LATEST ADDITIONS

Patricia Barber's café blue remains a musically and sonically stunning set seventeen years after its initial release on CD and later on a truncated vinyl edition. It's set in a dark, atmospheric musical space that recording engineer Jim Anderson captured perfectly, bathing Barber's sultry voice in a mysterious shroud of reverb created not by artificial means as was common at the time, but by establishing an improvised chamber under some stairs at CRC (Chicago Recording Company) where the record was produced.

Let's divide the world into two groups: one that says "Gene who?" and the other that recognizes the late Gene Clark as one of the greats from the rock era. That's my side of the divide.

Note: the review below was written and posted before we received a technical note that was supposed to have been included in the review LP. The note from Reference Vice President Marcia Martin says there were both analog and digital masters of this production. When the analog tape is still in good condition it will be used as the source for these new Reference Mastercut LPs. In this case and for From the Age of Swing the analog tapes were transferred to 176.4kHz/24 bit digital and the file was used to cut the lacquer. This is safer, Ms. Martin says, when dealing with older tapes.

The very first London "Blueback" probably engineered by the great K.E. Wilkinson in London's superb sounding Kingsway Hall combines stunning sonics with an accessible, lyrical musical program. Mendelsohn wrote the Overture opus. 21 in 1826 when he was but 17 years old. The remainder was written almost two decades later, commissioned by Prussian King Frederick William IV as accompaniment to an 1843 performance of the play.