It is possible to live in harmony with your environment!

I grew up in the sixties and seventies when we had high ideals about improving the planet through love, peace and harmony with nature and our fellow human beings. Sadly many of those ideals were lost along the way as the eighties and the realities of earning a living set in. Once in a while it's great to hear about people who never lost those ideals and who decided to forge ahead despite the odds. Here is one such story, and it makes me want to go out there and start a small farm myself! I guess I'm just a hippy at heart! :-)

"Growing your own food is a dangerous act because you're in danger of becoming free."
- Jules Dervaes

You can see the "Path to Freedom" website by CLICKING HERE.

Top Ten Crazy Turntable Designs! (yes, but can they play records?)

There are some crazy turntable designs out there to suit every crazy taste under the sun. So if you are not happy with your old traditional boring looking player here are some examples that may tickle your fancy instead.

VPI HR-X turntable

Wood Glue method for Cleaning Vinyl Records

I have never tried this myself, but from what I have heard it works really well for very dirty records that have deeply embedded dirt that can't come out with regular cleaning. I would test it first on a record you don't mind potentially ruining, but my logic dictates that it should be ok as long as you follow the simple instructions given here.

Vinyl Feature: Liza Minnelli - Tropical Nights

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How to Set-Up Your Pro-Ject Turntable

Vinyl in the News: Back in the groove: Daft Punk and Arctic Monkeys send vinyl LP sales rocketing by 100 per cent

Back in the groove: Daft Punk and Arctic Monkeys send vinyl LP sales rocketing by 100 per cent

Bands help push the popularity of the revived format to renewed heights this year

Daft Punk helped push annual sales of vinyl LPs over the half a million mark for the first time in more than a decade, according to an analysis by industry body BPI.

Releases by the French dance duo as well as Arctic Monkeys and David Bowie have helped push the popularity of the revived format to renewed heights this year.

Almost 550,000 LPs have been bought by music fans so far in 2013, already giving vinyl its most successful year since 2003. 

Read the rest of this news article on  The Independent's website by CLICKING HERE!

Cliff Richard interview Aarhus

Focus on Equipment: the Rega RP1 Turntable

Refoaming a pair of Snell E3 speakers (it's easier than you think)

When buying a second hand pair of speakers that are older than 10 - 20 years it is always a good idea to check them carefully for foam rot. Over time the foam surrounding the speaker cone can get perished and quite literally fall apart. The sound quality will be severely degraded when the foam is a gonner and especially the bass will be affected badly, and if left unattended you will eventually cause permanent damage to your drivers which will potentially be very expensive to replace.

Look at these examples of speaker rot I found online:

 

It's a very common problem but fortunately it is also very easy to remedy. For those who feel they cannot take on a DIY project like this most hi fi repair shops can do this repair fairly easily and at a reasonable cost. For those of us with some basic DIY skills repairing our own speakers is a piece of cake and much cheaper than having someone else doing the refoaming it for us.

Vinyl Feature: Don McLean - Homeless Brother

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Released in October 1978 by folk singer Don Mclean Homeless Brother was the fifth of twenty albums spanning a career of more than forty years. This was not his most commercially successful album only making it to 120th place on the US Billboard 200 at the time, however it is pure Don Mclean at his absolute best with the great folk style and fantastic vocals that he is known for.

The quality of the recording and the vinyl pressing is outstanding as well and sounds so real it's almost as if he is sitting in the room and performing for us personally. Very engaging!

How To Setup A Turntable

The vinyl revival: Sales of LP records double in 12 months

Sales of LP records double in 12 months to reach 550,000 thanks to releases by artists including Arctic Monkeys

Vinyl sales have doubled in the past year, with record industry body BPI is predicting that more than 700,000 will be sold by Christmas.

- Vinyl record sales have doubled thanks to famous names releasing LPs
- Around 550,000 have been bought so far in 2012 and could exceed 700,000

Sales of vinyl LP records have doubled in the last 12 months to their highest level for a decade.
Around 550,000 have been bought so far and the record industry body BPI is predicting that more than 700,000 will be sold by Christmas.
An online poll of 1,700 vinyl buyers found that 86 per cent of them said it was their favourite music format. A third of today’s LP fans are aged under 35.

Full Story:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2463674/The-vinyl-revival-Sales-LP-records-double-12-months-reach-550-000.html

17 October 2013
www.dailymail.co.uk

Don McLean on TV-am - 1984

Things to do with old Vinyl Records # 6 - Art!

Possibly the most difficult of the lot in technical and creative terms. Could be fun to try though, so let me know what you have done and send pics of course!

Vinyl Feature: Smokie - Greatest Hits

Released in April 1977 the album "Greatest Hits" by the band Smokie contained all 10 of their singles up to that time spanning their (then) 12 year career. They went on to be one of the longest surviving bands from that era and still exist today, although only one of the original band members is still with Smokie.

Their first ever hit was "If You Think You Know How To Love Me", they had 13 top twenty hits during the 1970's, and went on to sell over 30 million LP's and CDs. To date their mega hit song "Living Next Door To Alice" has sold over 10 million copies worldwide.

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