Category: Music

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Building A Streaming Media Player with Rasberry PI

HiFiBerry Case

How have you been coping during the Covid Lockdown? Lots of people have been been undertaking various projects and this is something that has been on my list for a long time.

I have been using the Logitech Media Server software for a long time. I currently have my music library running on a Lubuntu micro PC that I bought for £20 used. The music library is stored on a NAS device.

Up until now, I have been using a phone app or Apple TV app called SlimLibrary but I have always wanted a physical device to connect to one of my Hi-Fi and/or surround amplifier so this has prompted me to kill two birds with one stone and work on a Rasberry Pi computer that I’ve always wanted to play with, and also with some software called piCorePlayer to receive the streamed music from the server software.

I am looking to HiFiBerry to buy one of their bundles, including a bolt on DAC (no soldering required). This coupled with some RCA cables to the amp should provide the solution.

I look to be posting more here on that, and also some videos on YouTube so watch this space.

Read about the build here

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“Low Rider” and car culture in music and film

Who doesn’t love cars and 70s culture? I’m a big car fan and it was probably through the film “Gone in 60 Seconds” (remake) that I first heard this song.

Reading into it a bit more and looking at the background behind the song and what it was all about got me looking at the low-rider scene. This is where paint, wire wheels and hydraulic suspension are all used to jack the car up at individual corners, often controlled remotely as well so the driver could use the car as a show piece whilst not driving – all very cool.

Ford Galaxy – lowrider. You can download this here: http://getwallpapers.com/collection/lowrider-backgrounds

The band itself was made up of a multi-ethnic lineup and at the time did wonders to improve the acceptibilty of different races in pop music.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this, and now invite you to listen to the original video for the song. https://youtu.be/hg_KZQ7k3kI (unable to embed, sorry).

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Rebel country music and the rise of “The Highwaymen”

L-R – Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson

I’ve loved country music for quite some time, and among all the country greats, you have the likes of Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, and Johnny Cash. They all had very successful careers spanning decades.

Why is it called rebel country music you may ask? If you didn’t already know they all had run-ins with the law and were in jail or prison at various points throughout their lives. Looking back, this is what gave them more of a following and infamously boosted their careers.

In 1985 they came together to record their first record together but at that time didn’t yet have a name. The album “Highwayman” was credited to the band members individually.

In 1990 they came together again for a second attempt and produced another album of songs, dubbed “Highwayman 2” and toured extensively.

In 1995 they released their final release “The Road Goes on Forever” before Waylon and Johnny’s deteriorating health.

Since Waylon and Johnny both passed, the supergroup has become increasingly more popular. There have been several remasters or original recordings and releases of concert footage on Blueray.

You can read more about the group at AllMusic

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The Music of Bon Scott

I love AC/DC. I love rock music in general. I love loud music and it is without a doubt, and a pretty good fact, that AC/DC wouldn’t have been so successful had it not been for Bon coining a very large number of their best known hits.

I’m not going to bother compiling a list of my favourite tracks, as Ultimate Classic Rock have done that for me – see here: http://ultimateclassicrock.com/best-bon-scott-acdc-songs/ – but what I did want to do is list some of the music he was involved with before AC/DC came about.

Bon was the eldest member of AC/DC when he joined, but probably had the most experience out of them all.

He had sung in three bands prior to AC/DC.

  1. The Spektors (co drummer and singer)
  2. The Valentines (vocals)
  3. Fraternity (lead vocals, recorder)
I’ve created a playlist featuring some of the songs – feel free to add some of your favourites too!

I don’t think Bon Scott gets enough credit for his songwriting or the impact he had on AC/DC after he died.

Hope you enjoyed reading this.

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How to retro Hi-Fi on a Budget!

I’ve wanted to write something on this for a little while, so I am excited to be able to post something to help others reach their listening goals…

In this day of age, lots of people all over listen to music on their phone, or iPod or via smart home devices such as Amazon Echo or Sonos and Apple equivalents, and although these are improving greatly, their vastly overpriced and not specifically designed for listening to music.

You can do all of this without spending a lot. If you want to get a great sounding stereo setup follow these steps.

  1. You need an amplifier. If you want retro, eBay is your best bet and I have a Sony TA-F400 (Spec here). I’ve had a few others but this has been the most reliable. You can get one for around £70, and I would recommend not spending anything over £80 on this. If the exact model is not available, similar models in the “TA” range will do as good a job. This particular model is from 1988. The beauty of this amplifier, is that it also has a phono stage. For you millenials, that’ll allow you to hook up a record deck without using a separate pre-amp.
Sony TA-F400

2. You need some speakers. Now on this part you may want to spend a little more as you don’t necessarily want to be replacing speaker cones due to someone blowing the speakers, but more than anything if you buy older speakers they tend to cost a lot more, and you don’t know how people have treated them.

Richer Sounds have an absolutely cracking deal on some Wharfedale 9.0 speakers. Newer models have replaced them but they are critically acclaimed, and are currently for sale for only £39 (including 6 year warranty). You really can’t get anything better new for that price. Grab a pair here: http://bit.ly/2FfZmKW

Pair of Wharfedale 9.0s

3. You need some RCA cables. These will allow you to connect anything with a 3.5mm headphone jack. The following will work, here.

This is the basics, but it’s a good starting point to get you up and running on a budget.

If there’s any interest I can follow up with additional separates such as CD player and so on. If you want to see my personal setup you can take a look here

Enjoy and happy listening 🙂

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Getting a new subwoofer as the old one died

My trusty, and used, Mordaunt Short subwoofer died as I was watching Band of Brothers so I had to get a new one.

I did some research and reading about and came across the Cambridge Audio SX120. A much newer and lighter model when compared to the MS model.

I bought it from Richer Sounds for around £120 (Amazon selling the same model for double the price). I thought it was a fair amount.

I have uploaded an unboxing video to YouTube:


Cambridge Audio SX120 on the left and Mordaunt Short MS309W on right.
New sub in place next to our AV cab with room for LPs next to it now


The circuit board in the MS subwoofer.

The Mordaunt Short subwoofer is available for sale for spares and repairs for anyone who wants to repair it or keep it for spares. See the for sale here on eBay.

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A guide to services we use (that will help you too!)

We use a number of different services to catalogue what we watch and listen to.
I’m a bit of a stats geek so to begin with these are what we use to keep track of everything.

Last.fm – used to be massive but we still love it. Track all the music you listen to and compare trends. You play music in iTunes or Spotify, and it keeps count. They have a great guide with links to all the apps and services supported. This is a free service. My username is tobyw7
and Annabelle’s is AnnaC7

Discogs – catalogue your music collection. Started using this when I got my record player last year and I’m now loving it. I buy the majority of my LPs via the Discogs marketplace which is a dedicated buy/sell site for music. The mobile app keeps getting better! My account is tobyw7 (spot the trend!)

My Movies (app) – introduced by my girlfriend’s Dad, John. This is proper nerd stuff, catalogue your entire movie collection, add tags, labels, filter by genre, actor, and anything else you can imagine. Direct links to IMDb, and to trailers. The app is free for up to 50 titles but it’s well worth paying for. We love it! Check it out at www.mymovies.dk

Internet Movie Database (IMDb) – Now owned by Amazon but still as good (until they removed the forums). Our inspiration for creating this blog, was the removal of the forums and to open a place for discussion and comment. We wouldn’t be without this site, and would probably still be cycling through our Apple TV trying to find something to watch! Your go to resource for any film buff. Check it out at www.imdb.com