This year’s AXPONA Show was the best yet. It demonstrated that Chicago is a great place to hold a regional audio show—even if the city ignored it. It was well-attended by consumers and well-supported by local dealers and a wide sampling of manufacturers.
While AXPONA was, for the most part, not the place for product debuts (that will be in at Munich's High End Show in May), Channel D did introduce a new phono preamp, the Lino, which is the least expensive of the company's three phono preamplifiers.
Artisan Fidelity restores and re-imagines vintage turntables from Lenco, Garrard and Garrard/Loricraft. The room featured one of each as you'll see on the video.
A Lenco motor-based 'table equipped with a Kuzma 4 Point fitted with a Lyra Kleos was the source. A David Berning vacuum tube based preamp and OTL mono block amplifiers were the electronics. The speaker was a spectacularly finished, single coaxial driver design from LaHave Audio.
Tour the AXPONA 2015 Marketplace. AXPONA 2015 has turned into a regional powerhouse of a show: well run, well attended (though Sunday was off, somewhat) and now, well-established. More coverage coming up soon.
At AXPONA 2014 CoolCleveland.com's Thomas Mulready interviewed me following a turntable set-up seminar. This year he returned and asked me to conduct an on-camera CD vs. vinyl "shootout" using Roxy Music's Avalon as the test subject.
True, there were no seats so everyone had to stand, but Patricia Barber and her accompanying trio played to an appreciative, but foot-weary full house in the O'Hare Westin ballroom Friday evening.
Barber, whose overexposure (like that of Diana Krall and a few others) has produced an unfair backlash among some audio enthusiasts, demonstrated that she is an artist worthy of serious consideration and not a flash-in-the-audiophile-community-pan.
AXPONA Audio Con is NOT WELCOME in Chicago and the city is not glad the show is here. What other conclusion can one draw upon landing at O'Hare and waiting to pick up one's luggage only to be confronted by the sign you see at the top of this story?
AXPONA 2015 presents "AudioCon" Friday April 24th through Sunday April 26th at Chicago's Westin O'Hare Hotel. Analogplanet will be covering the show here and presenting seminars as well as tweeting (@analogplanet) breaking news.