AXPONA 2025: So Much Vinyl and So Little Time

SHOW
by Jeff Wilson
Apr 19, 2025

There were 213 listening rooms at AXPONA this year, and I congratulate anyone who made it to all of them. I certainly didn’t. In fact, I didn’t come close even though on all three days I visited dozens of rooms while posting on Facebook about memorable listening sessions.

I wasn’t reviewing equipment, however, and as, the hundred-plus people who stood outside the Expo Room before the doors opened at 10am on Friday morning were well aware, there’s more to AXPONA than high-end stereo equipment. As soon as the doors opened that morning, the vinyl collectors hit the record crates in their search for new LPs that in many cases were hot off the press, hard to find, or nearly out of print. Vinyl enthusiasts were also eager to paw through used records, some at collectable prices but some—many, in fact—for cheap. With so many vendors bringing so much wax, visiting the Expo Room (which also featured audio accessories, turntables, cables, vintage audio equipment, etc.) felt like going to a dozen record stores at once.

Some vendors were from the Chicago area, including Music Direct, who had a lot of Mobile Fidelity titles on hand as well as other albums that can be found on their website, musicdirect.com. The booth had stocked new copies of the new MoFi vinyl for Santana’s Lotus, a 3-LP live set that was recorded in Japan in 1973, and Dark Magus, a Miles Davis live date from 1974. Both of these titles have been on my reissue wish list for some time, and Issue 361 of TAS will include a feature article where I draw some parallels between these two projects that reflected the same Zeitgeist. I discovered on Friday morning that Tyson Hall from Music Direct is equally enthusiastic about these titles.

Tyson Hall

Acoustic Sounds also had a booth with vinyl, accessories, and a large quantity of reel-to-reel tapes. When I asked Chad Kassem, the owner of Acoustic Sounds, what brand-new title he was most excited about, he immediately grabbed a copy of AP’s reissue of Buena Vista Social Club. As it turns out, Jonathan Valin purchased a new reel-to-reel copy of BVSC at AXPONA and he’s going to review it for Issue 362 of TAS.

Chad Kassem

The booth for Elusive Disc stayed busy throughout the event, and especially on Saturday, when Impex Records hosted a meet-and-greet/album signing with jazz artist Patricia Barber, who also performed at AXPONA that evening. Here’s to the hard-working crew at Elusive Disc:

Elusive Disc Employees

Delmark Records was also on hand for the event. A Chicago-based record company launched in 1953, Delmark has a rich blues and jazz history. New titles keep appearing, including Johnny Iguana’s At Delmark, a solo piano blues album that came out the week of the show. On Saturday afternoon Johnny signed copies of the album, which is available on vinyl, CD, hi-res digital, and reel-to-reel tape. (It’s actually one of five R2R tapes in the Delmark catalog.) The owner of Delmark, Julia Miller delivered a talk on Friday about the history of Chicago labels, which have contributed so much to music—and are still making an impact.

Julia Miller

David Solomon, the self-described “Chief Hi Res Music Evangelist @ Qobuz,” also spoke at the event. His topic: “What’s New With Qobuz and Why the Audio Experts Prefer Qobuz Over the Rest.” Look for some TAS-created playlists on Qobuz in the future.

David Solomon Qobuz

Tags: AXPONA MUSIC SHOW REPORT VINYL

By Jeff Wilson

This will take some explaining, but I can connect the dots between pawing through LPs at a headshop called Elysian Fields in Des Moines, Iowa, as a seventh grader, and becoming the Music Editor for The Absolute Sound. At that starting point—around 1970/71—Elysian Fields had more LPs than any other store in Des Moines. Staring at all the colorful covers was both tantalizing and frustrating. I had no idea who most of the artists were, because radio played only a fraction of what was current. To figure out what was going on, I realized that I needed to build a record collection—and as anyone who’s visited me since high school can testify, I succeeded. Record collecting was still in my blood when, starting in the late 1980s, the Cincinnati Public Library book sale suddenly had an Elysian Fields quantity of LPs from people who’d switched to CDs. That’s where I met fellow record hawk Mark Lehman, who preceded me as music editor of TAS. Mark introduced me to Jonathan Valin, whose 1993 detective novel The Music Lovers depicts the battles between record hawks at library sales. That the private eye in the book, Harry Stoner, would stumble upon a corpse or two while unraveling the mystery behind the disappearance of some rare Living Stereo platters made perfect sense to me. After all, record collecting is serious business. Mark knew my journalistic experience included concert reviews for The Cincinnati Enquirer and several long, sprawling feature articles in the online version of Crawdaddy. When he became TAS music editor in 2008, he contacted me about writing for the magazine. I came on board shortly after the latest set of obituaries had been written for vinyl—and, as fate had it, right when the LP started to make yet another unexpected comeback. Suddenly, I found myself scrambling to document all the record companies pressing vinyl. Small outfits were popping up world-wide, and many were audiophile-oriented, plus already existing record companies began embracing the format again. Trying to keep track of everything made me feel, again, like that overwhelmed seventh grader in Elysian Fields, and as Music Editor I’ve found that keeping my finger on the pulse of the music world also requires considerable detective work. I’ve never had a favorite genre, but when it comes time to sit down and do some quality listening, for me nothing beats a well-recorded small-group jazz recording on vinyl. If a stereo can give me warmth and intimacy, tonal accuracy, clear imaging, crisp-sounding cymbals, and deep, woody-sounding bass, then I’m a happy camper.