Los Angeles Audio Show 2017 Report
LAAS 2017 Show Report Part 5
Ryan, AURALiC, Periodic Audio, StereoPravda, Aaudio Imports, Blue Coast Records, Kimber Kable, and Astell&Kern.
LAAS 2017 High-End Audio Show Report

  Aaudio Imports' Brian Ackerman brought a room packed with audiophile delights! Here's the room breakdown for you:

HB Cable Design PowerSlave Marble Power Distributor constant supply of electrical energy $13,500
Ikeda KAI MC Cartridge representing Ikeda San's over 4 decades of experience 8,500
Analord Master Phono Cable vacuum dielectric phono cable 5,300
Gorgon Interconnects a presumably impossible perfect lens 7,600
Kraken Ac remarkable & undeniable improvements in sonic performance 8,400
Proteus Ac utterly silent, coherent and powerful 12,000
Leviathan Ac representing a new standard in power delivery 14,500
Medusa Speaker Cables ultimate statement in amp/speaker interface technology 18,500

Thales TTT Compact II a turntable made to perfection $14,500
Simplicity II revolutionary zero tracking error tone-arm 9,200
Wilson Benesch Resolution Loudspeakers designed for the ultimate listening experience 69,500
Torus + Amp infrasonic generator ~ transforms timing & integration 12,500
R1 Carbon modular HI-FI Rack ~ engineered to perfection (8,500 per module) 25,500

Ypsilon PST-100 MKII Valve Preamp Stereophile class A $37,000 
AELIUS II Push Pull Mono Amps Sonic purity, endless power, unmatched build quality 39,000
VPS-100 Valve Phono Stage Stereophile class A+ 26,000
MC26L Step Up Transformer new reference level model 6,200

And my faves are the skull-like Metaxas Marquis Headphone Amp + Preamp as seen above. The home audio gear sounded sweet, as in clean, musical and they type you'd want to come home to, pour a delicious drink and enjoy the magical music.

With more than 20 years in the music industry, Cookie Marenco's (right) of Blue Coast Records has shared her creative and technical skills, which have touched almost every aspect of the music business for many years. She is widely known for the quality of her audio engineering skills and for drawing out passionate performances from the artists she produces. She has engineered or produced five Grammy-nominated records, several Gold records and an Academy Award-winning documentary.

Her artist credits include Max Roach, Brain, Kenny Aronoff, Steve Smith, Brady Blade, Tony Furtado, Tony Trischka, Dirk Powell, Rob Ickes, Charlie Haden, Tony Levin, Steve Rodby, Buckethead, Ralph Towner, Paul McCandless, Ernie Watts, Glen Moore, Mary Chapin Carpenter, John Jennings, Pat DiNizio, Kristin Hersch, Brad Mehldau, Matt Rollings, Kevin Kern, Art Lande, Clara Ponty, Chanticleer, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Mark Isham and Michael Tolcher. Her production and engineering skills can be found on projects for Monterey Jazz Festival, Telluride Bluegrass Festival, Marinfest, Midem, Hard Rock Cafe, Windham Hill Records, Verve, Rounder Records, Om Records, Sony, Warner Bros. and others. Blue Coast Records brought their Pyramix computer system, with speakers being Sony driven by Pass Labs amplification.

Kimber Kable is showing a close-to-release version of their in-ear monitor cables. This all-silver cable in their Axios line may be called the IE. It has a pair of special memory wires weaved within the silver conductor cables. This pair of memory wire is seamlessly weaved into Kimber Kable's luxurious handmade within the USA products. To say I was getting a bit, well, hot and bothered with joy, would be fairly accurate. This cables will be launched at RMAF so look for them within Enjoy the Music.com’s RMAF 2017 show coverage.

Last up within my LAAS 2017 coverage is the Astell&Kern SP1000 battery powered portable music player ($3499). It is their ultimate music player that employs dual AK4497EQ DACs, octa-core CPU, high output power with low distortion, and 5" color LCD screen,. A newly-developed GUI, USB 3.0, and multi-function wheel bring ease of use to a new level. Japan's Asahi Kasei AK4497EQ is used so that each DAC is dedicated to each independent left and right audio channel, producing a wider soundstage and better stereo separation. With the addition of an octa-core CPU, the SP1000 boots faster than previous models by Astell&Kern, plus now can process digital audio playback without lag or compromise in sound.

Their redesigned GUI has an intuitive menu that is centered on music playback. USB Type-C 3.0 support allows data transfers that are twice as fast as other Astell&Kern players. The SP1000 also provides 12 hours of music playback and with support for fast charging. Astell&Kern also announces a new cable line co-branded with Dutch cable specialist Crystal Cable. Four different headphone/IEM cable types will be available including MMCX cables and two-pin cables, available in both 3.5mm unbalanced and 2.5mm balanced termination.

Giving them a good listen, i came away very impressed. The new GUI is a joy to use, a nice improvement over the older Astell&Kern models i have here. With the SP1000, it looks like Astell&Kern has another winning portable music player on their hands.

And that, my friends, wraps up ye ol' humble LAAS 2017 show report. Thanks for reading and as always, in the end what really matters is that you...

Enjoy the Music,

Steven R. Rochlin

 

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