I've been reading Gramophone for nearly forty years and I have to agree that it's a shadow of what it once was. The British bias has worried me for years, and I've tended to filter this from a review, although UK listers may disagree. I still buy it because, as Len Fehskens observed, despite your best endeavours, you miss knowing of some releases. Jane Erb thought that: >...International Record Review, started by and composed of many people >who left Gramophone when it became so slick, has followed along and >also become slick. Too bad. I think IRR is a much better magazine that Gramophone. It reviews and lists more new releases from small labels, and I prefer its articles - Martin Anderson's recent ones on Norwegian composers were alone worth the price of the magazine. It also uses writers from different parts of the world, even (gasp!) from Australia. Given some less than rapturous comments from listers about the American Record Guide, I haven't bothered investigating it. Fanfare uses reviewers from other countries, including the UK. I can happily spend a week getting through a Fanfare - Gramophone is a small snack by comparison. Incidentally, I recently needed to look up a review in a 1993 Fanfare. It was a thick chunky volume of near airport novel dimensions. Its 2002 sylph-like descendant emphasised yet again how much things have changed in recent years. The other magazine I refer to frequently is Len Mullenger's excellent Musicweb, http://www.musicweb.uk.net or linked from Classical Net, which posts reviews every day. Len will also send you a weekly digest of reviews, and there is much else of interest at the site. I had no inducements to mention this - a good site deserves a free plug. Richard Pennycuick [log in to unmask]