Some Gear around the House

Leslie W2 Vintage Headphones

 

 

One of my great friends Yuri, taught me most of what I know about music and recording. I remember he introduced me to the vintage sound of a Hammond B3 through a Leslie speaker cabinets on the early Deep Purple & Nucleus (highly collectible) records. Yuri has the original pressing, I have a newer 180g vinyl pressing. 

The Doppler swoosh sound was incredible to me as he went through his incredible selection of vinyl. He described how the Allman Brothers Band and others would perform on stage with their Leslies rocking back and forth on the stage to give it a methodical sense of manic timing and sound. So calculated were the echoes of the vibrating Leslies most noticeable on Pink Floyd's "echoes". They were simply put, "the sound of an era". I was in high school listening to the Police and a Flock of Seagulls playing their mini moogs and DX-7's at the time and loved that I had been opened up to this new (old) ear candy. I came across these 1968 vintage Leslie W2's and it brought me back to that time. I recognized the logo and had to grab them. I didn't know that they even produced any audio accessories so these seemed like quite a find and it turns out they were. Ultra rare the W2's truly are vintage open aired units that have great reproduction. If I were to find a flaw it would be a lack of bass as is not unusual in those days without spending some serious money on higher end cans. Great mids and low fatigue,  I find them to be excellent for 40 year old phones. The W4's were the successor to the W2's and were upgraded with a switchable crossover to select genres from Classical to Popular and then to Vocals. Cool! These were only available in black with chrome accents. I will be watching for a pair of these one day.

Yamaha YP-B2 Turntable

Here is a very nice manual belt driven turntable that arrived this week. It has a simple and elegant vintage look with the Brazilian rosewood stocky plinth. A polished S-tonearm is complimented with the original head shell. It sounds like a menu description doesn't it? Ah well these units are like fine foods aren't they? When all the right ingredients are there it truly is delectable!

I replaced the belt and wiped it off and away we went. My wife actually likes cleaning them for me. Quite nice when she comments on the quality of a unit. Once the tracking was set up I found the sound to be surprisingly good as I was skeptical on the Yamaha series although they really did have some gems in the late 70's. All in all this is a solid entry level TT that you really cant go wrong with in both function and design.

Luxman K-5a Cassette Deck

I had a ton of hits on the vintage Nakamichi deck so I thought while the interest is there I would show this Luxman Deck that came in at the same time. Yet another 2 Head, Dolby B NR system in this spectacular tank of a unit. Vintage Vintage look from 1979. In terrific shape I have not yet put it up against the Nak but I am looking forward to the comparison. This deck had an MSRP of $495.00. Quite pricey if you compare the $200 difference over the Nakamichi. I will see if we have a winner. Same cleaning performed and the same cassettes will go head to head. :) Be well!

Contact Me

If you have any questions on the equipment you see please do not hesitate to email me at vits@gmx.com
I would be happy to answer any of your questions. Enjoy your Day!

Nakamichi BX-1 Deck

When it comes to analog signals I prefer to run vinyl over tape simply because of the superiority of turntable equipment that I have. Until... I set up this Nak deck and gave it a run through various music genres.

I was blown away at the dynamics of this simple two head system and really enjoyed the tapes that I have collecting dust. A great music lover friend walked in on a playing of the Aja album from Steely Dan and said "nice tunes". I told him it was a cassette and he was shocked. "you gotta be kidding" he said, "that's incredible quality". We had a nice discussion on the history of the Nakamichi's of yesterday and went through quite a few cassettes in the process. I have many 2 head decks that cost much more in their day then the BX-1 but this is truly a wonderful unit. The BX-1 is on the lower scale of decks they put out in 1982 but compared to some others this had to be a steal at an MSRP of $299.00
This particular deck is in fantastic shape and looks like it was rarely used or was treated as I would have.

Pioneer PL-530 Turntable

This Pioneer table is a fully automated direct drive table. S-tonearm with very accessible cuing and anti-skating mechanism. I like the bulked up look of this table. It's a very good sounding table and a pleasure to operate. The cover had many minute scratches across it and I managed to buff and polish them out quite effectively. I was impressed with how quiet the table runs. It is nice when a unit is completely original right down to the head shell. This was the golden era for Pioneer and I'm happy its arrived.

Simonetta Transistor Vintage Radio

My passion for sharing is usually the late 60's through 80's components but I really enjoy acquiring interesting radios as well. I did a write-up on a nice vintage Sony radio back in August and had some great emails about it.

Just arrived is this great condition Simonetta built in 1969. These were German built with wave bands of broadcasts, short wave, long wave and also FM. The loudspeakers are moving coil and has an output of 0.9Watt. This unit is leather wrapped and has held up over time. The antenna configures quite differently as it stores horizontally and extends to a 3.5ft height. Crystal clear reception and great power. I need to locate another tuning knob but other than that it cleaned up to original condition beautifully.
Watch for another transistor gem coming in from Denmark...Yes a B&O!

Merry Christmas to All

Energy 22 Connoisseur Speakers

One of my fondest vintage sound memories has to be at the age of 16 when I would ride my bicycle up to the high end hifi shop on Yonge St in Richmond Hill. This was the dream shop that I learned much of sound quality and equipment. I remember getting my first taste of Carver units and doing comparison tests with the other amps of that era. The sales rep who's name I forget was my sound guru. I do remember he was extremely tall. We would spend hours listening and testing in the sound room and he was always delighted to teach me the terms and train my ear. To spend that much time with me at that age was very exciting as I loved the pure sound he would demonstrate.

Hearing for the first time Steely Dan's Gaucho album thru the amazing Energy 22 Connoisseurs was just spectacular. In 1982 these retailed for $1,200. The hyper dome tweeter

is amazing and the relatively small cabinets produced a bottom end out of these small polypropylene woofers of 30Hz, seriously low. The timbre and backing keyboards were sweet sounds that I had never experienced prior to that day.

 
It was sooo pure and clean and of course it was vinyl. The imaging of these speakers was magical. A wide dispersion of sound filled the room urging you to place each instrument's location in your mind.

It was the Carver M-400t that pushed this masterpiece LP thru the 22's. Dubbed "the cube" the M-400t differs from the M-400a seen here on my friend Lloyd's blog, in that Bob Carver emulated a true tube amplifiers sound. It was an experience that is really what Vintage sound is all about. Even at the age of 16. Listen to "my rival" to really hear the full dynamics of this album.