Who knew?

For the past few days, I've been in Japan visiting dealers, riding the Bullet Train (200 mph), and enjoying this wonderful culture and its incredible people. Yesterday I was in the country's second largest city, Osaka. The day before, the far north. What a treat. I will definitely put together a short video of my trip and post it on our YouTube channel. Last night was my final evening before a full day of meetings with reviewers before sitting on an airplane for ten and a half hours back to Denver. It was a lovely evening in Tokyo—perhaps 80˚ F with a light southerly breeze—and I sat out on the hotel deck with a glass of red wine, listening to the "clickety clack" of the trains rolling into Tokyo Station and enjoying a moment of solitude. My thoughts—never too far from audio and design—soon drifted to the problems of reproducing piano. The hotel had crappy JBL outdoor speakers playing a jazz trio: bass, drums, piano (Bill Evans if I had to guess). At low levels, you tolerated the pale imitation of music for what it was, but when the pianist pounded the ivories in the heat of passion, I cringed. The sound wasn't biting or harsh but restricted, held back, unable to escape the prison inflicted by JBL-who-cares-sound. Of course, I was the only one that noticed, or cared, but it got me thinking about just how far from real this sound was and that it didn't have to be that way. I could do better. So could fifty other inventors. Would any of the other bar patrons have cared? Perhaps not, but we might have gotten a few to wonder where the live piano was, and frankly, that's good enough for me. I am an audiophile. And proud of it. When I rolled out of bed this morning the 100 Audiophile Hats were gone overnight. That put the biggest smile on my face I've had in months. Yes! Let's let the world know it matters. Great sound—live sound—is worth working towards. It just takes a bit of education and caring. No one objects to things sounding good, but some of us care when it doesn't. And if we care, we can demand better. We're audiophiles, and proud of it. We've ordered a new round of hats and they should be here in a few weeks. You can back order yours now and we've opened worldwide ordering.