Vinyl Candy, Kuetsu Black By Musashino Audio Labo

The Koetsu Black MC cartridge from the 80's it had an output of just 0.25mv, so you'll need a high gain, low noise phono stage to go with it. Weighting in at almost 10 grams, this is a medium compliance cartridge.

After living with my Kuzma CAR-30 for a few months, I was just itching for a cartridge change to go with my Kuzma Stabi XL turn table set up. I was hoping to find a used Shelter 901 in any incarnation, as there was MKII and MKIII after the original. I know, the Shelter is not the latest & greatest, but it is a comfort cartridge so to speak. It's been around for years, the sound is familiar on the warmer side of tonality, which is what I love. Then along came this Koetsu Black by Musashino Audio Labo.........

Like the Shelter, Koetsu is another familiar brand that has been around for a very long time. The story goes something like this, Sugano-san is a retired automotive engineer at Toyota. Post retirement, he ventured in to the art of hand winding cartridges, as Sugano-san is also a music lover himself. His hand wound cartridges, then called Koetsu Black, due to it's use of a black, powder coated aluminum body, was a hit in the market and by 1985, Sugano-san was unable to cope with the orders that were coming in worldwide. Hence there after he commissioned Musashino Audio Labo to help with the manufacturing of the Koetsu Black. By the 90's Sugano-san was too old to continue with the business and his son took over and expended the empire!(so to speak)

With new management came new ideas, and Koetsu started to introduced new materials such as Rosewood, Vermilion Varnishes, then gemstones such as Jade or Coral stone to the body, to basically add flavor over that classic hand wound over boron cantilever motor since the Black. As a result of using ever more exotic materials, Koetsu prices also start to increase over the years, top that off with hifi inflation, which is never in single digit territories, you get the idea!  Today Koetsu is mostly seen as high end cartridge maker, with the entry level model, still called the Koetsu Black Goldline retailing at a cool USD 2,500 a piece!     

On the top side, where the mount screw holes are, is where you can tell if it's an original Sugano-san hand wound early model, or in this case, the 1985 onwards Muasashino Audio Labo produced unit, with serial number to boot.

As usual, I digressed. Anyway picked up an ol' Koutsu Black by Musashino Audio Labo from a contact who happens to live nearby, and mounted it on to my Kuzma Stogi S12 inch arm. With a square body, the Koetsu was easy to mount and complete alignment to the tone arm.  Once the tracking force was set to 2 grams, I can start to play my LPs. From the first note, I have never felt the serenity that a piece of hifi equipment brought to my audio experience! The sweet highs were rolled off for that soft fluffy, disappearing in to the thing air of nothingness, always to soothing to ear...... The rolled of highs kinda makes the mid range slightly pronounced, which to me ears is always a good thing. Bass is solid, full bodied, but can sometimes sound lumpy too. However, that's only when you start to dissect the sound. When heard as whole, the sound is at once rose tinted hue with lushness, and vocalist centric all rolled in to one homogenously. 

If you're still reading up to this point, you'd conjectured a rather warm and comfortable sound but could be boring in the longer term, question? The answer is NO, with each LP or recording being played, the tonal colors of the music are flushed out in full, never monotonous! I often find my self appreciating all those tonal colors I never heard before in a recording, even if I've heard them a thousand times before the Koetsu, trust me it's that amazing! With the Koetsu, the music always flow with musical foot tapping tune, no doubt about that. Which is why despite it's warm tonality which endears it so well to genre like vocals, especially female(Tsai Chin or Teresa Teng comes to mind), jazz, and simple baroque style classical music, the Koetsu actually surprises me with it's ability to rock too! I some how always play my air guitar when I put on a rock LP. Hmm.............. Last but not least, the Koetsu just wipes out all the LP's surface noise better than most other cartridges, reducing most pops & clicks to nearly undiscernible levels. How ever if an LP is scarred, then then grove rot can still be heard, but much less rude sounding.

Now it can't be all pros with no cons, right? Yes, there are short falls to when it came to resolution. When compared with my Benz Micro LP, a slightly newer MC cartridge design, which have been with me for over 10 years now, mounted on the various turn tables I have played with, the Koetsu would lose out by emitting the finer musical details & tonal shadings so apparent on the Benz. Also when comparing to both the Benz and the Kuzma CAR-30, the band width of the Koetsu is left somewhat wanting as well.  The Koetsu also have a tendency to sound a bit slow in the proceedings if your platter speed is tune to correct 33.3 rpm using the strobo scope. My review is based on the setting of pushed up speed button by 2 notches, on the Kuzma's electronics speed control, both on 33 & 45 rpm. Some times, doing it right technically just sounds wrong!

   

This is the current version of Koetsu Black Goldline, with a gold plate at the bottom and slightly tapered body at the front. However many say it sounds more like a modern interpretation of the older Koetsu Black!  

And here I am, a happy camper at last, and by now, you would have formed the conclusion that I love the Koetsu Black a lot!  However, with that said, my impression of Koetsu was never great to start with, as it always gave me the impression of an ol'man's cartridge. To be honest, I have never heard anyone playing rock music with a Koetsu up till now. My previous brush in with the Koetsu always had me listening to Tasi chin, and other audiophile music only.  Now that I have one, I have new found respect for the Koetsu Black cartridge.

Now, from what I heard is that the current Koetsu Black Goldline has a slightly less rosy hued view on music and come with a slightly more modern(i.e. watered down or flattened) sound signature compared to those 80's originals made by Sugano-san himself, or the Musashino Audio Labo version. Some of those who are lucky enough to have compared, also swear that the Musashindo Audio Labo version is already watered down compared to the original early 80's Sugano-san hand wound version! Personally I have no way to verify those claims unless I go crazy and buy all 3 versions of the Koetsu Black to try. So, now I can understand the mystical journey & the plot twist and turns of the Koetsu Black cartridge, which has come a long way since. And don't you just love hifi brands that have a tradition and story line that lasted more than 40 years & counting?