This rushed, breathless edition of the Newsletter comes manicured by May Belt, since the world pre and post-eclipse seems to be gyrating in so many different directions – as we head to that next moment of the millennium – that there is scarcely time to think. Whilst I would not exactly approve of Luddite attitudes most of the time, there are questions beyond the Beltian ones of whether we can manage the information and instantness that is so much part of today that I wrestle with. Where is the space to think.
Of course Peter would tell us that it is not just information, but also the patterns underpinning the information that we receive, or have thrust upon us, that make it all so difficult. My own sense at present is that the noxiousness of the environment goes way beyond the experience of Hi-Fi Sound, but that our concentration, or our ability to attend to matters is shockingly assaulted by the massiveness of the technology or patterns around us.
Still, we must be grateful for Peter's contribution, which can provide an oasis from the sensory desert of the 1990s. It is always with pleasure that I include feedback on a recent product, in this case the Priority Label, and gratifying that many found them just as stunning as I did. There is more in store for such readers, as something new and shiny comes to steal our hearts and minds, and I urge all readers to read of the new developments. Yet on other levels, the experimentation of others shows just how innovative, and cost-effective, treatments can be. Again there are bargains to be found in the New Products pages, and it is only a lack of imagination and time that can stop the flow of molten sound that is released by these bargains. Dare to be different?
I also took considerable pleasure from Ken Hyams pieces on perception. The part I particularly like was the hearing of a group rehearsing, and how the music floated magically into his flat. I was taken by this for a number of reasons. I feel that the P.W.B. products do create a sort of bubble within which even external sounds take on more benign forms. I have certainly been able to track the quality of car alarms near my flat since using P.W.B. devices, and my only conclusion is that they seem to be getting better and more musical. But Ken's pieces also remind us of how Peter's products allow us to engage with new art forms or idioms, and that one can connect with the artistic intent more easily – P.W.B. devices become the universal translator!
Before stopping, it is also important to draw the reader's attention to the positive side of technology. Many will know that the Internet has become a way for the David's of this world to fight the Goliaths. It is in this world that P.W.B. devices are being written of again, and fortunately not by myself! There has been considerable interest, and as sometimes we have to wait for theory to catch up with phenomena, we also have to wait for technology to break down the walls of inequality (cf. the printing presses, earlier this millennium.) Hope has arisen again, tempered by experience, but fuelled by the acknowledgement of the reality that something is going on.
Until the Autumn.
Richard Graham
11th August 1999
P.W.B. Newsletter
P.W.B Electronics
18. Pasture Crescent
Leeds LS7 3QB
Or for you sophisticates
E-mail – to Newsletter@belt.demon.co.uk
When considering how to introduce someone to the extraordinary world of P.W.B. products, it is often difficult to demonstrate how writing ones signature, followed by > OK, or 'x26'x aid listening pleasure. It is yet more difficult to show how just a line through a bar-code helps make the Spice Girls really special! Such was the strange charm of the X-Pen, a product of almost infinite application, where only the time taken to sign, write or draw was the limitation. It became a standard treatment, was enhanced by the frosted film that came with it, and gave John Dymond a tool to really experiment with.
So a good product. But the good just got better, and alarmingly so.
As we all know by now, P.W.B. products all improve by virtue of the work continually being done in Leeds, and of how this 'resonates' to all other products; old foil is always the latest foil. The pen is different though. It is now swathed in the sort of computer label that we have all got used to, and bound with two yellow ring ties along its length. It would be wrong to describe it as an object of desire in the way a Dome might be, but with respect to function, it most certainly is.
The new X-Pen seems to bear so little relation to its predecessor in terms of magnitude of effect that one might question it bearing the same name. The effect now of drawing a straight and thin red line through a bar-code on the back of a book has to be heard to be believed. For many the sheer disbelief will probably be a bar to this acknowledgement, because how can one really tell oneself that such a line may be equivalent to many hundreds of pounds of cables. Of course such equivalents are not actually equivalent at all, because you cannot obtain the quality of the change through conventional methods or products. That quality of richness, voluptuousness, of molten gold, cannot be found through changes to cable etc. Yet a little line can!
Of course the most infuriating aspect to all of this is that one needs to go over everything again with the new X-Pen, and that takes time. I have almost developed repetitive strain injury writing 'x 26 'x on everything, or adding my signature etc. Yet the difference is so worthwhile I persist.
Whilst the magnitude of the change is quite something, there is of course a premium in terms of price. But fear not; even at the new price I suspect Mr Dymond will transform house and home, and yield quite the most extraordinary sounds for his ears.
If there were ever a product to try, try this, but also refer back to the previous reports and letters on the X-Pen in the Newsletters to ascertain how to use it. Time may not always be on our side with such a product, but it really is now the stuff of legends.
The Link Products.
Over time it has seemed to me less useful to dwell upon the theories that make sense of new products, than to describe the benefits; P.W.B. customers are not signed up to a school of thought or dogma, but are interested in the developments, and perhaps the theories. What is important to note, that whether or not one subscribes to a particular view, there is nothing even remotely adequate to make further sense of the fabulous inventions; conventional science really seems to have little to contribute, and much to obscure. These new exciting devices from the 'Missing Link' development have themselves evolved from an understanding of evolutionary processes, not from Darwin, yet closer to the Cosmologists. The discovery of the important, perhaps core role of Iodine in the products gives them an aesthetic charm and an understanding of it role in evolution. I could write about the thyroid gland, prenatal development, but that will hardly make a difference to your experience of the products, or understanding of Peter's thinking. He is all too ready to acknowledge the difficulty of describing a tenable conceptual framework that lends support to what is observed, but it is important to stay in touch with his 'approximations'. What is clear is that the disruption of patterns that extend backwards and forwards in time really makes a mess of our modern environment. And what is the answer .... well it may not be a higher bit rate (even though that might help a little).
Onto the Products!
These products followed on from the Priority label quite swiftly, and perhaps suffered as a result - how do you build upon the very good. These products do, and there is an interesting sideline which should get every Q-Clip owner foaming at the mouth.
First came a Ring Tie; more costly than any before, and with a series of washers around the girth that lent it a pleasing prettiness. Steeped in Iodine, it should impart the usual neutral or benign pattern to the cable it encloses, and therein the equipment the cable is connected to. Benign and neutral though do not seem the right words for what happens when one listens to music after the tie has been applied. I first was able to test the tie out with one attached to a crocodile clip. Attached to a mains cable, there was such a noticeable cleaning of the sound that one soon forgot that a listening test was in progress. When the full tie was attached ..... wow. The tie works well in conjunction with all other previous ties, and at this point in time I have been steadily attaching them to mains cables throughout my system. But it doesn't end there. I will leave the best surprise until the end, but for a real lift in sound, wherever YOU are, try attaching the tie/clip to a photograph of yourself. Spooky!
After fire, ice; after dark, Tia Maria; after Tie, Label. And this one is a very fetching Gold label, swamped in computer text, written by someone with very neat writing and a sharp pencil (or possibly a laser printer). It goes on everything, even the wall of the listening room. I found this label somewhat more compelling than the Tie, possibly just because it is applied to the whole object, and not just the cable. At Peter's suggestion I have put just one on as many objects/pieces of equipment that I could manage, and with each piece, the effect has been very pleasing. For those who know the effect of the Priority label, well imagine something, perhaps that bit more potent that seems to clean the sound or picture, where the Priority label seems to enrich. Both effects are quite compelling, and necessary. I have not been able to ascertain in which order to proceed, so more experimentation will be necessary. However, you should expect at least the same order of improvement as with the Priority labels, and if you have enjoyed these, there is quite a treat in store.
Now here's the best bit, and a veritable bargain. Schooled in the P.W.B. techniques for many years, I am of course aware that if one is using a general treatment like the Q-Clip, the application of other products to the item that is to be treated e.g. foils, enhances the treatment. This has included applying clips to CD cases, or mains plugs (disconnected of course.) What, I wondered would be the effect of attaching one of the new Link Tie Clips to an object, and then using the Q-Clip. I will leave it for the reader to find out, but with this, and the new X-Pen, my world has moved on yet again.
Jazz FM's slogan is particularly apt to describe recent developments at P.W.B. Electronics. I refer to the small-in-size, but great-in-results "Sound Has Priority" Labels. Having purchased several of these this summer I can report that not only Jazz FM, but all other sources including LP and CD sound stunningly good. The CD aspect of my system now seems to need less volume to sound embarrassingly loud. Even my old NAD tapedeck, which is reaching a serene old age, manages to come out of its corner, with some early Jerry Mulligan sounding fully revved up and searingly fast.
From the time I started using these little labels, a room with pictures on the wall, Hi-Fi equipment, top heavy with records and CDs, and a TV for good measure, has gone through yet another P.W.B.-driven transformation.
Visual perception, as predicted by May Belt in some introductory literature, has indeed improved. Mathew Collings series – now alas over – on Sunday evenings looked incredible. Entitled 'This is Modern Art', the series took the viewer on a helter-skelter ride through the strangest and most challenging of our twentieth century advanced and unsettling creators of modernistic artistic experiences. For years I had resisted postmodernism – such work was dismissed as pretentious nonsense or at best conceptualistic posturing. Now backed by Collings genuine highly knowledgeable and sympathetic commentary and interviews, I began to be affected. It was particularly fascinating that moderns such as Matisse and Rothko had designed and built religious chapels through designing a space where their work could be on permanent display. They were apparent non-believers who had nonetheless tackled religious themes as their final lasting testament.
Other names of more recent artists came up, and quickly I began to tune into what they were doing. The result of watching the programme was to become freed-up, detached from everyday worries, yet focused upon the visual of now. In my view, this enjoyment of post modernism and love of the programme was not a coincidence but a direct result of the enhancing effect of the Sound Has Priority Labels (and of course the accumulated P.W.B. products in the flat and listening room).
By the time the last few meter's of the series had run, I was not only listening in Colour, I was seeing in sound!
Kenneth Hyam August 1999
A telescope, a swivel, a projecting lens - through such a mechanism, sequential segments of an entire landscape could enter a room. In Renaissance times, the Camera Obscurer brought together the discipline of Art, Architecture and Engineering. Rooms were also built for their acoustic specialism, either to enhance the spoken voice or musical genius of the times. Some rooms were designed to channel sound from the outside, or to transport sound in some way from one location to another.
Modern technology has produced the stereo and the television as the twentieth century answer to the Camera Obscurer and Whispering Galleries of the past. With the advent of computer graphics, we can even see inside buildings that no longer exist. The downside to the 'Hi-Tec' revolution is the headache we get if we stare at a computer screen for too long. And there is something else: the effect of the energy fields of manufactured environments on our primitive senses. Each year the P.W.B. solutions to this problem become more effective and the results more astonishing.
In our living room of late it is not only Hi-Fi sound that has entered renewed levels of enjoyment. Sounds and noises from outside, now, have the definition and intimacy to paint mental pictures. For the most part - so far - this has been a pleasant experience. A car accelerating, the strike of a hammer, machinery from building sites; these produce an almost tactile sense of the things themselves. One has the distinct impression of seeing through sound.
Yesterday evening, singing was coming from the communal garden of the flats. They seemed to be professional singers rehearsing their material. Far from being part of the noisy neighbour syndrome, these Latin American music makers add something special to the living environment. Last night was so captivating that I felt as if I had dozed off in London and woken up in Havana. For the time being at any rate P.W.B. have turned our flat into a Camera Obscurer of sound.
Kenneth Hyam
It is always a great delight to receive a new P.W.B. device - especially when they work so effectively. I have tried the new Priority label on various sites, such as the turntable and the CD player, all to shockingly good results. Am I right in saying that it's main effect is, to put it in visual terms, an increase in apparent 'colour' of each instrument and voice, making them more 'real'. I remember describing P.W.B. devices once in a letter - it may have been a letter to one of the Hi-Fi magazines - in which I likened their effect to viewing an old master after restoration, when several centuries of grime had been removed. The information is there all of the time, it is just gaining access. Those labels do just that; they remove yet another level of soft focus crud that exists between our senses and our enjoyment of music. I now have no doubts that further barriers exist, mainly because I have experienced those effects many times now using various P.W.B. devices. Just when you think that the latest device has taken P.W.B.'s work to a conclusion, along comes a harmless looking, postage stamp sized piece of thin plastic that blows away any notion to that effect. What excites now - especially in hints drawn from the recent Newsletter (Easter 1999) is that we may be seeing but the tip of the iceberg, where P.W.B.'s work is concerned. The Belt's are taking us on a voyage of discovery, equal to any of the wonders of science, unearthed this century, and all we have to do is sit in our armchairs, listening to favourite music to hear the latest results. P.W.B. doesn't half make it difficult to be at the cutting edge of scientific discovery!
Kevin Kehoe
Yesterday the all new P.W.B. Newsletter arrived. Today the new Priority Label arrived ... May be it was just my hopeful anticipation, but I could almost swear that the moment it dropped through my letterbox onto the mat, the sound improved another notch.
Looks to me that the preferred final resting place for the first one is on the floor of the CD disc holder, so that the edge of the CD rotates above the centre of the label face. Intriguing stuff!
"It's at this point I tell myself to exercise some restraint - 'don't keep on playing track after track - its like overstuffing on the first deliciously fruity strawberries of the summer!"
I'm all agog for the biggest shock yet!
Michael Leach
Here is a further piece to my last letter:-
Gradually over the past month or so, I've added more 'Sound has Priority Labels.
Just to remind readers that my listening source is the tiny Bose Acoustic Wave Unit, which is essentially 6 trays of components stacked together into a cohesive whole.
To reap maximum benefit, each tray has to be in contact with the new Priority Label.
As a one time Hi-Fi obsessive nut-case, I am truly staggered to be thrilled by what I am now hearing via a pair of 3" speakers, coming from what could be described as a ghetto blaster. Even the mighty cathedral organ comes across convincingly.
For those of you who like that sort of thing, do buy the new Chandos CD of French organ classics, from Liverpool Cathedral (CHAN 9716) – absolutely stunning!
Whatever's coming next??
Michael Leach
My interest in a Dab tuner was sparked after reading an enthusiastic review in Gramophone by Geoffrey Horne. Sound quality from the Dab tuner cannot match top CD but live broadcasts bring benefits not available on CD. I cannot yet say whether I prefer it to Nicam broadcasts quality but I will give it a listen next time there is a Simalcast broadcast which should be soon with the Proms now going on.
On Thursday evening, after having had some photos taken of myself, I finally got around to doing the tests with the Missing Link Tie on Clip and photograph.
Using a CD of Mahler's fourth symphony that I am very familiar with, I have no doubts at all that listening with the Clip on the photo produced a significant improvement in perceived sound quality compared to listening with the Clip removed. The sound immediately induced a more relaxed feeling. The sound stage seemed to deepen with more space around the players and the overall sound was more smooth. Afterwards, listening without the Clip caused the strings to take on an unpleasant shrill quality. The test was repeated several times to convince myself that the effect was real. I next proceeded to repeat the test but this time using two photos and Tie Clips. To my ears, this produced an even better effect. Encouraged by this I decided to try the effect of using the Quantum Clip instead of the Missing Link Clip. This was easily the preferred method as the sound now took on that extra feeling of being that much closer to a live orchestra. I can see myself using this technique for future listening sessions as standard.
It was now time to try the effect of fitting the actual Missing Link Tie rather than the Tie Clip. (My earlier experiences with the Tie Clip on interconnects had produced a very lukewarm response). The cable chosen was the interconnect between passive controller and amplifier (every signal source passes through this lead so if it 'works', every sound should be improved, to my way of thinking).
Unfortunately, when fitting the tie I unknowingly disturbed the controller setting so that when I played the CD, the sound had been turned very low and this caused some confusion as you can imagine. However I believe this Tie is something special. Playing a Brendell CD later in the evening held my attention like never before and at the end of the sonata, the final note seemed to take minutes to die away.
On Friday evening I played some more of the Mahler CD before the Prom. came on and immediately it grabbed my attention, because this very familiar CD had taken on a sound quality that simply out classed anything previously heard. The detail and clarity was outstanding. In the second movement there is one section where two flutes come in together. When first bought, I used to think there was just one flute but as my sound system has improved over the years I came to realise there was more than one instrument and as the sound has got better still, so it has become easier to differentiate between the two. Listening on Friday night the two flutes obviously had space between them. Instances such as this highlight to me the huge improvements being made.
Switching on BBC2 and listening to the Prom in Nicam was again an outstanding experience, superior to any Nicam heard before. I began to wonder whether someone in Leeds was up to some tricks or could it really be that new cable tie fitted the night before has somehow gained in effectiveness overnight.
One thing I am certain, if it is the Missing Link Tie, then it is the best £50 I have ever spent on Hi-Fi.
Tom Marsden.
Just before last Christmas I was sent a video of May Belt's seminar on the work on 'Morphic resonance' and other such phenomena in the audio world. At one point in the seminar, May Belt told her invited guests that plastic seemed to be an ideal material to work with when trying out different experiments relating to Morphic resonance. This set me thinking on how to do my own type of experiment.
How could I produce my own kind of energy? The two main sources of energy that I had to hand were 1) Morphic Liquid, 2) Magic Torch - both unusual sources of energy.
I recommend the following.
Immerse in the bottle of Morphic liquid a dozen or so white plastic strips (plant pot markers) making sure that you do not displace too much valuable fluid. Apply a smidgen of Electret Cream to the thread of the bottle before firmly screwing the top back on. Place the bottle in the freezer for about 15 minutes, take it out, and then shine the magic torch against the computer generated label for about 15 seconds. Then return the bottle to the freezer. When the bottle has completely frozen, again shine the torch through the label and put it in the fridge to defrost. As the bottle and contents start to defrost , intermittently shin the torch through the label until the contents are back to their natural form. At this stage of the letter I do wish to stress that this is still at an experimental stage, but I believe it to be an important stage of the experiment, even thought the timing of the freezing and shining of the torch is still hit and miss. Next, take out the markers from the bottle and dry them off.
Glue all of the plastic strips to anything - inside of audio cases, such as amplifier lids, CD player casing etc.- and out of the way places, such as behind or underneath furniture.
At this stage of the experiment please be patient. When the strips are first glued down you should hear a noticeable difference straight away, but let the glue dry, and then sit down and listen....
One thing that I have noticed at this stage, for some odd reason, is that occasionally listening with these strips in place, nothing appears to happen, but don't let it deter you. When you have a further session the improvement comes in abundance. Why this action takes place I do not know. If you take up this
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