Podcast Interview with respected Audio & Music Reviewer Michael Fremer
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Hello, everyone and welcome back to the O B M podcast. I'm Rob Ss and it's great to have you here. Hope you're doing well on today's show. You'll be hearing me talking with Michael Fremer. Michael is a writer and editor and reviewer of all things audio and uh hi fi related and he is notorious for his expertise in the world of analog audio and vinyl records. Currently, he's the editor at tracking angle and he's also the editor at the absolute sound. And I caught up with Michael recently and we had a super great chat talking about vinyl music, the magic of listening to records, um music that he loves playing. And for me, it was a real pleasure because I've been following his work for many years and I'm always super keen to hear his thoughts on all manner of topics. So, yeah, it was a really great time and I really enjoyed it and I'm sure you guys will too. So, here's me with Michael Fremer and this is probably going back a few years now, but you spoke about listening to or hearing a David Bowie album. The man who sold the world many years ago, uh, at your friend's place, I think on your friend's audio system. And apparently that moment changed your whole idea of what great audio sounded like. Uh, have I got that right? And if so was that, was that the beginning of your obsession with, with high quality audio? Well, I always thought I had an obsession for high quality audio until I heard that. Then, then I realized that my obsession was uh very limited because my experience was limited to what I thought was high end audio, but it really wasn't. So, you know, I, I was reading certain magazines that I thought were the magazines that, that people into audio would read stereo review and high fidelity. Or at that point it was probably hi fi stereo review and high fidelity. And I, you know, that was a kind of mainstream stuff and I didn't know there was a whole another alternate universe of better stuff until I went to visit my friend and, and then, uh and, you know, to me, it was very frustrating that I didn't know about this other thing, but I didn't and I should have known about it because I was, I worked in a record store in 1969 when I got to Boston that uh downstairs was a record store and upstairs was this high end hi-fi store where all the wealthy people went and I was too intimidated to walk up the stairs. I really was too intimidated to walk up the stairs. You know, I was a hippie, I was in law school but I was still in a different world. And so I never saw that. And, uh, my friend who went to law school with me, actually, he graduated and moved to New York and got a really good job. And then, uh, he had the means to go to a high five store in New York and acquire this system that included, um, Magna Plane or Timpani one C loudspeakers and audio research, electronics. I'd never heard of that stuff. And the magazines that I was reading, uh, didn't review that kind of equipment. So for me, it was like, what, what have I been doing for the past? Who knows how many years I've been in an alternative universe of me that I thought was Hi fi and I mean, it was ok stuff, but not on that level. Yeah. So that was a, that was an ear opener, right? So, speaking of an, of ear openers going all the way from, from that point up until today, um, is probably, you know, way more than we can talk about in a single sitting. But to you today, what is great audio, you know, what's happened in audio is that the bottom has come up? So that what is now, the bottom of audio is actually very, very good and the top of what is audio is insanely good. Is on another level. But the people that don't know about this level where, where I think I'm at now, I mean, I might, if you watch that youtube video that, that just got posted last week where I show my room and, you know, look, the equipment is, is stupidly expensive. But using the word stupid just as, as a distant, it's not the really word, the stuff isn't stupid but it's very expensive. Um, the people look at it and they post things like, oh, this clown is selling snake oil. You couldn't do a double blind test and hear the difference between that and something that costs 1/10 that amount of money you couldn't. And, you know, this is bought by stupid people with a lot of money. Well, the funny part about that is these people don't have a lot of money because they're stupid. Most of them have a lot of money because they work very hard at skilled occupations. They are very smart and they make a lot of money because they're smart. Some of them, ok. They, they inherited the money but most of them are very smart. And so I'm not pulling the wool over anybody's eyes. People can read what I write and go hear it for themselves and make up their own minds. But so, so what's happened is the people who haven't experienced the kind of thing I have here don't know what it is and they get very angry about it and think that what they've got, which is cost 100th. The price sounds just as good. Well, it doesn't, but it, but the bottom now sounds very, very good compared to what the bottom was when I was a kid. So that's what's happened. And what's at the top has just gotten better and better and better. And that's both in the analog and digital domains. So for people just getting into audio then it's, uh, it's a great time to be alive. Uh, especially people that don't maybe have deep pockets to start with. Uh, they can get a really decent system by the sounds of it, by the sounds of what you're saying for not exorbitant amounts of money. That's absolutely true. You know, whether you're into the analogs or the digital side, you can now, when I was, uh, younger and didn't have a lot of money, I had a really good stereo for not that much money. I mean, I had, uh, a pair of, uh, Spiker T C fifties. I don't know whether you've heard of that brand. It's no longer manufactured pair of Spiker T C fifties. That was a, a bookshelf speaker that I put it on the stand and I built kits. I built, um, Haler DH one oh one pre Amp and a Haler DH 200 amplifier. And for not that much money, a couple of $1000 I had a really excellent stereo and today, you can get a system that's that good for even less money I would say. And a lot of it's, you know, coming in from China, which at this point I'm not too thrilled to support, but that's a whole another story. We're not gonna get political now. Um But yeah, you can get a decent system now and stream music on a, on a modestly priced streamer and stream 96 K 24 bit or 1 92 24 bit files. Uh That sound incredibly good for not that much money. So, yeah, it's a great time to be an audio file and you know, the headphone boom is incredible too. So if you, if you live in a house or in an apartment with your parents and they tell you to turn that nonsense down, you can just get some really good headphones and have a great time and remove the room in doing so. Right. They don't have to play with room acoustics and all that sort of stuff. Just put on a pair of cans. Yeah, it's like it's the, uh, it's the record store that never closes. They never kick you out and, and you can stream it and find out what you want to buy to own because I, you know, I'm a very strong advocate of owning music and not just streaming it because, you know, if one of these streaming companies goes away, all your music goes away or if one of the, uh, licensees pulls the license from, from, or, or Tidal or whatever you're listening on all those, all that music goes away, you end up with nothing. So, yeah. And I think it's a, a lot of young people today, uh, understand the value the, the tactile value of owning a record and buying something that's manufactured by, uh, an artist. They, that they, uh really are fans of and have that experience is great and having a shelf of music, it's fantastic that, that's understood. Now for a while, I thought it was gonna go away, but it's understood. Now, look, look at it now. I, I mean, going back to those early, early days or early, early days in your life, I'm keen to know just briefly what, what part did music specifically play in your life when you were growing up outside of just audio systems was music a big deal or? So I grew up around music and uh my parents have both liked music. My mother listened to mostly classical music on the radio and my father listened to some jazz, liked jazz, but he was a big Louis Armstrong fan. So he, he would play a lot of that. Um And I had to, and they had a console radio. I had to push them into getting a good stereo. So I did that and it worked. So and then I, then I, I appropriated it over time, right? Why why, why am I not surprised? I'm not surprised either. But, you know, when I was a little kid, when I was, when I was before I could learn, learn how to read, I knew all the records in, uh, in their, in my father's collection. They're all 78s, you know, and I didn't break any. I was very careful, but I knew them all because I knew the labels. I knew the Columbia record labels. I knew R C A label. I knew Decca record label. And so, and I knew each song because I knew, like, if the label was scratched a certain way, I knew what it was. And so their show and tell with their friends was, they would invite me downstairs and say I play, uh pick out Arthur Godfrey and play his record or pick out uh Cab Calloway and play his record and I could pick it out and play it and, and of course, that was the big show and tell and then it became a crazed record fanatic and they, and they were all upset about that, but they made me one. So, you know, but they, they, they built the beast. Oh, that's funny. Do you remember some of the first records that you really liked? You know, outside of your parents collection? What kind of music was telling you? I have, uh the first record I ever bought was The Glow Worm by The Mills Brothers. Do you know that song. No, I don't. No. Well, you probably don't want to know it. But it was The Glow Worm by the Mills Brothers. And it went Glow Little Glow Worm. Glimmer. Glimmer, la, la, la, la, la glimmer, glimmer. Do light the lights glow for me tonight. Something like that. I, I still have it. It's a 78 and uh, the 1st 45 that I bought was Mack the Knife by Bobby Darren. And I still have that. And the first LP I ever bought was uh the Kingston trio at large and I still do that. So, gee, and they, they're still in good Nick. What's that? They're still in, they, they're still in Good Nick. Those records. They're still in good condition. I took care of them. I was always a fanatic. I always, and I don't know what that's about, but it's a, it's a part of me, I guess. Um I'm fastidious in certain ways, not in other ways. So, um I always wanted to take good care of my records. In fact, my 78 of the glow Worm was broken by the woman who cleaned her house and I made her buy it over again. I think my mother probably gave her the money to do it, you know, because this, this, this guy is serious about his, about his vinyl, that's for sure. And when I, when I, we would go to a, to a butcher to get meat and the floor was sawdust and I made the butcher put newspaper down for me to walk on because I didn't want to walk, walk on the saw dust. Oh, wow. Maybe that's the O CD or something. I don't know. But yeah. Is that, is, is, is that a, is that a metaphor for, uh for maybe the acoustic treatment you have now in, in your listening room or is that, is that a stretch on my part? Well, people say my room is a filthy mess and, you know, it's, my records are in really good condition. Addition. The jackets are not so great because I, I play my records. I don't, I don't have them to preserve them and, and to, you know, have them hanging on the wall or just to show. So, you know, the jackets of the records that I really love, they're kind of, I kind of beat, but the records are in really good shape and that's what's important to me. So, and my room is, uh, not that neat because there's a lot of stuff in it. There's more stuff in it than that than should be in the, in the room, you know? But, um, do you remember the first time that you actually put a record down on, on a player on a turntable and put down the needle and, and what that experience was like? Was it a momentous experience or what, what was your rec, what's your recollection of them. Well, that was a, it was a Stromberg Carlson console that my parents had and, uh, it was playing 70 eights. You know, that, that's a, that's how far back I go. And, uh, you know, they had the 70 eights and I would bring them out and carefully and it was a, a stacker, you know, you'd stack a bunch of records up and, and, and I remember that pushing play and the record would fall and then it would play and when it was over the next one would fall. Yeah, that's what I did. And then I got my own record play, which is a, a little kitty phonograph that, uh, that I could play my own records one at a time on. And, yeah, but I mean, at that point in time it was the music that I was, uh, drawn to. It wasn't, it wasn't right. It was the music and I didn't really get high, fired up until I had a friend in high school who, uh, was it high school? Yeah. Or maybe junior high school. And I went to his house and his father had a really good stereo that, that had bass. You know, bass is very commonplace. Now, you hear bass in cars, you hear bass in almost everything has bass. But there was no, no bass around around in the 1950s. There was no bass around unless you went to see live music. And so uh, my hi-fi, at that point was just a record player. Didn't have any bass but I went to visit my friend and his father had a really good stereo and there was bass that was a major change in my life. Ear bass. And that sounds really, I can imagine. That's true. Yeah. I mean, it, yeah, I, I could only imagine if, if it fills out that, that lower third or, or what, you know, whatever the, uh, the, the portion is, I could imagine that being very different. How, how does that, how I guess is it, it must be incredibly different, your experience listening to vinyl these days as compared to them because your equipment is entirely different and, and in many cases, as you've said, it, it's some pretty high end gear. Uh How is your experience of listening to records changed or, or has it, well, in some ways it's changed in other ways, it hasn't. I, I had mentioned what my stereo was when I had the spike of T C fifties and, and, uh, and the Haler stuff and that was in the seventies and I was living in California and working on a, on an animated film and, uh, you know, I loved that system and I could sit there and put a record on and, and disappear into it and it's, it was three dimensional and it, and it, uh, it had all the, the prerequisites of, of a great audio system as far as I was concerned. Uh, and what I have now is like, you know, it's, it's 100 times better than that and it's more intense and more, um involving, but I get the same amount of pleasure from it no more. I can't explain that. It's like if I had to go back to that older system, I would still be there listening to the same records, listening to music. I don't want to have that happen. And I, I, you know, I wanna, I wanna continue to have what I have now, which is pretty, I have my, a friend of mine is, uh, what's in the band? Twisted sister, you know, the band Twisted Sister. Yeah. OK. So he's a guitarist and twisted sister and he's a, quite a serious audio file and he, uh, he's quite a smart guy and that, you know, the, that band was, it was a joke. I mean, they, they put that whole thing on the way they dressed and what they, the whole thing, it was, it was a shtick as they say. And he came over to visit last November and he, he has a good, good system and he wanted to hear, um, walk on the Wild side by Lou Reed and I have an original pressing of that and I put it on and, uh, it's an amazing recording, actually, the original pressing that is an amazing recording and when it was over he, I could see, he was amazed and he didn't say anything and we played a whole bunch of other things and then he left and the next day he called me and he said, and it was, it was AAA series of expletives that I will not repeat. But it was, you know what? I blanked, blanked your guts. I hate your blanking guts. You stop, you know, on and on. And what, what, what, what did I do? He says your stereo was so good. I can't stand it. I can't, my sister. Nothing compared to that. I hate you. It was, it was so, you know that song, right? Walk on the wild side, right? Yeah. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, I'm, I've been playing that song since, since the album came out and I have the same pressing I bought in 72 whenever that was that it came out. And when, when, when the colored girls go do, do, do, do do and they, and, and they sing that part as they sing it, it gets louder and louder and louder and moves forward in space. Like almost into your face. Did, did you know that? Uh, well, I can't remember the last time I heard that, although I've heard that song numerous times. So I'm gonna have to check it out now and see if my, um, more modest system didn't do any more modest. No. No, no. Ok. So you, they start and they're, they're back there way back in the room that they're singing in and you can see the room, you can see the studio or the booth that they're in, you can see it and then as they do, do, do, do, do they come forward and they just, like, it's almost like they're gonna sit in your lap and then, and then it's gone, you know, they just disappear into the ozone because they're finished. And, you know, when the song was over, he pointed that out, he said, I've never heard that like that. I never heard them like come out into the room. That was insane. You know, he, he mentioned like 10 things that he saw in the picture that he never heard before and I have that experience all the time. Uh When I play things that I haven't played in a long, long time, there are things in three dimensional space that are just hovering like right in front of me that I never heard before like that, it's fun. It isn't that crazy? Isn't that what it's about? You know, that's not what listens to music is about something else, but that's just an augmentation and added thrill and fun of the whole experience. Yeah, I mean, see, as you said, it's still a part of the experience and I'm imagining that has something to do with not just one thing but, but a number of things a being the initial recording how it was done, et cetera. What's on the actual tape or, or what was on there at the time. And then your original pressing might be different from some of the other pressings and certainly from some of the digital, um, stuff out there too. And then your system, then your room and then, so there's that the factors are almost too many to mention. Right. Well, the electricity, you know, I've lived in this house for over 20 years and I've had a constant problem of ground hum. And I, you know, ameliorated it with power conditioning and had a bunch of other things and sometimes it's worse than other times. And the, the, the solution is not power conditioning. The solution turned out to be replacing all the electricity from outside the house, from, from the roof down and redoing the entire grounding scheme of the house, which is what ended up being done. Two guys, uh, from Seattle, uh, called me and said, we, we're gonna, we wanna fly, we, we've seen your videos, we know you have problems, we're gonna solve your problems. We're gonna come out there and we're gonna look at it and we'll solve your problems. So they, on their own dime, they, they flew out, there's a video of that on my old youtube channel which I, I don't give the name of because they, when I left there, um, they weren't kind enough to mention my new youtube channel. And my new uh website which is tracking ale dot com. They didn't do that. So I'm not gonna mention the old one, but I'm gonna put this video up on my new channel. So they came and they checked everything out and they proposed a solution and, um, because they're not licensed in New Jersey, I had to get a local electrician who's an audio file, friend of mine. And uh, he did all the work and when they were done the, the difference, it was as big a difference as any component that you could add to your system. So my system went from being noisy, overtly noisy in some ways. And that was the annoying part to uh noisy in a way that you don't know it's noisy until it's gone. You know what I'm saying? So when they were finished and I went to listen, it was the three dimensionality of the system improved immensely because all of the backgrounds became so black and quiet that everything else sort of moved forward that everything else became almost like watching a 3D movie, right? So it went from being a noisy room to people coming down and saying that's one of the quietest systems I've ever heard. And that was so great and it didn't cost that much money really compared to what an expensive piece of audio gear costs. So I would say everything, everything matters. If you live in a house, you should definitely um do that. Right. Yeah, if you can obviously and, and I, I guess there's no end to these things. Right. I mean, once you go down the, down the path, um, you could possibly be toying with things indefinitely and maybe that is the point and part of the fun as well. Yeah, there is. You have to, like, have a, a big imagination to, when you hear about things that someone tells you about Not to, not to, you know, it's snake oil man. You're a snake oil salesman. That, that makes any difference. It's like cables, cables make a large difference. And people who say it doesn't make a difference. I, I can't imagine they've ever actually sat down and tried the AC cables make a big difference, you know, and, and they go, oh sure the electricity gets generated thousands of miles away. It gets, comes down, all these wires comes to a substation, you know, in near your house and then it comes to the, all the local wires to, to your house comes down into your room, into your ac court, through, through your box, whatever your box is made of it, you know, some, some U approved not audio file box. And then you're saying that the last three ft between the wall and your amplifier makes a difference. That's Ridic, that's how ridiculous you are that you would think that. And I said, you're right and you know what if you put a water filter on the end of your faucet, it can't possibly make a difference and clean out any of the water. Right. Right. Then they go, OK. That's, no, it's not that different. It really is not that different. Yeah. I mean, that's a, that's actually a great, the water uh filter analogy is a, is a, is a good comparison. Although I would, what I would say though is that it depends on what, what end of the game you're, you, you're at or what, you know, what end of the spectrum you're spectrum you're on. Because uh for, for, I think for the mass market, if I can call it that from, you know, for many people that have, um, you know, live in apartments or whatever they can, they, or, or by default, they have limited options. So I think, um, horses for courses, right? Yeah, look, that's the, you know, that's the last thing um to talk about is, is getting an expensive for you. That's not the first thing you should do, but speaker cables make a big difference. I got into a fight with someone I joined, I stupidly joined a Facebook group. Facebook groups are snake pits of angry people. And this wasn't a political one. This was about hi-fi, you know, and someone said I need to get, it was a political one. Someone said I need to get some speaker cable. What should I get? And somebody posted a picture of Amazon basics, speaker cable. Amazon basics, speaker cable is lamp cord. That's all it is. It's two parallel lines of a 16 gauge uh or maybe 18 gauge um copper wire in, you know, plastic in a plastic kind of sleeve and it was like $20 for a run. And someone says this is all you need. So no, it wasn't. Someone saying, hey, this is inexpensive. This try this, it was, this is all you need. I don't care who you are. You could have $50,000 speakers if you need speaker cable, this is all you need. So I posted innocently posted. So do you think the people that are marketing uh Amazon basics speaker cable have measured the inductance capacitance and resistance of the cable and know what it is and know that this cable is appropriate for this person's speakers. And the guy got back to me and he said, you don't even know what those things mean. You're old, you get here and you have a, a, an S A room that was what came back. Wow. Well, that's, that's, that's uh nice. And you're old, you, you have a blanking room. So of course, I named a column in, in the, the magazine I used to write for it. I named it that, you know, I'm old, but I have a blanking room. And you know, that's another thing that comes up. People always say, well, you're old. So you, your ears are terrible. You can't hear anymore and listen. I'm not gonna claim to you that my hearing is what it was when I was 30 years old because it's not, my hear is not what it once was. But my listening is better than ever. I can, I, I know what I'm listening for. I know what I'm doing and my hearing is still pretty good. You know, it, some of the top mastery engineers in the world, Bernie Grundman, Bob Ludwig Greg Kelby, these guys are all in their seventies, at least Bernie's probably in his eighties. He's still master great records. And, you know, these guys are friends of mine. And so, you know, Greg Kelby who comes over and visits me says, uh he says, look, my hearing isn't what it was 30 years ago, but my clients are all in their twenties, most of them and I master their records and I send them back the files and uh, and they listen and they think this is great. It's great. It's good. This, we like it. We're gonna, we're gonna pay you for this work, you know. So he's just like, obviously I'm still good. It's not like I'm, I'm boosting the top end so I can hear more of it because I can't hear anymore. It's not like that. Yeah. Well, there, there's your, there's your validation and not that you need it. But if you, if mastering engineers, particularly guys like Gruman who I don't think he's mastered well, let's not go into it. But I think on the whole a, any time I see his name and he's actually mastered it himself. It, it never, um, I, I, it's like he can never put a foot wrong. I don't want to juin him. But uh he does brilliant work. So, yeah, all those guys are still making great, mastering great records. And uh if you go to Bernie Grundman room, he, he masters on these speakers uh that are to me, I, I don't know how he does it because there's no top end in those speakers. As far as I'm concerned, I don't like them, but it doesn't matter what matters is what comes out and whatever your title is, what matters is the end result. And so, you know, as long as I review records and people buy them and go wow, great recommendation. Thank you. I bought that and it sounds as good as you said. It does. It sounds just like what you said it does. That's good enough for me. You know, because I mean, the brains, our brains are, are wondrous inventions or whatever they are and your ears are simply a conduit to get the, the, you know, the sound into your ear and to turn it into electricity and bring it to your brain and your brain can compensate for whatever the shortcomings are. You know, there's a guy I met who listen, he's deaf and he listens by and he's got a good stereo. He listens by holding an inflatable ball in his hands and lets the vibrations hit the ball and the ball hits his fingertips and that's how he listens. Well, that's remarkable. It is remarkable. And he also hears cable differences and he's a vinyl guy and, oh, gee, ok. Yeah, I interviewed him on one of my, uh, I think if you go to the capital audio fest video From 2021, uh on, uh tracking angle's youtube channel, you can, you can see him and he talks and he explains how he listens. It's amazing. And so, uh the brain can compensate for um, many shortcomings of people's hearing. And when I wrote that my listening is better than ever, even though my hearing isn't some of my enemies. And I've got these enemies who are pretty funny people. Um, he said, see, he thinks there's a difference between hearing and listening, you know, that's ridiculous. Well, the difference but it's, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, well, people, the other thing is, I mean, these, these sorts of conversations can, all the topics can go, can go on endlessly. But I, I think the other thing that what you said remind reminded me of is that just this idea that people hear music differently with their own, you know, through their own lenses, um, and have unique tastes as well and there's no accounting for taste, right? But for you, you review audio equipment, you've been in the game, in the industry for so long you've got this storied history with, in the analog domain and are really known as like the analog, the vinyl guy, uh, out there and especially online now, you know, whenever your name comes up, that's what, that's generally what you're known for. You know, uh How do you, how do you keep saying most important is not to tell people what to buy or what to like? If you do that, you're finished. The, the most important thing is to try to accurately describe how something sounds and not necessarily what you like. And the best comments I get the best comments from readers is I don't share your tastes. I don't like what you like. I know what you like, but I know when I read your review, I pretty much know how something sounds and whether I will like it or not, that is the compliment. And that's what I've always aimed to do because if you go to a hi-fi show and you go room to room, every, every room sounds different and uh some people can walk out of a room and go man, that sounded really great to me and I'll go in that room and it sounds awful to me in the, in the, in the aggregate. It's awful. I won't describe it. If I review that equipment, review that room, I won't say it sounds awful. I might say something like, um, the top end was somewhat rolled off, the bottom end was prominent. The mid base was a slightly excessive for what I would like. And I try to explain it in a way that's not, um, a negative, putting a negative unless the room is so awful. I have to say it's just awful, you know. Right. But I, I mean, are you, are you going through like a checklist in your mind that has become now ingrained and, and you're just reacting to it, uh, in, in a sense or are you listening more, uh, viscerally and just allowing, you know, whatever comes to mind, you have to not go in with the checklist and you have to not go in, uh, trying to hear something. You just, you just have to go in and see how you react to it. How do you react? So, I was at a show in Florida last week and a couple of rooms I walked into it. It was like, oh, this is great. You know, why do I then, then it's why do I like it first? Is how, how am I reacting? And then why do I like it or do I not like it? And I heard some rooms at this show that were absolutely fantastic and I, I liked them because the sound was open and, uh, tactile and visceral and, and it engaged me and I wanted to sit and listen to it and then over time I might find certain things that I didn't like or I did like, or, or whatever. But if you can describe it in a way that's not, um, that where you don't, that you're not using superlatives, you're not saying, oh, it's great. It's bad. It's, it's good or it's bad or it's fantastic. That doesn't mean anything if you can, if you come to that conclusion and then you can draw back a couple of notches and, and describe why you concluded that, then you can provide some useful information to the person hearing what you're saying or reading what you're saying, just to say this is the best I've ever heard or, you know, I mean, there was, there was a review by a writer of the, of the, from the magazine used to write for who said, uh if there's a better so and so so and so out there, uh I haven't heard it and then I'm thinking, ok, this guy maybe has heard three. He's very, he's a very new reviewer. Maybe he's heard three of these particular kinds of pieces that you write. It's like, and I've been doing it for, you know, 30 years. Plus I would never write that. If there's a better thing out there, I haven't heard, I would never write that because it's just foolish as objective as, as you, as you're attempting to be. I'm imagining that there is still Fremer coming through. Right. Michael Fremer still got a taste. You've still got this, you've got your voice coming through, but also your preferences I'm imagining. And that's probably like for me when I watch your stuff I, I it's not, I'm not looking purely for an objective opinion. I actually want to know what you think because you've got an, a, a, an angle that I, or a perspective, I guess, tracking angle that I appreciate. So there's, is it, it's a mix of objectivity and your voice is that fair to say? Or inevitably it's gonna be that, you know, I like to see a picture when I listen. You know, people say, well, uh sound staging and imaging is an artifact of Hi Fi. You don't hear it in live music. Well, of course, you hear it in live music. Ever. You ever go to a, to a symphony orchestra and sit in a good concert hall in a, in a really good seat like in the fifth row or sixth row. Uh You can hear where the brass is. You can hear where, where the big strings are. You can hear where the bass is. You can hear where the, you know, you know, the, each, each of the string sections is, you can hear, you can hear where the woodwinds are, you can hear where the press is, you can hear all that stuff. If a guy's smacking on a Timpani in the left corner, you you can hear it there. You know, it's maybe you can't hear that stuff. It's ridiculous. Now, if you're sitting in the balcony, maybe you can't hear that and it, that's not as important as having the instrumental timbers be accurate. So that, uh, uh, you know, a bassoon sounds like a bassoon and not a clarinet. Yeah, you want to think the instruments to sound real, that's more important. But then also you want to be able to see the picture that's what engages you. When you turn the lights out, you, you want to be in that space. And that's, yeah, that's one of the most exciting things about having a really good system that's set up properly is it can take you away from where you are and put you in an amazing space, small jazz club or, or a big concert hall. Yeah, that's, that's interesting because I, I know that or I, I, I heard you say somewhere that recordings are not live music, right? And they, they, they're just not, they're, they're purely recordings and there's so many variables that go into that. But is that another way of saying if you want to hear live music, buy a ticket and go see live music? Because that's, that's kind of what I took from it. Well, yeah, but there's two kinds of live music. So if you're going to see like AAA rock show, you know, amplified music, it's usually gonna sound better at home in, in many on a good system because, um, you're gonna be hearing that, that band played through some giant, um, P A speakers. And that's, although it's gotten much better, I have to say I went, like two shows I can talk about, I went to see Roxy music last September, one of my favorite bands ever. And I paid stupid amounts of money for a ticket for two tickets because I took my wife to that one and we had four seats, uh, probably 20 rows back. And the sound was incredibly good. It was, you know, it sounded as good as my stereo. So it was good. And then I saw high praise in your and I went to see, uh a Gene Clark tribute band. I don't know if you're a Gene Clark fan or, but from the Birds. Yeah, I mean, I keep hearing, I keep hearing his name pop up and everyone tells me you gotta, you gotta start going back and checking that out. So that's another, you can go on youtube and find that concert of it was organized by AAA couple who have a band called Beach House. You know that band. Yep. They're like a shoe gazing band and they're really good. And they, yeah, so the, the story was one of their parents, uh, gave them a Gene Clark album called No Other and they played it and it blew their minds. It just because it's, it's a an amazing record and beautifully recorded and, and Gene was a fantastic musician and wrote great songs and they decided that they wanted to play that record live. So they enlisted a bunch of other great young musicians and they put a band together and it had, uh, the lead singer from L CD Sound systems. It had, um, I can't remember, I can't remember who else was in it. But, and they, they played the Williamsburg Music Hall. And so I got tickets for that. I really wanted to see that and I got tickets for that and it was one of these things, I'll never forget that concert because the guy that mixed it, mixed it so that it was, you were sitting in front of a great stereo and hearing a great record being played back and that's what their goal was. Their goal was to re recreate that record live and add whatever, you know, their particular inflections were to it, which they did, they didn't like, do it, wrote, they just did it, the, the record song by song live, bringing the musicians who had to come on for each song that weren't in the previous song and, and do it. And it, it was just phenomenal. And then when it was over, when the album was over, more musicians came out and they covered a whole bunch of bird songs, like I'll feel a whole lot better and uh all, all the great songs that, that Jean Clark wrote for the Birds. It was like one of the best and to see a group of young people do this, uh, was, um, you know, it was great and you, you find that video on youtube and, and watch it. Awesome. Awesome. I'm gonna, I'm gonna have to check that out for sure. You do. I insist on it. In fact, I'm gonna give you a quiz next week. Please do. Um, uh, the other thing I wanted to just to touch on a little bit as well is, you know, I, I know you, you often talk about vinyl, you often are part of conversations and panels, uh, around the topic. So, uh, it's a topic that you would discuss at nauseum. But something that I wanted to get your thoughts on was this idea of the, the format itself and why it tends to be less tiring in, in many cases to listen to and, and somehow many people claim and, and, and share that it, it seems to be a completely different and more emotionally engaging experience and less tiring, more emotionally engaging. Um, I've heard you talk about, uh, aspects around, you know, vinyl, analog recording. What, what, what is it? Has anyone worked it out or we never know. I 100% believe that I still believe that to this day as, you know, as something I started experiencing when Ce Ds first came out and I was all gung ho for CD. Si mean, to me, this was, this is going to be the greatest thing. We were gonna get rid of all the problems with records and all the cleaning record. I mean, the first great I went, I went and bought the modern jazz quartet A Pyramid. It's a record by the modern jazz quartet. This release in the early sixties, I was a kid and I had given up on rock and roll because it had gone from being Buddy Holly and Elvis to Fabian and Frankie Avalon. And as far as I was concerned, I had outgrown rock and roll. So I got into jazz and I had to take two buses and a train to get into Sam Goodies in Manhattan and buy a record. And I went into Sam Goodies and I asked the guy behind the counter who was smart and new music to recommend a modern jazz quartet record for me. And he recommended an album called Pyramid and I bought it and I took the trains and the buses home and put it on my turntable and it started and it went repeating, it wouldn't stop. And that was a defective record. I did not want that record. I was OK with a pop or a click once in a while, but this was like repeating every, every cycle. So I got back, went to the corner, got on the bus, got on the second bus took the train all the way into New York and went to the store, returned the record and the guy put it on the turntable there and heard that she said, yep, here's another copy. I took it home. Same thing. And now that I know how records are made, I should have realized that every record in, in the store of that record was going to be the same because the press had been set a certain way and it was non Phil at the beginning of the record. And that's what the problem with the record. So I was all records going away and, and, and C DS coming back coming in and then I heard my first CD and it was, it was just a horrible experience and every CD I heard after that was a horrible experience. It, it was annoying to my ears. It grated, it sounded antiseptic and fake and, uh, it's gotten a lot better over time. But the fact that that experience was called Perfect and great. That drove me absolutely nuts. So that's when I started my campaign against C DS. And yeah, you ask why that is I to this day, I'm not sure we know, uh, I part of it I think is, is, uh, brick wall filters and the whole process of digitization, which, you know, the numbers look good, the measurements look good. But we are so much more to, our brains are so much more sophisticated than, uh, what we can measure that. It's not even close. So, whatever it is, uh I don't know what it is but I know that it is and I know that I always said if peop, if young people that are not hearing records could finally get to hear records, if they would hear what that is, they would want it. And that's happened, it's happened because I, I thought it would happen and it's because there's something about it. Even if you're buying a digital recording, you when you put it through the, the this filter, you know, this, this uh plug in called uh Cutting a Lack. It does something to it that transforms it and oh, it's distortion. I don't care what it is. All recordings are distorted, all recordings are distortions. They don't sound like real live music. The good ones allow you to suspend disbelief so that you think you're hearing a live performance. And I sit here in my room I could put on, you know, people say your stereo is so stupidly expensive. You could hire the band to come into your room for less money. Yeah. OK. You hire Miles Davis and bring him into my room and I, we bring Andrews down here, but I can play a Miles Davis record live at the plug nickel and here it's, and feel like Miles is in my room playing right in front of me. I can do that. A record can do the digital version doesn't do that. So why that is, I don't know, but I know it's still, it's, I still believe that because I hear it and more people hear that now. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it, it sounds like it's still a thing and again, it depends on, on, on the record but there, there seems to be, um, something physical, something visceral that happens. I know for me personally often I, I, I can't put it to words. It's very difficult to speak about, but I, I, I feel my, my muscles, my, my whole body tends to sort of, regardless of what music I'm playing. When I'm listening to records in my room, I tend to relax. Just, it almost like takes the edge off. I, I don't feel like I'm being attacked by what I'm hearing. Um, I don't know what, you know, maybe it's, who knows, it's not quite an argument for me about that because I, I firmly believe that I will say though that the, the newest higher resolution files give you more of what records give you. They sound, they're more listenable. But I still find after a certain period of time I'm done, I can sit down here and go record after record after record for hours and hours and just keep playing them and wanting and want to keep playing them. And even though I've got to get up and change the record every 20 minutes and, you know, and I go of course, tell people I said, in, in my hobby, I look around at people and most people in my hobby really do need to get up more often. They need to get up and get their heartbeats going and, you know, get some exercise and, um, but when I'm down here late at night it's, I only play records because that's what gives me that feeling that relaxes me and gets me in that, in that vibe. Even though the records we know have defects, we know that records have, you know, issues. They're not as perfect, but they're more perfect in other ways than, than digital formats that, that are, have gross imperfections. So, so, so when you do that, when you go into your room, especially late at night, what, what do you put on to truly relax or, or unwind to? Well, very rarely do I put on something new at that point unless it's something I really, I'm curious to hear that it's been sitting around here for a long time, but mostly I want to hear something that's familiar. It's like comfort food, you know, the same reason that you eat comfort food. Uh, and so I'll play something that I know really well, but I may, I might be something that I haven't played in, in a decade. You know, I have a lot of records so I'll pull something out that I haven't played in a decade that I, oh, I really liked that record 10 years ago or 20 years ago. I have expectations of it in my brain. Let me see what it sounds like. And more often than not, my expectations will not be met. It'll be either way better than I was expecting it to sound or way worse because my system is that much better that it can, it can resolve information. But when it's better, it's fantastic. Like I took out a copy of uh Donovan Live in concert. You know, that record, you know, Donovan, I know Donovan, I don't know that that particular album, he released a record Donovan Live. Uh It's at the beginning, his father comes out and he goes, and now I'd like you to meet at the evening star Donovan. It's your son, of course, it's your evening. And I know that record really well, it's got some great songs on it. It's a jazz record more than anything. And I put it on with an expectation, a low expectation of the live recording done at the Anaheim Convention Center in California. But it was spectacularly great. It was like you were there, you could smell the air, you could, you could. And I lived in Southern California. So, I it was like I was there and it's an amazing recording. It's like you can see the people on the stage playing, you can see the stage, you could see, I know that stage. It's, it's an amazing record that kind of experience is always the most fun because it, it, it completely defies expectations and allows your brain to really make you think you're there because you're hearing it much better than you're expecting to hear it. And, and for someone who has, I think I heard you say on, on another show over 16,000 records in your collection, if that's right. Um You know, I, I'm not gonna ask you, what are the records that you continue to return to? Because picking a, just a handful out of over 16,000 would be, I'm imagining fairly difficult, but, you know, the usual British rock records from the sixties, you know, who The Beatles The Stones, um, that kind of thing. Um, Nick Drake Dylan, you a blonde on blonde and original pressing a blonde on blonde isn't a really great sounding record recorded in Nashville. It's, it's a wonderful sounding record, you know, uh Roxy music, like I said, the band's second album, the fantastic classic records. Uh Birds, you know, that kind of, those are things that I, that are built into my system and so, uh, I can go downstairs and put one of those on and, and usually depending on what's happened to my system. If it's improved in some way, I'll hear that. I'll say I never heard that record like that before. That, that's always an amazing thing. I've heard things I never heard before on that record. That's crazy. Yeah, that that. That's, well, in, especially in your world with your, with your many years doing this. That's that, yeah, something hard to fathom. But, um, I'm, you know, when you, when you sit down it sounds like when you're alone or when you're, which is, it's most of the time because my room is not really, it's not a room designed for socializing. It's really, it's a workspace, you know. So it's me in the main seat and then there's a couple of other chairs, people can join. But, uh, I'm also here with my wife. Doesn't come down here much. She'd rather be upstairs. You, maybe you can hear the dogs in the background. It's like the surround sound track is dogs barking, but that sounds good. Um, I, I don't know if I'm putting you on the spot here, but is there something that you've heard in the last year or so? As far as something that's a record that is, that sounded incredibly good. Like just something that sounded remarkable. Um, you know, you'd have to go back into my website and, and read some of those reviews because, yeah, a lot of great records that have come out. There's plenty of new things. Uh, there's one thing called the, um, it was a classical jazz piece. I could go over and get it, get the name of it because I won't remember the name of it. Let me do that. I'm gonna take the, you know, I don't, I want to get the name correct because to get it wrong is stupid. But, you know, the thing is I review so many records. I, I review them up. Oh, a floating points. You know that with Farrah Sanders, you know? Yes, I have heard a fair bit about that. So, you're, you're a fan of that too? Do you have it on vinyl? I don't, that's worth getting. That's a phenomenal. That, that's ok. That's, you know, it's, it's a digital recording, but the record sounds better than any of the digital versions. Wait, I'm gonna get this other record. Hold on one second. I pulled out, I pulled out two things. Let me get my earphones back on. I pulled out 22 kind of recent things. So the one I was thinking of that, I couldn't read the exact name of it is called Mulberry Street Symphony. It's a guy named, uh Anders Capel who's a composer. He came to New York and, um, Mulberry Street is a, is a street in, in Manhattan where a lot of the immigrants came in the, in the, in the, at the end of the 19th century, he came there and he, there's a series of pictures taken by a photographer and a writer about the pictures how, how the, how the pictures affected him. One's called Creed in the Strange City. One's called Minding the Baby. One's called Tommy. The Shoeshine Boy, one's called Blind Man. And it's so evocative and it, it's a, it's, it's a symphony orchestra, but it's also got uh Brian Blade and Scott Cawley, two great jazz musicians on it playing with this symphony orchestra improvising along with, with, with the written score. It's a wonderful recording and it came out as a double vinyl set and they tell you was you record ad D which is, you know, extremely 3 52.8 32 bit recording. Uh And they used a dec microphone setup with a couple of spot mics. I mean, it was done really, really tremendously well. In fact, I haven't played this in a while because I'm so busy reviewing new records. I wanna put this on and play it. You reminded me to, yeah, I, I love when that happens. And then the other one is a, a record called, uh The Source by Tony Allen. Tony Allen was a fella drummer and uh he's passed away since he recorded this. Obviously, he didn't, he didn't record this after he passed away. But, uh and it was recorded in France all analogs. So it's an analog recording, an analog mix and analog master and it says triple analog. So it's a great sounding record and uh the music's wonderful and the recordings great. That's all I'm gonna say about it. I reviewed it. We probably can, I, I write uh reviews more eloquently than I can do it here right now. So those are two that are really, really good. One is a digital recording, you know, 3 82 24 bit is close to, close to analog. It's very good. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's so funny, isn't it? Like the, the digital analog debate? This is not the show for it. I'm not, I'm not gonna go down that path. But what, what I would say is that the, the, the whole idea of the ritual of playing records, that's something for me who, you know, I didn't really grow up. I grew up with, with cassette tapes and, and I'd put, put in a plug, a pair of it, plugs into a compact disc player. Sorry Michael. But, um, a lot of people did those back in the day, you know, walking into early on because you had to, things were coming up. You had to. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and so, but, but it was never, it was never, you know, now having experienced the joy of playing records and coming into it a little bit later, uh, it's just an entirely different process. The ritual, the whole, the whole experience seems like you're doing something worthwhile rather than just sitting down and, and clicking a single button. You know, it's, it's the mouse click version. This is a digger station. You know, it's that experience. It's, that's part of it. But people, the people that are still cynical about this go, yeah. It's, that, that's ritual, you know, but the, but aside from that, what is it, it's nothing. No, there is something about the sound, there is something about the sound. Uh, and, and, you know, that's what I think, what, what it is exactly why it is. Uh, people can try to explain it. Maybe someday they will explain it. But for now, uh I just know that it is and you've discovered it and I used to sit around with my friend Joe Harley, who is the tone poet and he does all the blue nutt Reiss. And we used to sit around when, when records are disappearing. We, we both said, you know, this could come back if we could only get uh generations of young people who have never experienced this to sit down and hear this. I, I think it'll blow their minds. I think, I think they'll hear this and go. I want that. If we can't make that happen, it's gonna go away. But I think if we work hard enough, we can make it happen and we both dedicated ourselves to making it happen. And, you know, we're only two of many people who did that and we helped make it happen. And so it's so great when I meet all these young people, you know, I have a kid writing for me. He's 17 years old and I met him when he was 12. He's a vinyl fanatic and I know how you're talking about and he's like, my best pal and, um, young people that get into this, it's so rewarding to me because I know that, uh, this will continue. Vinyl's not gonna go away. It's, it's here to stay, you know, who's gonna go away to me. Well, all of us, all of us inevitably are you. Is, did, did I hear you say vinyl will never die? Is that, are you sticking to that? Yeah, I will. But vinyl will never die. It's not, it's gonna continue. And these records are not being thrown, thrown in the dumpster, they're not being thrown away. They're being valued and treasured and cherished where they should be because they're fantastic. It's a fantastic format. It's, it's amazing picking up on, on your comments around young listeners, the, the Tik Tok generation. If I can, if I can, you know, basically the kids of today, if you needed to give a young go person or even a beginner, they don't need to be young per se. It's just a beginner getting into audio and, and thinking about the idea of actually getting into vinyl playback. Um How much would they need to spend money? And I know we're on different sides of the globe here. So you can use us dollars. You can get just broadly, you can get a OK, uh turntable for a couple of $100 and uh with like an audio technica turntable or, or the least expensive project or, or there's a few other brands out there or a U turn, uh Orbit turntable, you know, don't get a $50 turntable to play a $50 record. There's something wrong with that concept, you know, don't you have to spend more money. So, uh but for, or you could get a used turntable, you go to ebay and get a used pioneer. There was, you know, so many of those pioneers around uh and get someone to set it up properly or, or buy my turntable, set up DVD and learn how to set it up yourself. There's a, there's a bold face plug and there you go for a couple of $100 on the used market. You get yourself, you're in business, you can be in business fantastic. And, and obviously, then you've got to get some of the other peripheral equipment. But, but I'm assuming, you know, maybe for less than $1000 you could really set yourself up with something, it'll be basic, but something that you can enjoy, if you get $1000 you can definitely get yourself something decent, even if it's just a headphone driven system. But even even with the speakers, you know, on the used market, there's plenty of good used speakers. Yeah, 1000 bucks, you're, you're good to go. So to get started. And just remember once you do that you're finished, you're finished. You'll never stop. Stop. My inbox is full of people asking questions and it's like I, I can tell that they're totally neurotic about this and that's fine. It's good. It's a good thing to be neurotic about, you know. Thanks Michael. It was, it was a pleasure. Thanks. Great talking with you. Ok. Alright. Well, that was super fun. One of the great audio and analog music ambassadors and one of the most knowledgeable as well. Uh It was great talking to Michael, you know, talking to him, makes me want to pull out my records way more often and maybe we'll have another chat in the future and keep the conversation going. I feel like we could talk like that for hours. I certainly could. A quick reminder that Michael Fremer can be found online at tracking ale dot com and on youtube, Twitter and Instagram at the handle, tracking ale tracking angle, reviews music and audio gear with a focus on all things analog. So definitely check that out and he can also be found contributing to the absolute sound, which is the high end audio network at the absolute sound dot com and on social media under that same name or the handle T A S magazine. This has been another O B M production. If you enjoyed that. Can you spare a few quick seconds? Now, in your podcast app, there's a place in here somewhere where you can rate the podcast. Click on a rating. Thanks until the next show.