I don't roll tape too often these days. Now that I'm down to the cream of my record crop sound-wise, I find myself pulling albums out of the sleeves more often than before as I approach 70. I mean, what the hell, what's the point in not playing them at this juncture? Or I'm too tired/lazy/whatever and just plug in the hard drive and turn on the JRiver jukebox, which has all my mixes contained in its library along with a ton of albums. But once in a while, I pop a cassette into my Nakamichi 482Z, sit back, and am amazed all over. Today was the first time since I started playing with my speaker combo of LSA 1 bottoms and Louis' homebrew single driver boxes. And I woke up. Again.
Just finished listening to a tape I recorded a couple of years ago on this 482Z Nakamichi from a digital mix that goes all over the road musically and had to sit down on the couch and just listen. I finally really heard what I think the British refer to PRAT - pace, rhythm, and timing. From Bob Seger's Roll Me Away to Richard Thompson's Cookesferry Queen, the music just swung. I don't know how else to describe it. Once I pointed the single drivers straight ahead instead of toed-in a couple of weeks ago, the harshness I was hearing on-axis disappeared and they really do a nice job on snares and toms, which a lot of the music in this mix has in spades. That may have been it, it may not, but the music swung.
I can't say it quite matches my half-track PR99 rolling full steam at 15 ips with a recording made from 24/192 hi-res files on a reel of ATR Master, but it comes a lot closer than any cassette has a right to. I know Dragons and 1000s and Tandberg 3014s are the big dogs and BX-300s are really in demand and all that but this early-80s effort at the mid-point of the Nakamichi lineup may be the ultimate sleeper. Don't know why folks overlook them unless it is the siren song of a Dragon, although prices finally seem to be edging over $500 on average. It's got three heads, fer chrissake, and that seems to be the holy grail of Nak users and collectors.
Perhaps it's also Nakdoc's rebuild of this particular deck - I spotted it on a shelf full of non-working Naks back in his shop storage room on one visit and asked about it. The exterior was mint but someone brought it in for repair and never came back. I forget what Tom said was wrong and it took a couple of months to talk him into repairing and refurbishing it for me for $300, but nights like tonight remind me why I thought that was a good idea.
Here's to Tom and a Nakamichi 482Z.
Just finished listening to a tape I recorded a couple of years ago on this 482Z Nakamichi from a digital mix that goes all over the road musically and had to sit down on the couch and just listen. I finally really heard what I think the British refer to PRAT - pace, rhythm, and timing. From Bob Seger's Roll Me Away to Richard Thompson's Cookesferry Queen, the music just swung. I don't know how else to describe it. Once I pointed the single drivers straight ahead instead of toed-in a couple of weeks ago, the harshness I was hearing on-axis disappeared and they really do a nice job on snares and toms, which a lot of the music in this mix has in spades. That may have been it, it may not, but the music swung.
I can't say it quite matches my half-track PR99 rolling full steam at 15 ips with a recording made from 24/192 hi-res files on a reel of ATR Master, but it comes a lot closer than any cassette has a right to. I know Dragons and 1000s and Tandberg 3014s are the big dogs and BX-300s are really in demand and all that but this early-80s effort at the mid-point of the Nakamichi lineup may be the ultimate sleeper. Don't know why folks overlook them unless it is the siren song of a Dragon, although prices finally seem to be edging over $500 on average. It's got three heads, fer chrissake, and that seems to be the holy grail of Nak users and collectors.
Perhaps it's also Nakdoc's rebuild of this particular deck - I spotted it on a shelf full of non-working Naks back in his shop storage room on one visit and asked about it. The exterior was mint but someone brought it in for repair and never came back. I forget what Tom said was wrong and it took a couple of months to talk him into repairing and refurbishing it for me for $300, but nights like tonight remind me why I thought that was a good idea.
Here's to Tom and a Nakamichi 482Z.
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