LATEST ADDITIONS

It’s been a while since I’ve posted an AnalogPlanet playlist, mostly since I’ve busied myself with many other projects. But because it’s the holiday season, it’s only appropriate to bring, with a selection of my Christmas favorites, some holiday fun on here. There’s a mix of the normal picks (Nat “King” Cole’s “The Christmas Song” and the Vince Guaraldi Trio’s A Charlie Brown Christmas) and some seasonal tracks from a couple of my favorite artists (Tyler’s “Lights On,” the White Stripes’ “Candy Cane Children,” and the David Bowie/Bing Crosby collab) as well as some “how did anybody let this happen?!?!?!” Christmas songs (Dylan’s “Must Be Santa” and Eilert Pilarm’s rendition of “Blue Christmas”). Below are Tidal, Spotify, and YouTube playlists (sorry, Apple Music users) followed by commentary on each song. (Note: David Bowie and Bing Crosby’s “Peace On Earth/Little Drummer Boy” isn’t on the Tidal playlist. The record label made every effort to delete the song’s original version from streaming services in favor of the far inferior “modernized” London Symphony Orchestra-overdubbed version.)

Last Spring when analogPlanet editor Michael Fremer visited analogPlanet contributing editor Malachi Lui at his Portland, Oregon home, the two visited record stores, interviewed Discogs founder Kevin Lewandowski, shot a not yet published video at Cascade Record Pressing and toured Woodblock Chocolate Manufactory, which as you will see resembles in some ways a record pressing plant.

The previous in-store event at Audio Advisors in West Palm Beach where I spun records in one room while in another, Wilson Audio Specialties' Peter McGrath demoed the WAMM Master Chronosonic Loudpseakers and Mat Weisfeld introduced the new VPI Avenger Direct Drive Turntable went so well, the store asked me back to do a turntable set-up seminar and I could not refuse.

When first released in America in 1978 Dire Straits’ debut was an immediate sensation, though cautious record labels at first rejected signing the group until Warner Brothers bit. The original Vertigo release hit the U.K. earlier. Eventually, propelled by the catchy single “Sultans of Swing”, the album was Top Ten throughout Europe and much of the world.