Charlie

I wouldn't say any album is a perfect 10/10 but I feel these come closest - Hallucinogen - Twisted Shpongle - Are You Shpongled Shpongle - Tales of the Inexpressible Shpongle - Nothing Lasts... Celtic Cross - Hicksville Prometheus - Robot-o-chan Ott - Blumenkraft Juno Reactor - Beyond the Infinite Infected Mushroom - Classical Mushroom Sandman - Witchcraft UX - Ultimate Experience

Deep Purple - Hush

I was disappointed with Unusual Suspects 2, it's predecessor is much better in my opinion.

My opinion - there's not much good new stuff being released at the moment. Prometheus, Ott and Shulman are well worth checking out and are all releasing new albums later this year, other than them I'd recommend looking for older albums you missed the first time round. Eighty percent of the psy trance albums I purchased last year were oldies and I generally enjoyed them considerably more than the new releases I bought.

Depends what you like. They're not an electronic band and they're quite difficult to categorise. They kinda fuse folk with rock and pop. Best to download some samples and see what you think.

I hope that isn't true. Whilst I don't like all of their releases, I feel they release some of the best trance and probably trust them on name alone more than any other label.

Quite.

I don't know if there are too many labels but there are too many lables releasing sub-standard trance. Maybe it's a good thing, a sheep dressed in wolf's clothing, maybe some of them will go under and those left will go back to concentrating on quality rather than quantity. We'll see.

I get what you're saying but for something to fall into the worst ever category it needs to be awful in every sense - concept, arrangement, instrumentation, production, engineering, musicality... ...but anyway, to each his own.

I appreciate taste is taste but it's possible to dislike something yet recognise it's qualities.

Hallucinogen - Magik

I remember James, they had that Sit Down song. They were pretty good.

Okay, so you didn't like it, that I can understand, but to call it one of the worst albums of the year is really rather silly. Few albums are as technically accomplished as Nothing Lasts and even those unable to appreciate it on a musical level should bear witness to it's incredible engineering. It's an amazing example of aural sculpture.

Cables are as intrinsically important as the hi-fi components themselves. If you spend £10,000 a CD player and amplifier it's important the signal feeding the amplifier is as close as possible to the signal that left the CD player. Many cables employ special technology to ensure as little data as possible is lost or 'coloured' during this transfer. As for the placebo effect, I'm sure it plays a small part but as Pedro stated, we all hear things differently. Some people have very sensitive hearing and subsequently will notice subtle changes in ecoustics. I have a friend with very keen sight, he's constantly telling me my shelves and pictures are crooked but I don't see it, my eyesight isn't as tuned as his. Likewise, I hear nuances in music his ears don't detect. In summary - because one person cannot sense something it doesn't necessarily mean the next person is unable to.

eBayed.

eBayed.

Interesting article, but it didn't say what track was used in the test. The difference in quality between an original CD track and the equivelant MP3 file will be more difficult to determine when dealing with electronic music. Play a live folk song or a classical number and it becomes easier to tell which is which. The original CD recording will have room to breathe, instruments and voices will sound fuller and more natural. Dynamics and resolution will also be better.

Beethoven - Violin Concerto in D Major

Beautiful system you have. What's the Nordost Thor like, worth the substantial outlay? I don't suppose you're using it with the Valhalla mains cables as Nordost suggest? I currently have a Sugden Masterclass CD player upgraded with a Philips 16-bit double-crown DAC chip, Sugden Masterclass pre-amp, Sugden Masterclass Class A Stereo power amp (just 50 watts per channel but pure class A), ProAc Future One speakers, Isotek mains conditioner, Van Den Dul Mainsstream mains cables upgraded with silver-plated Wattgate IEC and 13A mains plugs, and Nordost Valkyrja XLR interconnects and speaker cables. Ridiculously expensive. Hi-fi's an addiction. I'm not proud of how much I've spent on my system but hi-fi manufacturers are all too aware audiophiles will pay silly money for the smallest improvements in sound quality. It's often daylight robbery.

What system do you have? On a good system (£10K plus) the difference between a 320Kbps mp3 and an original CD are easily recognisable, particularly if the system is powered through a decent mains conditioner and hooked up with top quality mains cables, interconnects and speaker cables. On such a system mp3s will generally sound comparatively flat and compressed with flabby bass.

You think?

Yeah, maybe.

I bought it on release but for whatever reason couldn't get into it, it just didn't excite me in the same way their first album Let's Turn On did, an album I adore and still play today.

lol

Must have taken ages.