PLEASURE OF  LISTENING

What is this page all about ??? I simply put here the things that HIT me (and which I remember about !) and which definitely separate the GCs from my Silver Nights and any other amps I own or have owned, including my pentode push-pull amps, and my Arcam surround sound system (100 wpc, solid state of  course). I do not say too much about the condition of  vinyl, except that most of  my collection came from car boot (yard) sales. However, I have an excellent motorised vinyl cleaning machine - a  "Nitty Gritty",  and  I make up cleaning fluid consisting of  mainly a mixture of  isopropyl alcohol and pure distilled water.  This machine is magic, and provided that records are not scratched (most are not actually) or heavily worn (classic tracks are usually worn to hell, so hard to get a classic in mint condition), most clean up like new.  If dust particles have been hammered home by styli running time and again over a dusty record, then the tiny dust particles are pushed so firmly down the bottom of the groove that no amount of cleaning can remove the crackling that this results in. In such cases it either has to be tolerated or the record ditched (maybe this problem can be solved to a certain extent by digitising and processing - see my computer page, dealing with archiving vinyl and other things, (under construction at time of  writing this).

The following is more like a diary (without dates, but in chronological order).  I would never have bothered with a page like this, but the enjoyment of the music is so much that I have to write about it, even if  I am the only one to subsequently take a peek to remind myself. From that point alone it is worth doing, as I have a large vinyl collection and can go through it at my leisure. The underlying thing is that this has only been made possible by the GainClone amps.

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SADE - vinyl album - Promise    

Track:   Jezebel

Whenever I listened to this track in the past, it ALWAYS jarred my nerves towards the end, where there are some loud(ish) keyboard chords.  I had attributed this to either record wear, or more likely, the stylus jumping due to the amplitude of  the grooves being simply too much to handle.  I did not want to alter the tracking weight of  around 1.9 grammes, so lived with this problem, but shuddered each time the chords came.  To my surprise, when I played the track first time using the GCs, the chords were NOT appreciably louder than the rest of the music, but just came out as beautiful clean chords amidst the rest of the music, so nothing to do with stylus jump or record wear at all, but to do with those harmonically related notes, played all together at high(ish) level, were enough to fool all my other amps which acted like mixers to produce some glorious overtones.

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ALISON MOYET - vinyl album - Alf

Track:  Where hides sleep

As is the case with almost every track from every album,  this sounded so different through the GCs that one can only describe one's feelings as both 'annoyed' and at the same time wanting to shout out. To hear that glorious powerful smooth voice come rolling out, and with a superb melody and top class instrumentation,  is just something else. So why 'annoyed' - well for two reasons 1. annoyed that all my beloved amps prior to the GCs never got anywhere close in bringing out the richness and detail and 2. annoyed that one couldn't immediately have 100 people gathered around to witness the sound those 'crappy little boxes' produce - the 'crappy little boxes' seem to defy the laws of nature

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MTV - Satellite digital music channels . Date: any time

Having been frustrated by the inferior quality of  the compressed music, there is no doubt that the GCs give it the best possible shot.  Previously I would use my surround sound system with sub-woofer, for watching and listening to the music channels....

Track/video: Moulin Rouge

There are some real deep bass notes, right in sub-woofer territory.  To my surprise the GCs pass this so brilliantly that the AN-E loudspeakers, despite only having 8.5" bass/mid passive drivers, pick up the deep bass incredibly well.  The top end is so far ahead of  the solid state 'conventional' amps in my surround sound system, that I will only use the GCs in future.

Track/video: Thriller

This is one of  the best videos around, but as I had (by chance) played the vinyl the night before, I was hugely disappointed with the sound (in my memory). Immediately after the video finished I played the vinyl, and the difference was more than huge, so much that one can make zero comparison.  It really brings home just how poor the MPEG music is, and many have complained and continue to do so about this. 

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QUEEN - Triple CD - Greatest hits I II & III

Track:  Another one bites the dust

[Remember that I use my Chord DAC64 with all CDs]

This is where the bass control shows how the GCs excel. The punctuation in the beat calls for instantaneous inky black spaces between the pulsating thumps, but even more exciting is the swell of  that chord which stops dead - I suppose this is actually a slowly decaying chord played backwards, so that it really does stop dead.

Track: I want it all

This is a great rock track.  When there is a mixture of  chorus, drums, powerful bass and massive guitar chords all at the same time, it becomes increasingly difficult for amps to hold the clarity, positioning and relative dynamics perfectly together. Now I appreciate that for rock music  "vibes" and "sensation"  are the most important elements, and not pure fidelity.  Folks want to listen to the beat.  I have another page dealing with types of  audio system, and I believe that these can be put into three main groups, one being "rock". That page is under construction/development at time of writing

Track:  The Show must go on

The power and beauty of  Freddie Mercury's solo voice shines through in this track especially, and it remains one of  my favourite test tracks

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CLANNAD - vinyl - Macalla

Track: Caislean Oir

Maire's beautiful voice texture comes shining through on this classic track, and the breathy chorus vocals, almost the 'hallmark' of  Clannad, are so realistic that they could be right there infront of  you

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FLEETWOOD MAC - vinyl - Rumours

Track: The Chain

One of the classic tracks, famous in UK for the bassline being the intro track for Formula 1 Grand Prix racing on the BBC, all the years that they had it. Regrettably, since ITV have had the rights to F1 racing the music has somehow seemed sadly lacking. Anyway, the first part of the chain is full of  percussion, pulse and inky black silences, plus the lovely vocal harmonies.  In the past I used to prefer the end section (F1 bit) of the track, but now I think I prefer the first section.  This track is one of the most unusual in that it is actually two different 'items' joined together - they tried it, and it worked, more than just fine !

Track: Oh Daddy

Christine McVie has such a beautiful clear voice, and I adore this track, and also Songbird, either  of  which I could play on 'repeat track' for hours on end. Unfortunately this is not possible on vinyl without getting up every couple of  minutes

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FLEETWOOD MAC - vinyl - Tango in the Night

Track: Big Love

Towards the end of  this track are some backing 'ughs' and 'aghs' by Stevie Nicks and (?) Lindsey Buckingham.

They come out so convincingly that one almost jumps out of  ones seat !

Track: When I see you again

The gravelly voice of  Stevie Nicks is pretty unique, and when it comes through like it does on this particular track, one wishes one could scoop that adorable creature up in one's arms - it makes me go queazy all over to hear those tones.

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2 JUNE 2004

Last week George (Sallit) came round to collect some Astronomy bits and pieces, and I showed him my GCs.  He was so gob-smacked that he had to try them, so today I went round and we tested them out on his Sony SACD player, etc, and compared with his high spec solid state amp.  It was an AMAZING evening,  verifying absolutely that the GCs a) NEVER for a second sounded solid state, b) were better than the BIG NAME solid state amps in (probably) every department, c) did indeed give the sort  of   performance one would normally associate with hugely expensive SET amps, and maybe with superior bass power and control.  Note that the chips I use in my GCs  are capable of  a SUSTAINED 50Watts into 8 ohms from a +/- 35v power supply, so they compete on power alone, with the monster SET amps.  On top of  this, they run so COOL, that it's hard to believe after  hours of  high volume listening.

Next move for me is for G to bring his Sony SCD1 player, his Audio Note M2 valve pre-amp, and some silver cabling over to my place, to identify the weakest components in my system.  Incidentally, my system has a slightly harsh sound, and I noticed on some GC forums that some users mentioned a harsh(ish) characteristic. I have to say that on G's system, which is about the most pure and refined that you can get, there was ZERO evidence of any harshness whatever, it was just unbelievable beautiful natural sounding reproduction !!!!!!!!!!!!!

7 June 2004

George brought his Sony SCD1 round, plus his M2 pre-amp.  We determined that the brightness in my system is due to my pre-amp, and when we hooked his gear up to my GCs the sound was awesome.  My game plan is to sort out a pre-amp (may build my own valve design), and get a SACD player.  Note that I will still use, very extensively, normal CD + DAC64.   My vinyl system with magnetic cartridge, sounded exceptional when using G's M2 pre-amp, again showing up my pre-amp as the 'weakest link' in my system.

footnote: am building some Gainclones for George, and these will be identical to my own, 'cos I fear that if  I start messing around with the circuit it may cause problems. So far we have not noticed any single point of  criticism with the GCs, so  there is no excuse or reason to try anything different, at least at this point in time. 

26 June 2004

A few days ago  George picked up his Gainclones. Today I got an e-mail - here is a summary of what he said:

" ABSOLUTELY BLOODY FANTASTIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Being a bit more constructive. I have now set everything up and optimised the CD replay and everything sounds really good. Dealing with the tetchy stuff the reason the SCD-1 CD didn't sound too good around your place was of course it had no outboard DAC. The Audionote DAC3.1X Signature makes a lot of difference. The amps normally run coolish but when running SACD the extra power in the bass makes things get very hot. Certainly, the bottom of the amps get very hot to the touch with the tops of the amps OK. I suspect that I will need the holes because of SACD and the size of the room.  [I thought we would try George's boxes with no ventilation holes, as mine (with ventilation holes underneath and at the rear) run very cool, so it was worth a try to see if  we could get away with no airflow around the internal heatsinks. Clearly we can't so I will put a few ventilation holes in his boxes at some stage - Nick]. The sound is really excellent. It is the best of the valves with a very natural way with voices. We listened to Bridge Over Troubled Waters and voice and piano were spell binding. The recording is old but good. The improvements vary with recordings but even Free's Alright Now showed that the bass drum was heavily damped and the bass guitar electronically damped. The 3D spacing is either immense (older recordings) or small (new recordings). But the drum kit on the new remastered Tommy was so natural and powerful with immense decay on cymbals. For the transistor part the power in well recorded drums and the sheer drive propels music along. The timing is superb and when you get good musicians then you hear the intricate interplay. But even on very bright recordings such as Bon Jovi, it never loses control of the voices even though they may be emphasised and bright. I am slowly going through my CD collection. In fact, the improvement is so immense I have not optimised SACD replay or set up vinyl yet.