Where does the line between a project and a hobby lie? When does a review transition from an assignment to an obsession?
Pear Audio Blue Little John Turntable in Red (image courtesy of Pear Audio Blue)
Have you ever had a piece of audio equipment you just didn't want to leave alone? The kind of item that evokes, as the kids say, all of the feels? Like, if you're not looking at it you're touching it, and if you're not touching it you're thinking about it, and if you're not thinking about it, it's because you're looking at it? I've spent time with those exciting and exceptional pieces before that have caught my attention like lightning in a bottle…trapped and perpetually able to deliver that jolt of "oh my…oh yes!" on demand.
Now here, specifically for the purposes of this article, I'm talking about components that are so freaking outstanding they make you want to ignore the daily demands of life and put all your time into the appreciation of the thing itself. Something so supremely special that it has you ignoring emails, turning off the ringer on your phone and only watching the first episode of Stranger Things Season 2 because what you've got baby, it is all of that and more. Yes, that lofty level of superb specialness in a component is what I'm talking about right here and this particular component(s) comes care of Pear Audio Analogue.
Figure 1 - Balance in all things (Levin Designs Record Brush with the Pear Audio Blue Little John Turntable on a Critical Mass Systems Grandmaster Black Rack)
Confession
I'm new to this whole vinyl thing. My early exposure to it came as a shouted "Don't you dare come in here! Or jump around in your room! Or shut your door! Or breathe loudly!" all while my parents transferred their records to this new-fangled and "superior" tape format. In the room where most of my parents' audio resided, no one and nothing ever stayed for long. If we had music playing on the "big" system it was so we could listen to it in another part of the house (just crank that dial to eleven!). Vinyl wasn't kept in the same room as the stereo, much less on the same floor of the house. It was a disjointed and mixed (media) message that I had to parse early on. But music still managed to play a big role in my formative years regardless of the roadblocks I encountered. My audio thrills, outside of illicitly taping songs off the radio on my Sony boom-box, came from playing Radiohead and Nirvana CDs on my parent's system when they weren't home (at modest volume levels lest the neighbors complain). From here we can fast forward a decade or two to some choice turntable moments at ye olde editors den of audio sybaritism, where vinyl was given the pomp and circumstance I foolishly hadn't known it to be deserving of. My ears were immediately opened and unplugged and all things record-ish became a sudden and pressing interest. Quite sadly, this interest went unexplored and unrewarded for an extended period of time as finances, responsibilities, and other audio indulgences fought for my attentions.
Figure 2 - This is WAR!
Confession number two: I've always semi-secretly been a bit format agnostic. Sure, I doubled down on SACD and DSD playback fairly early, at least relative to the not-so-general audio public. But, for me, it's always begun with the music and lyrics. Given the choice I will listen to the faintest of radio signals over the silence of the road. I will tolerate LPs that skip, stations that are mostly static and even the odd pair of ear buds that only plays on the left side. For me, the enjoyment of music has always met in the intersection of where I am and what I am hearing, "in the moment" if you will. That moment is everything. So while I adore my Astell&Kern AK240, while I have earbuds in every jacket pocket and bag that I own, while every computer, laptop, and tablet in my house has a dedicated DAC and my living room has more headphones in it than throw pillows…I mostly just want what to hear what I want when I want it, medium be damned.
Figure 3 - Triptych x3
And therein lays the rub. A record player won't fit into my back pocket or integrate with my car. It doesn't plug into my laptop and I'd look like a basement DJ if I tried setting a turntable up at my regular coffee shop. I would need floorspace at home, a stack of media for playback, and some semi-regular free time before a turntable even begins to make sense. Oh, I'd need funds for all of this as well, funds my wife has earmarked for extravagances like food and clothing and the electric bill. And again, I'm new to this format. I'd be making all these choices like an inebriated teenager buying Taco Bell at two in the morning…buying cheaply what I am sure to regret deeply come morning.
So how does an uneducated and vinyl-deficient audio-enthusiast go about making that initial foray into turntable-ism? Especially when he has no learned tolerance for the time absorbing ritual that is playing a record? I suppose one could look on Wirecutter for a recommendation. I could dig through my parent's basement for the suitcase record player my grandmother let the older grandkids (not me) use when they visited. I could read this very site and look through the plethora of Talmudic reviews for just the essentials. Or, you know, I could implore Ye Olde Editor for a reviewable setup. Something that's pre this and already that; along the lines of an easy button, but for vinyl.
Unsurprisingly I went with option "D" which was to slowly drop hints over many, many years, then wait for the Jefe de Jefes to suggest that it was the right time for me review a turntable (friends in high places and all that). In this case it turned out to be Michael Vamos of Audio Skies, the US distributor of Pear Audio Blue, and a truly great fellow, who did an amazing job of feeding the analog fire in my soul.
And so it was that one glorious day, I opened my front door to the FedEx driver and watched as he placed two large boxes carefully onto the porch. That's right; I had to carry the oversized boxes into my own house. I've found that manual labor is not typically indicative of an auspicious start, but it seemed only fitting in this case as the very act of playing a record is so much more hands-on than I would have imagined. It's both more involved and much more deliberate than any other media playback I have experienced thus far (and no, I'm not planning on investigating the arcane addiction to Reel-to-Reel that seems to devour ones' heart and budget). As I carefully maneuvered these boxes of audio delight into my living room I was already feeling the subtle twinges of a connection with the project at hand.
Figure 4 - A growing obsession
The first complication (there's always at least one) was scheduling. I'm decent with an instruction manual and my Google-fu is formidable, however I was under firm instruction to wait before any attempt at setting up the components. The waiting, with apologies to the late and great Tom Petty, was not the hardest part. Surely it was, all cards on the table, difficult to look at the unopened boxes and not grow a little anxious. As with most trying things however, I employed the patience that I am always preaching to my sons and soldiered through the waiting with a stoicism worthy of (name checking) Marcus Aurelius. No, the toughest thing here was the scheduling process. Trying to sync up my schedule with the bosses' schedule is a difficult endeavor, difficult during the best of weeks. Trying to carve out a chunk of time where he could get here, and I could be here, during office hours, with the kids away and not underfoot…it took some doing. I think next time around (editor willing) I'll sacrifice a day planner in my fire pit out back and consult the ashes before attempting to schedule a set-up. This go-round took a couple weeks lead time before we could find an appropriate window to embark on the Great Turntable Project of 2017.
With fevered anticipation the day of the appointed time arrived and a gloriously delightful time it was. I'd already marked out an acceptable space for the rack (an audaciously over the top Critical Mass Systems Grandmaster Black Filter Rack, from the one and only Dr. DWR himself) and had cleared the coffee AND the dining table so that parts and piece, tools and gadgets could be neatly arranged. With everything comfortably close at hand, a clear workspace and a fresh pot of coffee, we began.
Figure 5 - Top down, wind in my hair...
My 72" carpenters level was NOT needed for setup thankfully. And did you know that leveling a tone arm, even one as spectacular as the Coronet 1 provided with this turntable, does not require the use of a plumb bob? I did not, but then again, I didn't know anything at all about the setup process of a turntable. As I embarked upon this road of audio discovery, with my trusty field guide the fantastic Dr. D himself leading the way, I expected my knowledge of all things vinyl-ish to grow exponentially (not quite).
Special mid-paragraph confession number three: All these months later I'm still not sure how one distinguishes between 33 and 45 rpm LPs without fiddling with the record players settings. I mean, within my limited experience, there's been no telltale marking on the jacket, on the innersleeve or the center-label-ish-thingy on each side of the LP (see, I had to look up what to call it after typing the whole "center-label-ish-thingy" and it's called, officially, a Label…I'm learning new things all the time). I've found myself fiddling with the belt on the player oh-so-many times when I've confidently dropped the needle on an album, only to hear the opening strains of said album as filtered through molasses. Especially on the Foo Fighters' choice Wasting Light, which has befuddled me almost every single time I've played it (ok, every time…I can't lie to you). First world problems aside, we assertively placed the plinth onto the shelf of the rack (turntable words bonus points!) and mounted the tone arm and I was as a thirsty man sighting water. With the instructions in hand, the patient and ever-helpful Michael Vamos on Facetime and the wind at our backs (figuratively, we were inside with the windows and doors shut) we breezed through the remainder of the setup. I was (and remain) enraptured with the always-on motor that drives the table and I spent much time starting and stopping, starting and stopping the platter spinning. The slip mat recalled the sand-blasted texturing of a finely crafted tobacco pipe and the sealed but utilitarianly raw looking wood fit snuggly into the fengshui that my house is lacking.
Pear Audio Blue Phono Amp (image courtesy of Pear Audio Blue)
Where to go from here?
Well, I wasted no time at all in dropping needle on LP. Nothing and no one was dissuading me from inaugurating this fine Little John turntable with OKNOTOK from Radiohead. As a cornerstone of musical discovery for me (seriously, I spent every bus ride to and from high school, for four months, listening to The Bends and nothing else) Radiohead had to be the first album I listened to with this turntable. Nothing else would suffice.
Sidebar: Have you ever tried describing something that doesn't (to your knowledge) exist? For example, I remember one late night with my wife where I was trying to describe the very specific and distinct snack craving I was having. To my knowledge the snack didn't exist, but I must have spent a good half hour trying to put into words what up until then was just a feeling. I kept saying "sort of like popcorn but made out of peanut butter, you know, like popped or puffed peanut butter." Strange (I know) but it was late at night as we were watching a movie and I was trying to keep myself from eating a whole pint of ice cream. The catch wasn't that I was indecisive or that (according to my wife) my unique cravings would make me the absolute worst pregnant woman ever. No, it was that I desired something I hadn't experienced but which I absolutely grasped the brilliance of, all without ever tasting or seeing it. I could (and did) describe to my wife the composition, the mouth feel, the lightness and the crunch of this made-up snack.
Months later I accidentally stumbled upon the wonderfulness that is Bamba, a peanut-based snack that closely resembles a Cheeto made of peanut butter. It's light and crispy and crunchy and delicious and is precisely what I'd been unwittingly trying to describe that evening to my wife. I say all this by way of attempting to explain how I felt upon first hearing this Pear Audio Blue turntable in action. It felt like walking into my house the first time after signing the purchase documents. In a moment, in a split-second it became "home." In a similar fashion, once the needle of the Hana SH (Shibata High output) Phono Cartridge made contact with the 180 gram deliciousness of the album and "Airbag" came spilling out of my speakers, I knew I was home.
Figure 6 - Cool like blue...
Confessional Bonus Round
Now I've got this (borrowed) rack in my living room with the most delightful of audio delicacies filling each shelf like the window display at a exotic car dealership. Each shelf has carefully nestled within it a wonder of audio wonderfulness. I could have (probably) just geeked out to the audio goodness that the Pear Audio Little John turntable and Pear Audio Blue Phono Preamplifier have brought to me and called it a job well done. But I must, MUST be on about one (or two) specific components here, to fulfill the audio obligations these products demand of me. My bad guys, stay with me here. Honorable…no, past that, this is more than honorable mention, this is beyond a merit award, this is a straight-up award of fantastical audio excellence through addition.
ModWright PH150 and ModWright-modded OPPO Sonica on their Daedalus Audio DiDs at AXPONA 2016 (photograph by David W. Robinson)
This is the "Embarrassment of Riches" award. Daedalus Audio and ModWright Instruments, come on down! Do you know how much isolation is "enough" for your components? When I was gifted the use of the CMS component rack by the man behind the curtain (Dr. D!) I expected to experience a stillness that impacted not just the sound coming forth from my speakers, but a stillness that impacted my hearing and breathing and my heart. Overdramatic, sure, but the eighteen thousand layers (hyperbole) of isolation materials residing in each shelf brought with it serious expectations. And assuredly it delivered. However…the impact was not precisely what I expected, and that lack of expected impact can be laid solely at the feet of Daedalus Audio's Daedalus Isolation Devices. I've had the pleasure of integrating these devices into my audio listening chain for the past eleven months and their impact on vibration has been nothing short of game changing.
To be frank, I had despaired of bringing this turntable into my house, as the only suitable location for it to reside in is a high-traffic area where my two young boys stomp, tromp and bounce through their daily lives like a herd of rampaging rhinoceroses. The CMS Grandmaster Black rack does offer me quite a bit of security and peace of mind regarding the House of Pain style antics my boys display daily. On the sound and isolation front however, I'd be hard pressed to single out a quantifiable improvement that the addition of the CMS rack brought over the already impressive gains in resonance dampening I've enjoyed with the DiD's from Daedalus Audio. Yes, yes, they're that good. That good looking, that good of a design (simplicity on point!), that good period.
Image courtesy of Daedalus Audio
As for the KWI 200 Integrated Power Amplifier from great folks up North at ModWright Instruments, well, this punched my "easy" button like few other audio devices have. Weighing in at 55lbs, this behemoth of simplicity anchors the bottom shelf of the CMS rack with all the grace and elegance one would expect from a top-flight component. This is the kind of amplifier I had been lusting after, ever since I begun my descent into the dark audio arts. This juggernaut of sound amplification has blessed my audio ecosystem for the past eleven months as well, and in that time, I've had the pleasure of watching jaws repeatedly drop at its might. Probably my favorite comment from a listener was when a close friend, listening to my setup with the KWI 200 in it for the first time, sat through the vicious stomp of Depeche Mode's "Personal Jesus" and promptly stated "Oh, you've got serious now have you?" Yes indeed, absolutely bloody serious.
Figure 7- "You...light up my life..."
One of the enjoyable (qualified with a "for me") things about reading my listening notes is trying to decipher what my intent was. I can be great at setting the scene, but when I'm jotting notes while I'm doing a first listen I can be a bit obtuse. Once again, I'll qualify this with the statement that I'm new to this vinyl life and while the impressions I relay might be accurate to me they are also not the impressions of a fully-informed turntable critic. Onwards. Now I'm not sure how exactly, empirically, I knew that the bass I was hearing was "underdeveloped and slightly lacking" or that the drums were "too tight and formal". I'm not sure what experience led me to state that the sound "hadn't opened up yet". I have no classical audio training to fall back on if challenged over my assertion that "the turntable hasn't woken up yet". For the purposes of this review however, I'm not sure that it matters. I'm a neophyte to this vinyl lifestyle and all the collectible, first pressing, European exclusive albums in the world being on my record shelf won't change that. What will (and did) change this is repeated listening. Over and over, round and round, till the grove is in me and not the LP. My notes became more of a stream-of-consciousness word soup as I got on with the business of listening. Days and months in, I began focusing more and more on the albums themselves and the deeper I went I began forsaking even the pretense of objectivity for the delight of listening to the music. This isn't to say I repudiated my original listening notes, it's just that the issues described therein began to fade away, one at a time, the more hours I spent with the system. The blossoming of the soundstage accompanied a deepening of the bass' impact and I began looking for albums that would capitalize on this. I still haven't picked up a copy of The James Gang's Ride Again, but it's on the list, along with sooooo many others. I can't look at my burgeoning vinyl collection without immediately thinking of three or four more essential albums that will highlight the gains this turntable has experienced.
Figure 8 - Preamp selfie (Ink Outline by Robinson)
So what lies ahead for this system of magical delights? Lots! I've a metric ton of listening to do before I feel qualified to expound on the technical merits of this turntable+preamplifier combo. I've been debating removing the preamplifier and running the turntable directly through to the KWI 200 (which does have a MM/MC phono stage, thank you for the concern) just to see (hear) what exactly the preamplifier brings to the table, over and beyond the turntable itself. I'm planning on doing more group listening sessions, as some of my most rewarding listening times have come in a relaxed family-and-friends setting, where everyone gets a chance to comment on both the gear and the music we're listening to. I'd like to output the turntable to some of my headphones, to see if the transcendent sound I've experienced thus far sparkles or fades through different listening devices. I'm even giving serious thought to my speakers and just what the "for worse" in my marriage vows will allow me to get away with, purchase-wise.
Oh, and I am absolutely stacking my shekels in advance of my purchasing my first turntable. You see, when this review comes to an end, as all reviews must, the turntable sized hole in my heart will need prompt filling. This Little John turntable has stolen away any doubts about the place a record player has in my house and in my life. This is necessary. This is music, when I need it, how I need it. The intersection is here, the moment is now. More to come…
Photographs by David Williamson, unless otherwise noted; all image processing by David W. Robinson
