LATEST ADDITIONS

While we have indeed been focused on featuring more reasonably priced gear here on AP of late, we do still want to recognize some higher-end, high-caliber products as well — besides, we love looking at aspirational gear as much as most audiophiles do, you know? With that in mind, we turn our lens onto the Nagra Reference turntable, a truly high-end model if ever there was. Read on to see all the specs and features that make this table worthy of joining Nagra’s impressive Reference line — and, oh yeah, to also find out what its not-so-insignificant SRP happens to be. . .

In the circles of soul music fans, Isaac Hayes’ seminal June 1969 LP Hot Buttered Soul is well-known as a landmark recording, an album that helped break down conventions of what a hit soul recording could be. This four-song album originally went gold on the Enterprise label, but Craft Recordings just may have taken Hot Buttered Soul to new aural heights with their recently released AAA Small Batch 180g 1LP edition. Read Mark Smotroff’s review to see if the Small Batch version of this seminal soul LP belongs in your collection, STAT. . .

The more vinyl the merrier, as the saying goes — or at least, that’s how it goes with us analog lovers. Relative to that, we’ve just gotten word that Metal 2000, an Italian company, is launching their new Futura vinyl record press, something that’s sure to help increase manufacturing options for a number of potential LP-pressing clients. Read on to see Metal 2000’s philosophy behind the Futura, and how it does what it does. . .

Plangent Processes is again at the center of a pair of new Grateful Dead reissues that were released by Rhino back in January: a) July 1977’s Top 30 hit LP Terrapin Station and July 1987’s Top 10 smash In the Dark — and now we’re finally getting around to reviewing them here together. Read Mark Smotroff’s review to see if either or both of these new LP editions of Terrapin Station and In the Dark — supervised and produced by noted Dead archivist David Lemieux, and mastered for vinyl by David Glasser — belong in your collection. . .