – Feel It (1979)

Obscure doesn’t begin to describe this one. It didn’t get much club play back in the day, and all the copies I’ve seen are marked For Promotional Use Only. It’s not great, but it’s not awful; middle-of-the-road disco would be a good description. It was their only release, and even now they’d rather not talk about it. There’s no CD release, so I dubbed my vinyl onto a shiny silver disc some time ago.

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Morning Tunes

Supertramp – Breakfast In America (1979)

How did I miss this one all. these. years?!?

I know how I overlooked it when it first came out. 1979? I was deep in the throes of disco. While other genres occasionally broke into my consciousness at the time, what I call traditional FM pop/rock wasn’t one of them. But seriously…I never gave this one a second glance until a few days ago based on some strong recommendations from the Reddit, and I slip on my headphones and just get lost in it. I can now understand why it’s ranked among some of the best albums (and recordings) ever made.

Especially the final track, Child Of Vision:

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