Sony YP-EW21 “The Mountain bouncer” Circa 1996 The design screams 200% 1992 windbreaker. This trifold velcro wallet of Walkmen truly looks ready to go camping. Orange and burgundy nylon outerwear, geared up to hit the trails. In addition to the Velcro there is a dual snap storage pouch for backup batteries (when rolled) or an extra cassette (unrolled). Open it reveals a metal chassis with latchless design and cozy drop-in cassette bay. Unit allows playback with lid open for viewing full profile of a playing cassette similar to a SPORT Walkman. Tape sits in a cavity like it’s the missing piece. Button controlled tilt up eject mechanism with shallow action, reveals enough of the tape to be grabbed for removal. Auto reverse and continuous playback switches are oriented to the left of the side-mounted transport control buttons. Megabass 1 sounds like it adds something to the top end as well. Emphasis in the bottom end seems to be on the punchy side of 60hz, up to about 150hz. Megabass 2 is highly energetic. Way too intense for bass heavy music in most situations. Save for very low level listening. It works with about half of the songs on the great adventures of slick Rick. Black Sunday sounds better without either boost. Very unobtrusive hiss. Sounds different than EX head/amp assembly. Balanced response, a slight low end emphasis by default. The background details are well articulated. Mixes sound “correct” to their vinyl counterparts. Black Sunday’s drums are extra memorable coming from this machine. Clear vocal presentation. Low fatigue factor in extended listening. Soundgarden’s Black Hole Sun reveals a wide stereo image and deep soundstage. The modulated guitar work is attention-grabbing, however the real show-stealer is Chris Cornell’s vocal performance over the drums. The YP-EW21 presents all these little things happening at once with a brilliant, cohesive delivery. AVJonez
