PonoMusic - My Morning Jacket Artist Edition

Started by wonderfulman, Mar 12, 2014, 02:19 PM

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rincon2

Quote from: Fully on Apr 16, 2014, 11:02 AM
Trust me, no one thinks you are an idiot for not buying a Pono.
Neil does.

walterfredo

Quote from: rincon2 on Apr 16, 2014, 02:07 PM
Quote from: Fully on Apr 16, 2014, 11:02 AM
Trust me, no one thinks you are an idiot for not buying a Pono.
Neil does.

well if Neil believes it, he's probably right. 

rincon2

Quote from: walterfredo on Apr 16, 2014, 04:33 PM
Quote from: rincon2 on Apr 16, 2014, 02:07 PM
Quote from: Fully on Apr 16, 2014, 11:02 AM
Trust me, no one thinks you are an idiot for not buying a Pono.
Neil does.

well if Neil believes it, he's probably right.
Thanks. Unless you ordered one, we share that quality.

iLikeBeer

Just thought I would chime in on this subject.  Personally, is it really all that shocking that all of those musicians in that promo piece for the PonoMusic player are raving about the quality of the music?  I mean, they're the ones that will also have a chance to profit from the music sales for this PonoMusic are they not?

One thing I think is funny is how all of these musicians are so down on cd's and digital music, yet I wonder what their feelings were when cd's were first introduced which forced people who had large collections of cassette tapes to have to go out and re-purchase their entire music collection on cd because cassette tapes were now obsolete?  I'm guessing there were some pretty nice profits being made off of these now horrible cd's???  And I doubt there was much groaning about the quality of the music on cd's back then?!   :rolleyes:

But now, as digital music such as mp3's have basically made cd's obsolete, it's now time for the music industry to come up with something new to make even more money off of us, the consumers.

Look, these PonoMusic players might just be musical ecstasy for all I know and might just give my ears an orgasm every time they listen to one.  But I guess I won't know for a while because I'm perfectly content listening to my mp3's under water as Neil would have us believe is how it sounds listening to such poor quality music.  Funny thing is, as a former swimmer, I have swam in pools where the music is pumped in underwater and I have to say, my mp3's I play over my home stereo sure do sound a tad bit better than anything I ever heard through music pumped in through underwater speakers...  :tongue:   :beer:


Mr. White

Kentuckians For The Commonwealth (KFTC) Member Since 2011

Mr. White

Kentuckians For The Commonwealth (KFTC) Member Since 2011

Mr. White

Quote from: buymycar on Mar 30, 2014, 10:59 PM
It looks like it came from the Pono twitter feed:

http://twitter.com/pono

Is Patrick's autograph missing?

I think it is. I hope somebody catches it before they are actually made and shipped out.
Kentuckians For The Commonwealth (KFTC) Member Since 2011

rincon2

Oh, the irony! Neil Young's Letter Home came out today. Recorded with Jack Whites 50's tech direct to vinyl process, it sounds like it was recorded in a cigar box with a fish hook as a stylus. So, we are supposed to be appalled by mp3's yet he can release analog turds and it is OK? I don't know if it is hypocritical, marketing, or just plain crazy.

Santo

Quote from: rincon2 on May 27, 2014, 12:26 PM
Oh, the irony! Neil Young's Letter Home came out today. Recorded with Jack Whites 50's tech direct to vinyl process, it sounds like it was recorded in a cigar box with a fish hook as a stylus. So, we are supposed to be appalled by mp3's yet he can release analog turds and it is OK? I don't know if it is hypocritical, marketing, or just plain crazy.

Its fits perfectly with his plan. You can get the Deluxe Set which includes both "Standard Audiophile" recordings. Its only $109 ($75 on Popmarket). Nostalgia (and lack thereof) is expensive. Love Neil Young, but he is rarely affordable.

rincon2

Quote from: Santo on May 27, 2014, 01:05 PM
Quote from: rincon2 on May 27, 2014, 12:26 PM
Oh, the irony! Neil Young's Letter Home came out today. Recorded with Jack Whites 50's tech direct to vinyl process, it sounds like it was recorded in a cigar box with a fish hook as a stylus. So, we are supposed to be appalled by mp3's yet he can release analog turds and it is OK? I don't know if it is hypocritical, marketing, or just plain crazy.

Its fits perfectly with his plan. You can get the Deluxe Set which includes both "Standard Audiophile" recordings. Its only $109 ($75 on Popmarket). Nostalgia (and lack thereof) is expensive. Love Neil Young, but he is rarely affordable.
So marketing it is. Marketing with hypocrisy. If listening to the OBH recordings is akin to listening to music underwater, then listening to his new album is like being underwater with dogpoop in your ears.

Mr. White









This is a closer view of the previous image, so you can read it better.
Kentuckians For The Commonwealth (KFTC) Member Since 2011

Emb1528

Would love to hear the PCs and OBHs on here. Probably not likely they'll put the new album on here. The 400 bones is a lot to shell out. Buuttt would be sweet to score the mmj version.

I'm still waiting for them to release the early greats in flac!!! Or even better, vinyl!
Doesn't matter what you're doin', as long as you're losin' your head

Mr. White

Quote from: Emb1528 on Aug 05, 2014, 12:48 AM
Would love to hear the PCs and OBHs on here. Probably not likely they'll put the new album on here. The 400 bones is a lot to shell out. Buuttt would be sweet to score the mmj version.

I'm still waiting for them to release the early greats in flac!!! Or even better, vinyl!

Emb1528, you can still play your downloads of the Port Chester and One Big Holiday shows (or any other shows you may have downloaded) on the Pono Music Player. The Pono Music Player can play just about any digital music file you could think of. It can play FLAC-HD, FLAC, ALAC-HD, ALAC, WAV, AAC, AIFF, WMA, 320 MP3, or MP3's of lower quality...and several more formats I'm not really familiar with. When My Morning Jacket started offering their "Official Bootlegs" for downloading, there was quite a detailed discussion here on the Forum about the various audio quality/formats they were being offered in and which ones most of us on here were interested in. I decided back then that I would go ahead and purchase the best ones available (knowing full well that I would have to purchase a DAC in the not too distant future in order to fully enjoy their potential). The Pono Music Player has one of the highest quality DAC's built in. It is built by Ayre Acoustics, so that took care of the DAC issue for me.  I have all the 15 available MMJ shows in either FLAC or FLAC-HD. The only ones I have in MP3 form are the 2 Bonnaroo shows from 2004 and 2005 that are only offered in that format (since they were originally made available through Bonnaroo alone). So, you see, even if you purchased the Pono Music Player (or plan to in the future), you are not obliged or required to buy ANYTHING from the Pono Music Store. You can purchase your digital music files from anywhere and still be able to play them on your  Pono Music Player. The main hope is that people will "discover" that higher resolution digital files/downloads just sound better. In turn, people will begin to become more discerning in their digital music downloading. In fact, those of us on the Pono Kickstarter comments board have been discussing "ripping" CD's to FLAC and/or WAV for playback on the Pono Music Player for several months now. I have around 60 to 70 albums already done. I am going ahead and converting/ripping my best CD's (re-masters and hard to find albums) to 3 different formats, just to be covered in the future. I convert/rip to FLAC, WAV, and 320 MP3 just about every night. I hope to have my entire CD collection done in the next few months.

Like I said before, the Pono Music Player is capable of playing back just about any digital music format you may have. The hardware in the Player will make any file format sound somewhat better, but the main thrust of the Pono movement is to make people aware of the difference in higher resolution music files. Therefore, people will seek them out...Pono Music hopes you will want to purchase them from their soon-to-be launched Music Store, but you don't have to. You can simply live with whatever downloads you already have...whether they be from an included download card in the jacket of a new vinyl album, from iTunes, from Amazon, or converted/ripped from your own CD or vinyl collection. I hope this clears up some of the confusion. 

Again, you do not have to purchase any music from Pono in order to use the Pono Music Player. It can play back ANY FORMAT digital music file. ...but go high resolution. You won't regret it!

Long Live Pono!
Kentuckians For The Commonwealth (KFTC) Member Since 2011

Emb1528

White - Oh I totally agree that the high quality stuff makes a huuuge difference. I to have all the flac-HD offerings of the shows. I just feel like I am going to have to do some serious upgrades to my stereo system to REALLY get the full effect.

Converting all your current media is a great idea. Forward thinking my friend! Niiice.
Doesn't matter what you're doin', as long as you're losin' your head

Mr. White

Quote from: Emb1528 on Aug 05, 2014, 09:58 PM
White - Oh I totally agree that the high quality stuff makes a huuuge difference. I to have all the flac-HD offerings of the shows. I just feel like I am going to have to do some serious upgrades to my stereo system to REALLY get the full effect.

Converting all your current media is a great idea. Forward thinking my friend! Niiice.

Yeah, I am probably being a bit too optimistic in saying I'll have most of my collection converted in the next few months ... unless a few months means maybe a year from now! I had been converting my CD's into those 3 formats a few months before finding out about the Pono Music Player (and being spurred into action by My Morning Jacket endorsing the Player and allowing there to be an Artist Signature Series Player made in their name). I usually put the WAV versions on my little cheap GPX MP3 player. The only lower than 320 MP3 files/songs/albums I ever listen to on my MP3 player are the ones that came free with a vinyl album or that were only available in that lesser quality MP3 form.

As far as having to upgrade all my stereo equipment, I'm not going that route. I have some basic stuff (15 year old RCA Stereo/Receiver/Amp from Radio Shack, an Audio-Technica AT-LP60-USB Turntable, random DVD Players (Sylvania and Memorex DVD Recorder, and Toshiba Blu-Ray Player). The only "High Quality" stuff I own are my 24 year old Bose Acoustimass (AM-5) speakers. The Pono Music Player should make all the difference. The way it has been described by people who have listened to it is that even with the simplest set of headphones being used, you will hear a major difference. The conversation over on their Kickstarter comments section has centered around quality headphones though. The most recent "listening parties" have proven to some that all kinds of headphones allow the listener to "hear the difference". Like I mentioned in the earlier post, the big upgrade that I was going to have to make at some point in the game was to purchase a quality DAC. Well, that is all done with the inclusion of the Ayre Acoustics DAC being installed in the Pono Player. I will probably use it at home on the stereo (with my Bose speakers) and in my car through the audio-in jack. That's the way Neil demonstrated it to people in the music industry (including to members of MMJ). I'm probably going to purchase a set of Sennheiser Momentums for my headphones, but I'm going to wait until I get the Player in my hands to truly test it out to the fullest. I'm not trying to "push" Pono on to anyone here. It seemed to only generate a lot of negative comments saying I was foolish or that it was just a "money grab" by a man that really probably already has enough money to last a couple of lifetimes.

Anyway, let's all be "Pono" to each other!
Kentuckians For The Commonwealth (KFTC) Member Since 2011

Emb1528

Yeah it's a very interesting little device. I watched some of those testimonial videos which seemed pretty cool. Some Sennheisers would be awesome!

Wait till they start offering this on quality on phones  :happy:
Doesn't matter what you're doin', as long as you're losin' your head

GO4IT

Great posts, Mr. White, articulating what Pono is and isn't.  I'm happy, along with you, that I jumped on early even though I had to take a lot on faith.  Certainly looking forward to getting my MMJ edition!

Mr. White

Quote from: GO4IT on Aug 08, 2014, 09:42 PM
Great posts, Mr. White, articulating what Pono is and isn't.  I'm happy, along with you, that I jumped on early even though I had to take a lot on faith.  Certainly looking forward to getting my MMJ edition!

It's hard to believe, but it looks like you and I are the ONLY FORUM FOLK who got one...at least the only ones who still frequent this place anymore. There has to be a couple more of us out of the 96 Players sold!?! Kind of trippy if there's not...
Kentuckians For The Commonwealth (KFTC) Member Since 2011

johnnYYac

I wish I could, but I'm focusing on expanding my vinyl collection. I'd love to hear one someday, though.
The fact that my heart's beating is all the proof you need.

itrainmonkeys

Quote from: johnnYYac on Aug 14, 2014, 12:40 AM
I wish I could, but I'm focusing on expanding my vinyl collection. I'd love to hear one someday, though.

Same here but replace "expanding my vinyl collection" with "trying to pay my bills" haha.

Would have loved to have been able to afford this but just couldn't pull the trigger.