Mason West

Review of Austin AudioWorks

Austin Stereo Service is an analog purist's heaven...

Austin Stereo Service is an analog purist's heaven, and its head angel will place you in a centrally located chair for the greatest audio effect that can be achieved from a sparkling clean piece of vinyl. Every metropolitan area in the US manages to support one or two vinyl stores, and this is where you want to go to find the appropriate hardware on which to play the vinyl. I noticed, for example, that, between the cuts of the Peter Gabriel album that I sampled, there was absolutely no surface noise, and the equipment's response to the music was close to perfect fidelity. On the shelves are an assortment of high quality audio equipment from pre-digital days. Meters, smooth turning knobs, and decisively flipping switches define the fronts of the equipment, like that gleaming Marantz amplifier.