Can you believe it? Tape Project is ten years old! Thanks to everyone who has supported us in introducing studio quality tape reproduction to the audiophile community!

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Messages - MylesAstor

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1
Yes, it's back in stock.

A don’t miss tape. No version of the LP-even the original-comes close to the tape.

2
Prerecorded Tapes / Announcing Audionirvana.org Tape Circle!
« on: June 27, 2018, 10:13:15 PM »
Audionirvana.org is proud to announce the launch of the “Audionirvana Tape Circle!”

Audionirvana board members will have access to sampler tapes from several leading labels currently releasing music on 15 ips, 2 track tape.

The first sampler tape was kindly provided by Ed Pong, head honcho at classical label UltraAnalogue and features six selections taken from their most releases.

https://www.audionirvana.org/forum/the-audionirvana-tape-circle/ultraanalogue/90801-hands-up-for-everyone-interested-in-the-ultraanalogue-sampler-tape

Coming soon! Releases from Opus 3, Yarlung Records, International Phonograph, Leslie Brooks, BC-Musicale, Entertape and others.

Offer limited to Audionirvana.org board members and  US audiophiles (at the moment).

3
General Discussion / Re: Reference 15-ips Tape List
« on: June 05, 2017, 10:41:30 AM »
Top tape list revision. A few new tapes added to the list and some new additions to the Bakers Dozen.

https://www.audionirvana.org/forum/the-audio-vault/all-things-reel-to-reel/104-the-best-of-the-best/page2

4
Events / For Those Attending Axpona 2017
« on: March 21, 2017, 05:08:23 AM »
There will be another in the continuing series of tape seminars this year! Look forward to seeing everyone there!

http://www.axpona.com/sessions_detail.asp?id=4264

5
General Discussion / Re: Retiring!
« on: December 23, 2016, 07:27:51 AM »
Dan, thanks to you and Eileen for all the work involved in TP.  At the recent RMAF show, Romo was on a panel on tape moderated by Myles Astor. The packed audience gave a great round of applause to Tape Project for getting this who mini industry started a decade ago. A great ride so far for TP and as the world of tape is expanding, the ride will continue, thanks to the big push that you, Paul and Romo gave it.

Larry

Ah yes, I was on what I think was the first one of those panels that Myles did, a few years ago. It was great to see the enthusiasm of the attendees. I was also one of first two people to demo with tape at RMAF. The other guy was Ron Welborne, who had seen our tape demo at VSAC 2003. It was the very first one, in 2004. I had an Ampex 934 with a modified Seduction tape head preamp playing into our S.E.X. headphone amp, and a Nagra IV-S playing into the big headphone amp/preamp that is now Xavier's. Paul made up some demo reels for me (still have 'em, great stuff) and we pretty much blew everyone away with the sound. That was one of a couple of very positive experiences that led us to start the project. After we started the project we went back to RMAF a few times, and at least once we were playing our albums and playback electronics in a room that got best sound of the show.

Yes Dan, you were on the first Axpona tape forum! :) With Greg, Ki, Charlie and Jonathan IIRC!

Sad to hear you are leaving but sure the TTP will continue on setting the standard for reel-to-reel tape! Plus you were a great resource on not just tape but hardware too.

7
Suggestion Box / Re: I guess...
« on: December 02, 2016, 05:46:26 AM »
I'd like to hear from other people which Bob Dylan titles they would like. We already have on our wish list: Hwy 61, Nashville Skyline, Blood On The Tracks. These have been on our wish list since before he started winning high profile awards.

So Dylan fans, please chime in.

One oddball personal note: when I was getting trained in LP cutting, my teachers had me start by pushing the spiral button while they cut records and explained the finer points to me. Just whatever records they happened to be cutting at the time. Turned out the records they were cutting at the time were Herbie Hancock's Headhunters and Blood On The Tracks. No, I didn't master those records, George and Phil did. That's the music I was listening to while they trained me.

I was always attached to The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. Done by John Hammnond, Sr., thought Freewheelin' had amazing sonics.

8
Prerecorded Tapes / Re: Chad Enters the R2R Business
« on: December 02, 2016, 05:39:44 AM »
http://positive-feedback.com/reviews/music-reviews/acoustic-sounds-reel-to-reel-tape/

For those interested, there a running tab on new tapes releases and recommended tapes here:

audionirvana.org

9
General Discussion / Re: Reeltronix takeup reel - wow!
« on: October 22, 2016, 06:19:25 PM »
Just received some exciting news from Patrick Sinegal of Reeltronix. It appears that his new Reeltronix reels will be available in about four weeks. Patrick expects, if he can get 60 preorders (email at [email protected]), that the “standard” reels will retail for $450. The price of the two-tone black and the nickel plated reels still hasn’t been finalized but he expects they will retail for in the vicinity of $475.00 and $495.00 each, respectively. Patrick new website should also go live mid-November.
Patrick’s also made a few changes to the design of the reel’s hubs as illustrated in the accompanying pictures. The new Reeltronix reels will have a “grooved” rather than smooth hub making threading easier while at the same time not damaging the tape. The logo is being finalized and he shared, “will be very different than the first that was impressive on its own. I'm doing a dome resin logo which I had to go 0.050 inches deep and machining that deep worked perfectly.”

The pictures seem to big to post on TTP but you can see them here:

https://www.audionirvana.org/forum/the-audio-vault/all-things-reel-to-reel/19671-special-announcement-regarding-reeltronix-reels

10
Events / Re: Tape Seminar At RMAF 2016
« on: October 10, 2016, 10:37:54 PM »
Please drop by if attending RMAF! Should be an outstanding forum!

Analog Tape: The Ultimate Format @ Seminar Room, Pod Pavilion
Oct 8 @ 1:30 pm – 2:30 pm

Moderator: Myles Astor, Positive-Feedback
Panelists: Chad Kassem, Acoustic Sounds, Inc., Chris Mara, Welcome to 1979 Studios, Mara Machines; Dan Labrie, ATR Services, Inc.; Michael Romanowski, Coast Mastering, The Tape Project

Reel-to-reel analog tape is the hot new audiophile playback format. You’ve likely noticed more tape machines than at any hi-fi show prior, and next year you’re likely to see even more. Just like with vinyl, rumors of this format’s death were greatly exaggerated. Audiophiles are quickly confirming that tape gives them the best chance at achieving the ultimate in detail, transparency, dynamics and lifelike recreation. Hear from our panel of experts about what titles are coming soon and about your options for getting a tape machine into your listening room.

Myles Astor – Positive-Feedback

Myles Astor is a long time high-end audio enthusiast, journalist and publisher. His reviews have appeared over the years in many magazines including The Absolute Sound and his own publication Ultimate Audio. Myles currently writes for and is a Senior Assistant Editor at Positive-Feedback magazine as well as recently launching his own highly successful online high-end audio bulletin board www.audionirvana.org. It is now ten years since Myles, with the encouragement of the late Winston Ma, took the plunge and bought his first reel-to-reel machine. And as they say, the rest is history. That lead to being the first to cover the then fledgling renaissance in reel-to-reel tape beginning with his piece on The Tape Project. Since that initial piece, Myles, writing for Positive-Feedback, has focused on reviewing tape playback equipment as well as covering the increasing number of new music releases on tape.

Chad Kassem – Acoustic Sounds, Inc.

Chad Kassem is an audiophile pioneer and foremost champion of the vinyl LP. Chad’s the founder and owner of Acoustic Sounds, Inc., the world’s largest source for audiophile recordings, as well as Quality Record Pressings, manufacturer of the world’s finest LPs. There’s also Analogue Productions, a leading audiophile reissue label, and Super HiRez, Chad’s hi-res download service.

Up next for Analogue Productions is the addition of reel-to-reel tape to their reissue catalog, utilizing a fleet of six Ampex 102 machines. Tape is not an unfamiliar topic for Analogue Productions, as more than 95 percent of its reissues are sourced from the original analog masters. What’s more, Chad’s recording studio/concert hall, Blue Heaven Studios, records almost exclusively to half-inch tape. Last year Chad purchased the legendary Doug Sax’s The Mastering Lab, the first independent mastering facility and long regarded as the world’s best. Construction is underway to get The Mastering Lab back in operation at Acoustic Sounds’ home base of Salina, Kansas.

Chris Mara – Welcome to 1979 Studios, Mara Machines

Chris Mara is a recording engineer with more than 20 years of analog expertise. In 2008, Mara opened a 7,500-square-foot analog-centric recording studio in Nashville aptly named Welcome To 1979. This quickly attracted industry attention (including the cover of Mix Magazine) since recording digitally was the norm. Welcome to 1979 has clients such as Pete Townshend, Eric Burdon, Third Man Records, etc. Last year marked a “full circle moment” for Mara when Pam Tillis recorded her new album at Welcome to 1979. Mara was a fresh new assistant engineer on her 1998 record Everytime.

Also in 2008, Mara launched Mara Machines, a tape machine restoration company that focuses on MCI tape machines, the same machines used at Welcome to 1979 and on countless hit records throughout the ’70s and ’80s. Mara has grown Mara Machines into the largest tape machine restoration company in the world, restoring and selling about 50 machines per year to people all over the world. Mara plans to introduce a machine geared towards the audiophile market in late 2016.

Dan Labrie – ATR Services, Inc.

Dan Labrie – Toronto-born and Detroit-raised – is an analog recording expert who is fascinated with the intersection of music and science. A graduate of Michigan Tech University, Dan worked for a brief stint at an all-analog studio in Detroit before accepting a position with ATR Services and ATR Magnetics. There he had the privilege of learning from and working under industry veteran Mike Spitz.

Dan now leads both technical branches of the ATR Group – ATR Magnetics and ATR Services. ATR Services, founded in 1991, provides parts, repair service and restorations for the Ampex ATR-100 series recorder. ATR Magnetics is the only producer of professional analog magnetic media in the U.S.

Michael Romanowski – Coast Mastering, The Tape Project

Michael Romanowski is the owner and Grammy-nominated chief mastering engineer of Coast Mastering and co-founder of the analog tape label The Tape Project.

Michael started his audio career as a musician and live sound engineer in Nashville before relocating in 1994 to the Bay Area to apprentice as a mastering engineer at Rocket Lab with Paul Stubblebine and Ken Lee. In 1999, he became the chief mastering engineer for Sausalito’s Plant Mastering and in 2001 he reunited with Stubblebine and built two new mastering rooms at the former location of Coast Records. In 2007, Michael acquired the business and in 2015 re-branded the mastering service as Coast Mastering in the historic Studio C in the Fantasy Studio complex in Berkeley, California.

In 2006, Michael, with partners Stubblebine and Dan Schmalle, started a tape-only label called The Tape Project. They release 1/4” 15ips two-track tapes duplicated real time from the original analog masters.
Categories: Seminars

https://www.audionirvana.org/forum/the-audio-vault/all-things-reel-to-reel/29831-rmaf-2016-tape-seminar-analog-tape-the-ultimate-format

11
Events / Tape Seminar At RMAF 2016
« on: September 23, 2016, 06:37:06 PM »
Please drop by if attending RMAF! Should be an outstanding forum!

Analog Tape: The Ultimate Format @ Seminar Room, Pod Pavilion
Oct 8 @ 1:30 pm – 2:30 pm

Moderator: Myles Astor, Positive-Feedback
Panelists: Chad Kassem, Acoustic Sounds, Inc., Chris Mara, Welcome to 1979 Studios, Mara Machines; Dan Labrie, ATR Services, Inc.; Michael Romanowski, Coast Mastering, The Tape Project

Reel-to-reel analog tape is the hot new audiophile playback format. You’ve likely noticed more tape machines than at any hi-fi show prior, and next year you’re likely to see even more. Just like with vinyl, rumors of this format’s death were greatly exaggerated. Audiophiles are quickly confirming that tape gives them the best chance at achieving the ultimate in detail, transparency, dynamics and lifelike recreation. Hear from our panel of experts about what titles are coming soon and about your options for getting a tape machine into your listening room.

Myles Astor – Positive-Feedback

Myles Astor is a long time high-end audio enthusiast, journalist and publisher. His reviews have appeared over the years in many magazines including The Absolute Sound and his own publication Ultimate Audio. Myles currently writes for and is a Senior Assistant Editor at Positive-Feedback magazine as well as recently launching his own highly successful online high-end audio bulletin board www.audionirvana.org. It is now ten years since Myles, with the encouragement of the late Winston Ma, took the plunge and bought his first reel-to-reel machine. And as they say, the rest is history. That lead to being the first to cover the then fledgling renaissance in reel-to-reel tape beginning with his piece on The Tape Project. Since that initial piece, Myles, writing for Positive-Feedback, has focused on reviewing tape playback equipment as well as covering the increasing number of new music releases on tape.

Chad Kassem – Acoustic Sounds, Inc.

Chad Kassem is an audiophile pioneer and foremost champion of the vinyl LP. Chad’s the founder and owner of Acoustic Sounds, Inc., the world’s largest source for audiophile recordings, as well as Quality Record Pressings, manufacturer of the world’s finest LPs. There’s also Analogue Productions, a leading audiophile reissue label, and Super HiRez, Chad’s hi-res download service.

Up next for Analogue Productions is the addition of reel-to-reel tape to their reissue catalog, utilizing a fleet of six Ampex 102 machines. Tape is not an unfamiliar topic for Analogue Productions, as more than 95 percent of its reissues are sourced from the original analog masters. What’s more, Chad’s recording studio/concert hall, Blue Heaven Studios, records almost exclusively to half-inch tape. Last year Chad purchased the legendary Doug Sax’s The Mastering Lab, the first independent mastering facility and long regarded as the world’s best. Construction is underway to get The Mastering Lab back in operation at Acoustic Sounds’ home base of Salina, Kansas.

Chris Mara – Welcome to 1979 Studios, Mara Machines

Chris Mara is a recording engineer with more than 20 years of analog expertise. In 2008, Mara opened a 7,500-square-foot analog-centric recording studio in Nashville aptly named Welcome To 1979. This quickly attracted industry attention (including the cover of Mix Magazine) since recording digitally was the norm. Welcome to 1979 has clients such as Pete Townshend, Eric Burdon, Third Man Records, etc. Last year marked a “full circle moment” for Mara when Pam Tillis recorded her new album at Welcome to 1979. Mara was a fresh new assistant engineer on her 1998 record Everytime.

Also in 2008, Mara launched Mara Machines, a tape machine restoration company that focuses on MCI tape machines, the same machines used at Welcome to 1979 and on countless hit records throughout the ’70s and ’80s. Mara has grown Mara Machines into the largest tape machine restoration company in the world, restoring and selling about 50 machines per year to people all over the world. Mara plans to introduce a machine geared towards the audiophile market in late 2016.

Dan Labrie – ATR Services, Inc.

Dan Labrie – Toronto-born and Detroit-raised – is an analog recording expert who is fascinated with the intersection of music and science. A graduate of Michigan Tech University, Dan worked for a brief stint at an all-analog studio in Detroit before accepting a position with ATR Services and ATR Magnetics. There he had the privilege of learning from and working under industry veteran Mike Spitz.

Dan now leads both technical branches of the ATR Group – ATR Magnetics and ATR Services. ATR Services, founded in 1991, provides parts, repair service and restorations for the Ampex ATR-100 series recorder. ATR Magnetics is the only producer of professional analog magnetic media in the U.S.

Michael Romanowski – Coast Mastering, The Tape Project

Michael Romanowski is the owner and Grammy-nominated chief mastering engineer of Coast Mastering and co-founder of the analog tape label The Tape Project.

Michael started his audio career as a musician and live sound engineer in Nashville before relocating in 1994 to the Bay Area to apprentice as a mastering engineer at Rocket Lab with Paul Stubblebine and Ken Lee. In 1999, he became the chief mastering engineer for Sausalito’s Plant Mastering and in 2001 he reunited with Stubblebine and built two new mastering rooms at the former location of Coast Records. In 2007, Michael acquired the business and in 2015 re-branded the mastering service as Coast Mastering in the historic Studio C in the Fantasy Studio complex in Berkeley, California.

In 2006, Michael, with partners Stubblebine and Dan Schmalle, started a tape-only label called The Tape Project. They release 1/4” 15ips two-track tapes duplicated real time from the original analog masters.
Categories: Seminars

12
General Discussion / Reference 15-ips Tape List
« on: June 16, 2016, 02:56:21 PM »
Thought everyone would enjoy checking out the reference tape list that I've put together on my bulletin board www.audionirvana.com. I've also assembled a list of all the companies now releasing legitimate tapes in the world--with two more including one big name --to come before the end of the year!

Best of the Best: see post #12 for latest update!

https://www.audionirvana.org/forum/the-audio-vault/all-things-reel-to-reel/104-the-best-of-the-best

And for current tape resources:

https://www.audionirvana.org/forum/the-audio-vault/all-things-reel-to-reel/103-where-to-find-reel-to-reel-recordings

13
So PICTURES! would be nice.

A video of the session will soon be available on the  Axpona YouTube site. Paul was really awesome and the audience really enjoyed hearing about his experiences in both the recording and playback end.

Of course the highlight of the session was Chad announcing he'll soon be releasing music in the R2R format. Axpona attendees were treated to four 30 ips, 1/2 inch sampler tapes from Analogue Productions in the Joseph Audio room. All that heard them were pretty blown away. I didn't hear all of the samplers but some of the highlights were Dean Martin, Getz/Gilberto, Ray Charles, Muddy Waters, Kenny Burrell and especially Dusty's The Look of Love.

Chris also mentioned that he'll be releasing an audiophile version of the MCI decks later this year. One really interesting tidbit from Chris was how the ratio of professional/consumer business has shifted over the last five years changed from 80/20 to 20/80. (I think that Dan Labrie of ATR Services is also seeing the same shift in business; in fact, five years ago, it was rare for him to sell a machine to an audiophile. Not so today!) Chris also mentioned in passing that several other companies involved in refurbishing and repairing pro decks are also becoming interested in the audiophile market.

So here's the video of the sessions.

I guess there's no way to post a video so here's the link:

https://youtu.be/StL9w56lVic

14
So PICTURES! would be nice.

A video of the session will soon be available on the  Axpona YouTube site. Paul was really awesome and the audience really enjoyed hearing about his experiences in both the recording and playback end.

Of course the highlight of the session was Chad announcing he'll soon be releasing music in the R2R format. Axpona attendees were treated to four 30 ips, 1/2 inch sampler tapes from Analogue Productions in the Joseph Audio room. All that heard them were pretty blown away. I didn't hear all of the samplers but some of the highlights were Dean Martin, Getz/Gilberto, Ray Charles, Muddy Waters, Kenny Burrell and especially Dusty's The Look of Love.

Chris also mentioned that he'll be releasing an audiophile version of the MCI decks later this year. One really interesting tidbit from Chris was how the ratio of professional/consumer business has shifted over the last five years changed from 80/20 to 20/80. (I think that Dan Labrie of ATR Services is also seeing the same shift in business; in fact, five years ago, it was rare for him to sell a machine to an audiophile. Not so today!) Chris also mentioned in passing that several other companies involved in refurbishing and repairing pro decks are also becoming interested in the audiophile market.

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