artist: Laurence Juber This item is currently unavailable from Amazon.com. album: Guitar Noir format: DVD-Audio label: AIX release year: 2003 performance: 9 sound 9.5 reviewed by: Tim Hart Who is Laurence Juber, you ask? Well, in the circles that matter, and this excludes anything to do with pop music, he has been around for quite some time. Most notable is his stint as guitarist in one of the later renditions of the band Wings with Sir Paul McCartney. Also, he has recorded with folks like Alan Parsons, Belinda Carlisle, Paul Williams, and Ringo Starr, to name a few, as well as composing soundtracks for TV and film. He is also known as a masterful “fingerstyle guitarist,” which has its roots in flamenco and bluegrass. In other words, no picks.

artist: Chicago function popUp(URL,NAME) { amznwin=window.open(URL,NAME,'location=yes,scrollbars=yes,status=yes,toolbar=yes,resizable=yes,width=380,height=450,screenX=10,screenY=10,top=10,left=10'); amznwin.focus();} document.open(); document.write(""); document.close(); album: II format: DVD-Audio label: Warner/Rhino release year: 2003 performance: 9 sound 8.5 reviewed by: Tim Hart Chicago was one of the few ‘70s groups that consistently put out a string of hits, all with different lead singers. And different they were. Nobody had fused musical genres the way Chicago did. Their style of playing combined hard rock, R&B, jazz and furious improvisation from each of the band's seven members.

artist: Tipper album: Surrounded format: DVD-Audio label: Myutopia Recordings release year: 2003 performance: 7 sound 8 reviewed by: Bryan Dailey Surrounded, the brainchild of Wimbledon England’s 27-year-old techno music whiz Tipper, began on an Apple iMac with an aftermarket soundcard and a dream. While on a North American tour with several other techno DJs, Tipper assembled this somber, melodic collection of low-intensity electronic music that eventually caught the ears of 5.1 Entertainment’s Richard Dashut. The album was mixed in surround for release on Myutopia Recordings.

artist: Blue Oyster Cult This title is currently unavailable from Amazon.com. album: A Long Day's Night format: DVD-Audio label: Sanctuary/Silverline release year: 2003 performance: 7 sound 7 reviewed by: Bryan Dailey Originally recorded on June 21, 2002 on the summer solstice at the Navy Pier/Skyline Stage in Chicago, Blue Oyster Cult decided to work without a net that night. Most live albums are based on the best tracks from several evenings’ performances, but A Long Day’s Night was recorded in one take, in front of a live audience. The DVD video and stereo CD versions of A Long Day’s Night were released in 2002, and now Silverline records has remixed the evening’s performance into 5.1 surround sound for the DVD-Audio disc. Mixed by Rich Tozzoli, this disc features the option of 24/96 DVD-Audio for those of you with DVD-Audio players, as well as 24-bit/48kHz Dolby Digital for those with only regular DVD players.

artist: Queen function popUp(URL,NAME) { amznwin=window.open(URL,NAME,'location=yes,scrollbars=yes,status=yes,toolbar=yes,resizable=yes,width=380,height=450,screenX=10,screenY=10,top=10,left=10'); amznwin.focus();} document.open(); document.write(""); document.close(); album: The Game format: DVD-Audio - 5.1 MLP, DTS default surround PCM stereo label: DTS Entertainment release year: 2003 performance: 8 sound 8 reviewed by: Jerry Del Colliano In the spirit of low corporate productivity, I once had an employee who felt the need to record things backwards into his Mac, play them back and then vocally repeat them back into the mic as closely as he could to the backwards version. He would then flip his imitation of the backwards version around (using digital audio editing software) and compare his version to the original. One of the funniest things he ever did was record the line “Another One Bites The Dust” backwards. Once flipped around, it sounds phonetically like “on-a-warium-klumps-it-nufs-it.” After an hour or so of practice, he could repeat his version so well that it was almost identical to the original recording he made of the line. Can you believe I actually employed this guy?