Neil Young unveils his $400 portable music player

by Mark Teo

March 10, 2014

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Tech consolidation hasn’t been kind to portable music players. The stalwart iPod classic, for example, was the most iconic mp3 player ever—and it was discontinued last year; it hadn’t seen any updates since 2009. So, logic would dictate that the market for mp3 players has been killed by smartphones, by streaming music services, by shifting consumer demands—but Neil Young doesn’t listen to logic.

Instead, today at SXSW, he unveiled his long-incubating idea for the PonoPlayer, his high-quality digital music player. The triangular player will cost $399 and will have a capacity of 128gb—less than the iPod classic—and for those eager to buy one, they’ll be available via Kickstarter on March 15.

So what, exactly, sets Pono apart from traditional digital music players (aside from its exorbitant pricetag)? According to PonoPlayer’s press release, it’s on a mission to restore “the soul of music.”

“It’s about the music, real music,” Young said in a statement. “We want to move digital music into the 21st century and PonoMusic does that. We couldn’t be more excited—not for ourselves, but for those that are moved by what music means in their lives.”

Those are all PR platitudes, though. Here’s how Young and co. plan on rediscovering the “soul” of music: First off, it won’t be using mp3s. Instead, Pono will reportedly be using its own proprietary compressed music file and desktop media management system—basically, its own version of iTunes. The player itself will be able to hold an estimated 100-500 albums.

In contrast, a 160gb iPod classic claimed it could hold roughly 40,000 songs. So, we’re wagering that Pono will deliver high-quality audio—high-resolution files, perhaps akin to .FLACs—but it wont provide the same compactness as the trusty mp3.

Young, for his part, has been working on the player for a number of years with Ayre Audio. In fact, in 2012, he brought a prototype of the player on the Late Show With David Letterman. Here’s how the player looked back then.

“The simplest way to describe what we’ve accomplished is that we’ve liberated the music of the artist from the digital file and restored it to its original artistic quality—as it was in the studio,” Young said. “Hearing Pono for the first time is like that first blast of daylight when you leave a movie theatre on a sun-filled day.”

Sure, Neil. Still, we’re not sure how these files will differ from .WAV files or .FLAC files—both are high-quality digital files. As Pitchfork notes, there are concerns over how compressed these files will be—and unless the Pono can somehow compress files significantly and maintain a high fidelity, it’s not offering anything new.

So, what do you think: Would you give up mp3s for the PonoPlayer?

UPDATE: The general reaction to this story was less than positive. On Facebook, our readers wrote that the device was costly, ill-designed and, in many cases, seemed to go against Neil Young’s stance on products and the oil-sands. Well, looks like y’all were the vocal minority: Launched yesterday, the Pono’s Kickstarter has already nearly doubled its $800,000 goal, and with 34 days left in the campaign that number will only rise.

Not only have 30 people pledged $5,000 or more—a package that includes a Neil Young dinner and listening party— $400 or more packages, of which there are more than a dozen, are quickly running out.

Tags: Music, News, neil young

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