Audiophilepure

Gryphon Audio Designs Ethos CD player

Then you put on something you know really well. I’m at once proud and not proud to say that first disc was Back In Blackby AC/DC [Atlantic]. This is one of those albums I had on LP, cassette and CD (the LP got destroyed by playing on cheap equipment and was stolen by a junkie friend of an ex-girlfriend, the tape got mangled in a car cassette player and the CD has led a comparatively sheltered life by way of comparison). From the opening peel of ‘Hells Bells’ through to the title track, Ethos played these early 1980s arena rock tracks with the sort of force and intensity that makes you reach for the volume control and wish you were young enough to headbang without all the crepitus. The guitars on this disc can often sound ‘toppy’ and compressed, but here although you can still hear the compression, you realise its both deliberate and a pedal effect before the amp’s own distortion rather than laid on afterwards. As a consequence, it causes an equalisation of plectrum strike and makes for those intense power chords the Young brothers used to such good effect.

The dCS Bartok: Take Two…

As much a digital audio product can, Bartok comes on as the equivalent of a ‘60s McIntosh tube amplifier or ‘80s JBL horn speaker — classics to which people keep returning because they are that good, that reliable, that fun. Another incentive: Its seamless interfacing ability with Roon, particularly now that the platform’s 1.8 software makes streaming on Bartok an easier and smarter experience. It also should go without saying (again) that using a Bartok doesn’t mean you’ll stop spinning records. Instead, it serves as an equalizer: Granting added access, increasing options, bestowing convenience, and bringing sought-after analog qualities to digital while spotlighting albums that sound better digitally than they do on a turntable