JAnonymous5150
Headphoneus Supremus
Qobuz > ROON > Holo Audio Cyan 2 > Schiit Vali 3 (GE5670) > Grado SR325x
A New Day Dawning (2004) by Siena Root - Some revivalist 70's rock from Sweden is finishing this session. They've done a good job of sounding like Uriah Heep and Groundhogs and it's hard not to treat it as a copy rather than a homage but that's what I'm doing and I'm enjoying the hell out of it and seeing as the 70's was the decade I fell in love with music why wouldn't I? The music might be a flashback to the 70's but the musicianship is bang up to date, the organ playing would do Ken Hensley proud and the guitar has a 70's sound but with 21st century accuracy.
I went old school for this album, the wonderful little Vali 3 and my 325x Grados and the combined result is way better than the cost of those two should be able to achieve in a month of sundays.
Great pick! I love Siena Root. Wanna hear something truly sacrilegious, though? I find myself liking them more than Uriah Heep. Do me a favor and don't tell anyone, okay? No one will be able to take me seriously as a musician if this gets out.
Topical Shenanigans:
I'm on the modded Hifiman Audivinas this morning and I'm driving them with my modded Schiit Lyr (w/ 60s Mullard O-Getter/Grey Shield ECC88s) with a Modi Multibit 2 fed by a Wiim Mini. I'm going to assemble a guide to the mods I've gone on these because I'm actually really proud of how they've turned out. Once I'm home and have my workshop rebuilt, I have a couple different waveguides I want to fabricate and try, but as they sit right now my Audivinas have a low end that reaches deep and has some real punch and impact. The mids are sweet, clear, and even, slightly favoring the lower mids, but presenting the whole range in a full, slightly musical manner that does surprisingly well with vocals of all stripes. The mids were a mess originally and required quite a bit of trial and error tweaking (no measurement rig on the road) to get them where I was happy with them. The treble was actually greatly improved after some basic damping was applied and after my last round of mods it's airy and well extended up top giving cymbals a nice lively wash without making them too splashy or ringy.
Overall, they've become a great pair of headphones. You can get them for $699 from Hifiman right now (less with any coupons applied) and if you add a little bit of elbow grease and a few bucks in materials you end up with a pair of closed backs that compete with any of the closed backs I've come across in their originally intended price range which makes them an incredible deal, IMO. I'm actually going to order a second pair because I have an alternate path that I was tempted to take with my modding process and after hearing/seeing how successful the mods on my current pair have been, I really want to give the modding path I didn't follow a shot. Sorry for the essay, I'm just excited, and more than a little bit proud, about how these turned out.
Now we come to music. This morning I've got two releases from a band named Sputnik cued/queued up: Parallax Vol. I (rel. 2016) and Vol. II (rel. 2024). Hailing from all the way up in Winnipeg, these guys are a proggy jazz fusion outfit whose sound also incorporates influences from blues, funk, lounge, R&B, etc. I don't remember exactly how I came across Vol I, but it must've been on a random Bandcamp deep dive a couple years ago. I immediately liked what I heard and was a bit disappointed to see that it was their only album and that further volumes had never materialized. Then, out of nowhere, they released Vol II in December eight years after Vol I and after I had spent the last couple years lamenting the fact that it didn't exist and that the band appeared to be done. The fact that it's an even better album than Vol I makes it all that much more miraculous. If you're a fan of prog, fusion, music with a bit of funk in the bassline, etc these albums should absolutely find their way into your queue.
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