The Atlantic Magazine

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“They turn music into fire and back into music again,” Blackie Pagano says, quoting The Cramps’ Lux Interior on vacuum tube amplifiers. Pagano, who has spent his life dismantling and restoring gadgets, describes his work in this short documentary from New Yorkers. His client list, available on his website, includes everyone from David Bowie to the Jonas Brothers. However, the celebrity clientele “does NOT mean I am rich, snotty, over-priced, or inaccessible,” Pagano says. “Most clients are working or practicing musicians or audiophiles.”