cd

I bought a ticket and was ready to go to Woodstock; however, my ride chickened out and I missed the seminal musical event of the 1960s.

The thing is, over the course of those three days in August 1969, I, even a 20-year-old, was glad I missed it.

Sure, three days of peace and music sounds nice, but Woodstock was an instant media legend. Granted, great bands were there by the helicopter load; but the sound, as best as I could tell, was awful for the crowd gathered. Unlike today's high-powered concert sound systems that can easily play sound loud enough to cause hearing loss, the Woodstock system was probably pretty low intensity volumewise. Then again, I'm sure most of the 500,000 Woodstock Nation attendees were grooving under their own power.

That, combined with the rain, mud, and less than stellar lavatories would have made me pretty miserable.

I bought the "Woodstock: Music from the original Soundtrack" LP when it came out, and I saw the film--in 70mm in Manhattan. For me, those were a lot better than being there. I listened to the best music of the three days and didn't have to endure the rest of ordeal.

Think about it: The edited, perfected versions of the event are the ways most folks have experienced Woodstock. Most people were either too young to go in the first place, and most boomers, like myself, didn't get there. For us, Woodstock is the movie or music.

I just wonder for those who were there, have the movie and soundtrack albums replaced their memories of the actual event? There seems to be an endless stream of Woodstock titles coming out. … Read more

This is Part 2 of a list of my favorite sounding CDs of late, in no particular order. My preference is for realistic-sounding recordings, recordings that allow the band to sound "live." And sure, I still like a lot of recordings that are heavily processed, but I wouldn't by any stretch use them to "test" the naturalness of a speaker.

The first half of the top 10 CD list appeared in the previous Audiophiliac.

Savage Aural Hotbed, "Wreckquiem"

Talk about heavy metal, Savage Aural Hotbed is a (mostly) industrial percussion group. They rhythmically hit, scrape, or smash pipes, barrels, tenor and baritone snorkelhorns, electric power tools, and drums. I love SAH records for their dense textures and searing dynamics and this new one will give your system an aerobic workout while dazzling your ears with its mesmerizing charms.

Rosanne Cash, "10 Song Demo"

OK, this one's from 1996, but it's withstood the test of time. True to the title, it's just Cash accompanied by a small group of players, Production is minimal, so if your system is good enough the music can sound very, very real. The music's a perfect 10.

Gerald Clayton, "Two-Shade"

Clayton's nimble piano trio delivers hard-driving pieces and explosive improvisations that'll push your hi-fi to the limit. The piano, bass, and drums balance is, musically and sonically, as good as it gets. It may be Clayton's trio, but it's a band of equals. The stereo image is set back, behind the plane of my speakers, so it doesn't have the claustrophobic, up close perspective of most contemporary jazz recordings. … Read more

Black Hat this week means lots of security vulnerabilities in the news, including the fact that Secure Sockets Layer is now just Sockets Layer thanks to an exploit discovered by Kaminsky and friends. We also decide that you can't fix stupid. Too bad. I wish we could.

Apple at CES 2010 says WSJ – Engadget says otherwise. http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-10299417-37.html http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/30/wsj-apple-going-to-ces-2010-reality-nope/

Apple says jailbreaking is a national security issue http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10298646-1.html

Details on presidential motorcades, safe house for First Family, leak via P2P http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9136053/Details_on_presidential_motorcades_safe_house_for_First_Family_leak_via_P2P

Researchers exploit flaws in SSL, domain authentication system http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-10299459-245.html

Intel motherboards suffer Bios flaws http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39698949,00.htm

Re-engineering GPS for navigation on phones http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-10298696-94.html

Windows Mobile becomes Windows Phone http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1495570/windows-mobile-windows-phone

Nissan introduces new smart in-car nav system http://social.telematicsupdate.com/content/nissans-new-nav-system-focuses-safer-greener-driving

EMI selling CDs to megachains only from now on http://slashdot.org/story/09/07/30/0117222/EMI-Only-Selling-CDs-To-Mega-Chains-From-Now-On… Read more

It's interesting. Tens of millions of homes are equipped with multichannel home theater systems, but multichannel music is a dead issue. Stereo rules the roost, for going on 50 years.

Ten years ago it looked like stereo's days were numbered--the two new multichannel formats, SACD and DVD-Audio, were on track to be the next big things. Funny, it didn't work out that way. I cover the subject in detail in my "Whatever happened to 5.1-channel music?" article that appeared in the July issue of Stereophile magazine.

Obviously, 5.1-channel sound makes sense for movies and home theater, mostly because 5.1 was an outgrowth of theatrical film-sound technologies stretching all the way back to the 1950s.

Every attempt to bring surround music into the home without video has flopped, big time. Are you old enough to remember the rise and fall of quadraphonic in the 1970s? What was needed was a surround format that didn't require music lovers to invest in new playback gear. Surely such a format would prove the viability of music surround...wouldn't it?… Read more

What, you don't have a turntable? What's wrong with you?

When the CD was unveiled to the world in 1982 with the "Perfect Sound Forever" motto, everyone assumed the LP's days were numbered. Well, nearly three decades later, vinyl's hanging in there and the CD's future looks uncertain.

Vinyl appeals to oldsters who still covet their LP collections, and kids who are just now getting into the groove. To some vinyl sounds better, more musical than digital, and some just dig the more physical connection to the music vinyl provides.

CD Baby remains an essential part of any independent musician's toolbox, offering musicians an easy and relatively inexpensive way to sell CDs and MP3 downloads from a personalized Web page. It's not necessarily the cheapest way to sell music online, but its long track record and wide variety of services, including digital distribution through iTunes and other stores, and short-run CD manufacturing (provided by Discmakers, which bought the company last August), still make it my top recommendation for independent artists.

This July, the site will relaunch with several significant improvements, including more attractive artist pages, the ability to … Read more

Pandora is a great music-discovery service, so it's only natural that independent bands would hope to get their music placed on it. Unfortunately for them, Pandora just made that a little harder--and a little more expensive.

As I first saw on the Digital Audio Insider blog a couple weeks ago, Pandora recently changed its music submission process, and is now accepting solicitations only from bands who have a physical CD for sale through Amazon.com. That requires the artist to manufacture a CD with proper album art and bar code, which is much more expensive than creating a bunch … Read more

These days, even the most entry level car stereos need to have a few tricks up their sleeves to even be worth considering. The Alpine CDE-102 is no exception.

In addition to spinning basic audio CDs and receiving AM/FM radio transmissions, the CDE-102 also features MP3, AAC, and WMA playback from data CDs or its front-facing USB port.

However, the CDE-102's best features require additional purchases. For example, Bluetooth hands free and audio streaming can be added with Considering the "Made for iPod" and "Works with iPhone" badges slapped all over the box, we … Read more

Nero's BackItUp and Burn makes the whole process of regular data backups easier for everyone. Using an intuitive tabbed interface and simple controls, just about anyone can pick up BackItUp and Burn and start a regular schedule for backups in only a few clicks. The software even offers the option of sending you an e-mail notification when automated backups are complete.

In addition to regular backups, BackItUp and Burn also includes full burning capabilities (as the name suggests) letting you burn your music, videos, data, and pictures to CD, DVD, or Blue-ray disks. Nero offers a free Gigabyte of … Read more