Analogue addiction.

It has been awhile since I've updated anything on here, so here's a bit of a mammoth one.  Everything much the same but two years older, but not necessarily any wiser!  Still the main pastimes' are listening to music and watching movies, but not doing so much with the photography these days except to take good pictures to sell things on eBay or specialist forums in a major de-cluttering exercise.  The most changes to my stereo have revolved around (pun intended) my turntable, with the introduction of a wonderful rebuilt Decca London Export (Grey) cartridge mounted in the Roksan NIMA.  In the SME M2-12 I now have a Goldring Excel-GS and finally in the Rega I'm running a Grado F-1+.  So basically not a single 'new' production cartridge in sight!  However, recently I've been intrigued by the renewed interest in the Ortofon SPU (Stereo Pick-Up) cartridges, but then these are also a throwback to an earlier time, so perhaps wholly in keeping with my current changes.  So what follows is my initial thoughts on this old design classic (?) that I've been listening to for awhile now.  Even though I had to get a new arm and create a way to mount it as this cartridge does require rather specific playing requirements not catered for by my other tonearms.

Now having played 50+ LP’s with the SPU (Classic NE) I thought I’d compile a few thoughts on this cartridge.  Initially when it arrived I wondered why these are never shown with the bundled spacer for using with a standard headshell – should have asked I suppose, then I wouldn't have bought one!  The cartridge came bundled with the aforementioned spacer, mounting bolts, small screwdriver and some cartridge leads, all within the rather nice red jewel type case.

So fitting, now I always attached the cartridge tags before mounting the cartridge, especially as the Jelco has an SME type removable headshell, however the SPU is blessed with the skinniest pins I’ve ever come across, so perhaps this is why they bundle some cartridge leads, but no, these are just as oversized for the cartridge pins.  So sticking with the ones on the Jelco head I squeezed them down until they were nice and tight, then on to mounting the cartridge itself.  Using the spacer, supplied which is quite a sloppy fit and I think would have been nice if it was machined to a far closer tolerance, but it is what it is I guess – but this means if you want it to look ‘good’ not only do you have to hold the main cartridge body, keep the mounting nuts secure, whilst doing up the bolts and align the spacer, so I just let the spacer do its own thing which meant it didn’t end up sitting square along the cartridge body, won’t have a detrimental effect, just looks untidy, perhaps I should have used the tiniest but of Blutak to stop it moving about!  Actually, then replaced this with the blue additional spacer I bought and this one is a far superior fit and self holds in-line with the cartridge body with no problem, which I found a bit bizarre.

So bolted up, took a few minutes to balance, adjust arm/cartridge to be level with the record surface and dial in 4g VTF via my Roksan digital scales.  Now according to the cartridge spec, this should weight 13g and the standard Jelco weight (according to Jelco’s specs) only works up to 12g so I’d ordered the heavier counterweight, but this proved unable to allow 4g VTF unless the weight was mounted backwards – just couldn’t get it beyond 3.6g before it was right up against the arm bearing housing, so used the standard weight which was fine (so yet another wasted purchase) oh and the Jelco counterweight markings shouldn’t be relied on – quite a way out.  Cantilever was then aligned using an Ortofon two point protractor with no problem.

So lets play and set-up the bias, I generally use Joni Mitchel’s ‘Wild Things Run Fast’ as it is both very well recorded and her voice is absolutely stable between both channels, also I’d sooner use music rather than a test disc for this element of set-up.

Now with all the basics done (fine tuned the VTA/VTF again) I let it play on and was presented with a rather bass heavy, almost ponderous & bland sound, mid-band was congested, treble recessed – but that’s OK it is new and some cartridges do need to bed in, so put on some old rock LP’s and played CD’s for the next few hours, just watching the arm traverse the LP’s.  After 10 sides, had another listen to Joni and was rewarded with a significant improvement, but it was still only providing a rather bland & pedestrian sound – so let’s fast forward a few days when we’ve passed the 100 side milestone using the SPU for background music.

The sound of this cartridge is rich and sounds reasonably well balanced the bass is particularly deep (perhaps a bit too dominant) and articulate and it reproduces guitar like no other cartridge I’ve heard!  If you have a blues/rock/country/reggae based LP diet you will be well served by this cartridge, Robert Cray, Steve Ray Vaughn, Bob Marley, Steve Miller band have never sounded as good.  My 60’s pressings of Merle Haggard were a revelation of listening pleasure as was my 70’s John Mayall Blues Breakers.  ELO, Rolling Stones, Doors & Glen Campbell were all just wonderful to listen to as well, mind you it wasn’t all great – there is always the sense of something missing, like the movement out of the corner of your eye, but when you turn to look there isn’t anything to see, I would occasionally feel there was a hint of some detail that just wasn’t being reproduced, was being held in the background, hinted at, but never fully revealed.  Also cymbals I felt were not always clearly reproduced, strikes on the bell were clear and clean, but as the sticks were moved more to the outer edge of the cymbal bow their overall sound change from cymbal to more like tin tray!  There was also still some mid-band congestion in complex passages and that articulate bass became less so when both bass drum & bass guitar were both ‘going for it’ as in Narada Michael Walden’s superb Dance of Life.  Vocals are well produced but an occasional hint of nasality, but sibilance is held well in check, great for some of my less than pristine pressings – I’ve not bought a new LP since the early 90’s!  Difficult piano/keyboard passages were also sometimes a disappointment for instance with David Sancious’s ‘Sleight of Hand’ from the wonderful recording of ‘The Bridge’ losing a large element of the inner subtlety that can make this and the rest of the LP a sheer joy to listen too.  Another instance was my Martyn Dyke’s recording of Dussek’s Sonata in G minor no:8 where the mixture of ponderous rhythms & tonic-dominant broken chord formations didn’t ever provide the gradual development into the usual coherent piece I’m use to hearing, but this has always been a difficult piece of music to portray sympathetically.  At this point I swapped out the SPU from my Goldring Excel-GS to try and sort out if some of the above shortcomings were down to the Jelco arm (or my rather rough and ready DIY arm pod).  Very little of the above issues I felt could be levelled at the arm/pod with the possible exception of some of the mid-band congestion.  The Excel with the Gyger ‘S’ tip pulls off astonishing levels of detail from the LP grooves and the tin tray cymbals were no more, complex bass & drums were easy to follow and those keyboard pieces once again made sense, indeed for its price I feel the Jelco is a surprisingly good arm.

Overall in isolation the SPU Classic NE could be classified as a lively almost ‘bouncy’ sounding cartridge with reasonable levels of detail, but only with the right music, I didn’t particularly feel it suited classical/orchestral or modern(ish) jazz but it certainly entertained with the above mentioned genres and classic period disco.  I say in isolation because both my other cartridges do provide a far more lively presentation, mind you one being a Decca would make most other cartridges sound rather pedestrian.  Real question is, is it worth the £600 asking price and I have to say in all honesty probably not.  Given both its tonearm requirement for its mass and VTF it won’t ever be a drop in replacement in most set-ups and for the same cost I expect there are some very fine sounding alternatives – not least from Ortofon’s own stable.  It does however have a unique place if you mainline on early bass, drum & guitar pop, or Blues, Country & Reggae derived genres.  The rebuild costs are also reasonable from Ortofon at €365 (£280ish currently) for which you get a complete new set of internals, you also don’t need a high powered ‘scope to see the tip is beautifully ground and polished so should provide a long lifetime of use. Finally just a quick search on eBay would indicate that values remain high on the second-hand market.  Overall, I’m happy to keep this cartridge given as it does provide, with the right music, high levels of enjoyment, but then I do have a three arm/cartridge set-up so can pick and choose which cartridge/arm combination delivers the sound I want to hear.  Later I will probably look at getting a permanent armboard and mount from Acoustic Signature to replace my Rega/Grado F-1+ with the Jelco/SPU.  I also have to confess that I wouldn’t mind trying one of the GM versions as I now have an arm with an SME type collet, but that will have to wait for another day, but I probably wouldn't move any higher up the 'SPU' hierarchy.

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