Saturday 12 October 2013

Vinyl Feature: The Beatles - The Red and Blue Albums

The Red Album front cover

Today I am featuring two double albums together simply because they belong together having being released on the same day as complementary collections of The Beatles "A-side" singles hits spanning their career together. Despite having singles hits with cover versions this series only included songs composed by the Beatles themselves.

The first album is titled "The Beatles 1962-1966" but came to be commonly known as "The Red Album", and the second album "The Beatles 1967-1970" which came to be known as "The Blue Album". They were released together on the 2nd of April 1973 and I think it is still one of the best compilations of Beatles songs ever created.

Thursday 10 October 2013

In conversation with Shawn Phillips


Recreate the Disco Era! - How-to make a Disco Ball

Got all that old disco music and want to throw a great disco theme party? Well you will need to get the mood right and this easy DIY disco ball would be just the right thing to help you get your boogie down:




Don't have any disco music to have a disco party? No problem, Amazon have a brilliant 5 cd collection of classic disco music that will keep you jiving for hours! Click on the link below and have it delivered to you in super quick time:


Audio Note Factory Tour in the heart of the factory

A brief and informal look inside the Audio Note factory.

Things to do with old Vinyl Records # 5 - Lamps!

These look like they require a higher level of skill than some of the other examples, but I think with a bit of determination they should be doable.

Wednesday 9 October 2013

Vinyl Feature: Simon and Garfunkel - The Concert in Central Park

Back in 1982 I was in my final year of high school in my home town of Pretoria South Africa and had a drivers licence, a very laid back attitude towards life in general and towards studying for my final exams in particular. The year before Simon and Garfunkel had performed a free benefit concert in Central Park New York and I was eagerly awaiting the live album that had been promised by the media. When I finally purchased it sometime in 1982 it instantly became a firm favourite and would be played on many long hazy evenings together with friends in mostly very smoke laden environments with the smell of stale beer providing a special ambiance. It remained at the top of the playlist for several years until it was stolen along with my entire record collection one fateful night. (You can read about that by clicking here.)

Front Cover

Monday 7 October 2013

One Love - Song Around LA - Playing For Change

I think Bob Marley would approve!

Turnaround - A Vinyl Records Documentary


Vinyl Feature: Barbra Streisand - The Barbra Streisand Album

Released in 1963 this was Barbra Streisand's debut album when she was a mere twenty years old and was just the first album in a long and very successful recording career that spanned almost 50 years! She is quite a raw young talent here with some rough edges but all the potential for being one of the great female voices of her generation. She matured over the years and, in my opinion at least, became one of the all time greats.

Despite being quite new to the game Barbra Streisand had great success on her first recording venture and The Barbra Streisand Album went on to peak at number 8 on the US Billboard pop albums chart, and was certified a gold album by the RIAA.

The Barbra Streisand Album - front cover

Thursday 3 October 2013

Guest Post: "Acrylic Flexy Rack" by Arnold Cruz from his blog "The road to nirvana"

I recently looked into upgrading my shelving for my hifi setup and in my searches I came across what looked like a very good looking and practical shelving system called the Flexy Shelf (or Table) and had it in the back of my mind to build one and post my results here on Vinyl Philosophy. As it turned out I went with the wall mounted shelves instead, mainly because I already had almost everything I needed lying around at home.

Despite this I still wanted to do one and continued to look at other peoples attempts to plan my way forward. In my searchings I came across a particularly nice looking example on the website of Arnold Cruz at The road to nirvana and then proceeded to ask him if I could repost his Flexy Shelf post right here on Vinyl Philosophy so that more people could benefit from what I think is one of the prettiest Flexy Shelves out there. So with his permission here it is:

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Acrylic Flexy Rack

An article on the online site TNT Audio inspired me to try working on a version that suits my personal preferences. The original article calls for MDF shelves, but I decided to go a notch higher by using Acrylic (or sometimes called Plexiglass).

My first version was based on the layout and measurements of the original article and looked like this:

the doors interviews 1968 (HQ)