ack in July 2016, I wrote at length about Kuzma’s CAR-50 cartridge, the $6550 flagship in a four-model range. A lot of those words were spent discussing both the potential benefits of a system approach to record players (one that treats the ‘table, ‘arm and cartridge as a single, integrated entity) and how the physical and electrical characteristics of the Kuzma cartridges suited their use with the company’s turntables and tonearms. I also noted that the four Kuzma cartridges were visually and physically all but indistinguishable. Apart from the squarish, blue body, they look and behave almost identically, differentiated only by stylus profile, cantilever material and the wire used to wind the coils.

The new top-of-the-line CAR-60 ($12,995) continues that trend. It uses the same 17-gram generator/body, with its blocky shape, and bolt-on stylus guard (easy to handle, easy to set up) and has the same 10cu compliance, 6-ohm internal impedance and 0.3mV output. It even employs the same Microridge stylus profile and 4N silver coil wire as the CAR-50. So what, you may well ask, justifies doubling the price? It can’t be only the pretty raspberry-red color.

The CAR-60’s one distinguishing feature is all but invisible. This cartridge, like a small number of illustrious predecessors, uses a diamond cantilever. With the sole exception of Dynavector’s DV-17D2, those historical antecedents have all been expensive. Sadly, the high price hasn’t always been matched by similarly high performance, proving yet again that there are no silver bullets in audio. Taking a successful, established design and adding a diamond cantilever is no guarantee of success; more often than not, the end result has been quite the opposite. Thankfully, in this instance, that isn’t the case. The CAR-60 is spectacularly and obviously successful, both sonically and musically. This isn’t simply a case of gilding the lily, adding a bit more detail or sparkle to an existing model. In fact, in some ways it’s quite the opposite. If someone says "diamond," the natural inclination is to think bright and shiny, but diamond tweeters are characterized by their lack of brightness or edge. In many ways that’s exactly what Kuzma has achieved with this cartridge. It’s not about adding extra information or "zip." It’s all about making more of the information you have, tightening the focus, increasing the transparency, concentrating the musical energy and sense of drive.

If you want to get an instant handle on the CAR-60, then voice, piano and bass are pretty much the perfect combination. Joe Jackson’s stripped-back cover of "Eleanor Rigby" (from the Intervention Records release of Jackson’s fabulous live set, Summer in the City [Intervention Records IR-018]) reveals the focussed energy, top-to-bottom continuity and natural presence this cartridge simply exudes. Jackson’s voice can be difficult to get right, but with the Kuzma there’s no tendency to whine or false thinness. Instead, it’s direct and present, solid in space and human in expression and intonation. The impression of chest and lips, diction and pronunciation, is uncannily natural and communicative, really capturing not just the sense of somebody singing, but somebody singing for you. The piano sound is equally convincing, the chords stabbed out by Jackson’s right hand devoid of the hardness, glare or woody coloration that so often infects audio systems. Instead, the notes ring true, with natural attack and no edge. But arguably, the pièce de résistance is Graham Maby’s bass, which is taut and tactile, full and weighty, with the proper texture and decay, propulsive attack, agility and sense of purpose. He plays in perfect lockstep with Jackson -- hardly surprising given that they’ve been working together for over 35 years -- pitch and place perfect on a musical landscape that’s so sparse that any error or deviation would be as musically awkward as it would be obvious.

Moving through the tracks demonstrates just how coherent the CAR-60’s energy spectrum really is. Notes don’t lag or jump at you; irrespective of pitch, the instruments hold stable in space, playing in perfect time. The graceful transitions from "Be My Number Two" to "Home Town" and on into "It’s Different for Girls" are as elegant as they are musically articulate, the changes in pace and key as natural as they are effective. It’s possible to take the absence of edge and overshoot, the natural weight and harmonics as softness or lack of impact. Make that mistake and you may well go searching for something that isn’t -- and shouldn’t be -- there, just because you are used to it. Jack up the VTA and crank up the tracking force and you’ll end up with something that sounds slow, thin and, ironically, lighter in the bass than it is, simply because you’ve killed the attack and lifted the bass energy up the range. That thicker midbass will also rob the cartridge of the delicacy and astonishing articulation that makes it such a communicative transducer. This cartridge isn’t exaggerated or hi-fi spectacular, so don’t expect it to be. Instead, play to its strengths and the musical rewards are considerable.

For once, set up and alignment are a cinch, with a nice visible cantilever and a cartridge body you can really get hold of. What you do need to work on is VTF, which is critical to the overall balance and energy. What you are looking for is the perfect balance of presence and articulation. Just be warned, the sweet spot between too heavy and too light is very narrow indeed. I used the CAR-60 in both the Kuzma 4Point and the VPI JMW 3D 12 Reference tonearms. In the case of the Kuzma, microscopic adjustments in tracking force are simply applied, but with the JMW I was seriously glad for the Soundsmith Counter Intuitive fitted to the 'arm, an accessory I’ve always considered essential, but having set up the CAR-60, has been elevated several steps further up the ladder of importance. When I say that VTF is critical, I’m talking about adjustments of the Did I actually alter it? kind. That might seem obsessive -- until you start to appreciate the results -- but then if you aren’t prepared to go there, you probably shouldn’t be spending this kind of money on a cartridge anyway.

Setting up the CAR-60 isn’t difficult; it just requires care, it will be time-consuming and you have to listen! This is one cartridge where the stylus balance barely even gets you to the ballpark. You need to use your ears to get this baby singing. It may take a while, but when you hit that spot, you’ll know it. What’s going to throw you off if you try to skate on the setup is that the cartridge’s response is itself counterintuitive, losing weight and extension as you increase VTF. When it comes to the CAR-60, quick and dirty simply doesn’t cut it -- and the musical results are going to reflect that all too clearly.

o far I’ve concentrated on how the CAR-60 portrays the elements within the music, but all of this talk of coherence, even energy distribution and natural harmonic decay should have already suggested that where this cartridge excels is in presenting the performance as a single coherent whole. Just as it reveals (and revels in) the intimate musical relationship between Joe Jackson and Graham Maby, so it accurately maps the inner chemistry of other performances.

Karajan doesn’t have the greatest reputation as a conductor of concertos, just as Deutsche Grammophon doesn’t enjoy the greatest reputation for the sound quality of its discs. Yet the combination of Rostropovich and the Berliner Philharmonic performing the Dvorak Cello Concerto [Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft  SLPM 139044] is just too good to let pass, which probably explains why Deutsche Grammophon sold so many copies. Clean early pressings are easy to find and cheap to buy, partly because, all too often, when you play this LP you are rewarded with lumpy bass, screechy strings and fractured phrasing -- unless you have access to a phono stage that offers the Teldec EQ curve, in this instance, a CH Precision (either the P1 phono stage or I1 integrated). Engage the correct curve and the performance pulls together, spatially and tonally, and in terms of timing.

Play it with the Teldec curve and the CAR-60 and the difference is little short of astonishing, the cartridge revealing a totally unexpected level of musical integrity and acoustic coherence in this much-maligned recording. The strings lose that glare and edge, the bass steps up in terms of integration and proportion, the dynamic steps become more definite and more defined, the sense of musical momentum and purpose more emphatic, the phrasing far more expressive. Suddenly this sounds like a great orchestra at the top of its game -- but even that doesn’t prepare you for Rostropovich and the stunning authority and technical mastery of his performance. The rich, natural tonal palette and harmonic development preserved and portrayed by the CAR-60 obviously play their part, but there’s more to it than that. Just as the Teldec curve musically locks things in place, so the CAR-60 reinforces that effect, the shape and proportions, pattern and density of the music, clear, unforced and explicit, qualities that are so important on this piece in particular, with its stepped crescendos and dramatic dynamic contrasts.

How and why does the CAR-60 manage to embody and project this sense of musical integrity? Clearly it’s down to the diamond cantilever, but as always it’s not just what’s been used but how it has been used that counts. The rigidity and energy transfer of the cantilever play their part, but if you are going to drive extra energy and faster dynamics into the generator, you had better make sure that the cartridge body and suspension can handle it -- and not forget the 'arm too. In this case, the low compliance, high mass and sheer mechanical integrity of the CAR-60 will be, quite literally, music to your ears. Between them, they mandate a high-mass, super-stable 'arm that ensures every last vibrational nuance is converted into signal. In this context, Kuzma’s 4Point is the obvious choice, a combination that works superbly, but I’ll admit to some surprise as to just how well the VPI 3D 12 handled the big Kuzma cartridge. Of course, anybody who attended the TAB Analog Setup Seminar at Rocky Mountain Audio Fest last year will have heard the same 'arm sporting a CAR-20 to considerable musical effect, but the CAR-60 places a whole different level of demand on the tonearm, the results achieved a clear indication of not only the quality of the cartridge but just how well the 3D-printed armtube behaves.

Any cartridge that’s this expensive is going to have to do something, at least one thing, that's pretty special to justify its price. For the Lyra Atlas, it’s all about microdynamic discrimination and the sinews in the music; for the Fuuga, it’s about power and momentum -- musical and emotional; and for the Kuzma CAR-60 it’s about time -- the ability to give the music time to happen. You can hear it in the open, uncluttered cut and thrust of the Brandenburgs, but it reaches another level with a singer like Billie Holiday. Listen to Lady Sings The Blues [Clef MGC-721] and a track like "Good Morning Heartache" takes on an effortless, unforced quality, at once intimate and emotive, the graceful phrasing at odds with the familiar pain running through the lyric. The CAR-60 lets you marvel at the delivery, phrasing and diction, but it lets you hear into the arrangement too, allowing you to appreciate the relaxed sense of musical space between the musicians, the space they give that vocal. "Strange Fruit" makes the CAR-60’s sure-footed sense of time and space even more obvious, the cartridge never losing track of the song’s pace and flow, despite the halting lyric, hesitant phrasing and gothic images. The end result is even more powerful and vivid than usual, a stellar turn from the Kuzma cartridge.

Sol Gabetta’s cello transcription of Vivaldi’s "Winter" concerto from the Four Seasons (Il Progetto Vivaldi [RCA 88697131691]) has become something of an audiophile showpiece, with its small-scale acoustic recording, transparency and sheer musical energy. The CAR-60 delivers the opening to this familiar piece with not just a natural sense of space, but also an inevitable feeling of building momentum. The cello entry has greater poise and seems less hurried than it often does, Gabetta managing to master the rapid flurries of notes and tumbling phrases with greater control and grace -- remarkable, given that the part was written for violin. Yet there’s no lack of the energy or attack that is so much a part of Gabetta’s demonstrative style, the almost showy, virtuoso display that led her to make this recording in the first place.

The result is more of a performance and musically more impressive than the simple fireworks display that this piece can so easily become. The shape and order of the piece, the phrasing and interlocking lines, are perfectly preserved, bringing clarity and purpose to the playing and a sense of ensemble that can easily be lost if the cello becomes dominant. That rhythmic clarity is key to appreciating the CAR-60’s musical strengths. This is a cartridge that doesn’t just allow the music time to happen; it keeps time too -- bringing us right back to that solid sense of musical integrity. You hear it in the natural perspective and balanced sense of scale it brings to the Sol Gabetta track, as well as in the articulation in her playing. You hear it in the familiar strains of the Du Pré/Barbirolli Elgar Cello Concerto -- not the EMI original but Warner’s latest box set (five LPs including the previously CD-only Strauss Don Quixote [0190295754747]) although that’s a story for another day.

That ability to bring time and space to performances without diluting their energy or chemistry becomes more apparent the better the orchestra, the tighter the band. Whether it’s Elvis and The Attractions or the Basie Big Band, the fit and finish of the performance are given new polish and power. The delicacy and intimacy of Alison Krauss’s vocals on Forget About It [Diverse Records DIV002 LP] are matched by the sensitivity in the playing, the gorgeous inverted vocal harmonies on the same label’s pressing of Dolly Varden’s superb The Dumbest Magnets [Diverse Records DIV007 LP] are just as captivating. By bringing space and organization to the system, a natural clarity and perspective, the CAR-60 releases more of the artists’ genius, more of their performance, but it does so without hype or fanfare, spotlighting or exaggeration. It just digs deeper and gets you closer.

The bigger the ticket the harder it is to stray from the safe and secure, the established reputation and accepted wisdom. There are other cartridges at this and higher prices that come with a more hallowed history. But if you are serious about spending this kind of money on a moving-coil, if you are serious about your music and you have a serious tonearm to go with it, then the Kuzma CAR-60 is one cartridge that deserves serious consideration. Kuzma might have built its reputation on turntables and tonearms, but its cartridges are catching up so fast they might just overtake.