Good vs. Bad Recordings...???

[tmazz]

You have touched upon the issue in a completely different way than I would've ever thought of by myself and think the completely different tact you've taken here is great.  

One of the great benefits of hanging out here. There is always someone available to put a different spin on things and get you thinking.  

[StereoNut]

You have touched upon the issue in a completely different way than I would've ever thought of by myself and think the completely different tact you've taken here is great. 

One of the great benefits of hanging out here. Here is always someone available to put a different spin on things and get you thinking. 

Just noticed this now.  "tact = tack."  Sorry! 

[tmazz]

Wow Rich, that was an interesting (and comprehensive) thought piece.

Just for the record (ha ha) Bill came over for a "playdate" last night and in addition to listening to music, we spent a good amount of time discussing this. I think that Bill's original direction  got sidetracked a bit (not that this is a bad thing because it turned into a great discussion. Based on what we talked about last night I think the original problem was more what do you do about  a piece of great music that is just not up to par sonically. Most of us grew up in a time when audio equipment was no where near as good as it is today and got attached to music that didn't sound that "offensive" on the low-fi systems of yesteryear, but has all of its warts exposed on a modern system. My solution has been to just not play those things on the main system and try to find another way to enjoy then (car ipod or only listening to them when I have a cold and my ears are clogged.) Let's face it there are simply recordings out there that are sonic stinkers and we just have to deal with that

The key is you just have to get past listening to sound and back into listening to music. Listening to sound is a necessary part of this hobby, but it has its time and place. You need to listen to sound to do equipment selection and system setup. But all to often we get stuck in that sound listening mode and fail to enjoy the music for what it is. When I first got involved in the AudioSyndrome we had a number of older members who basically built all of their gear from scratch because there was nothing on the market at the time that would do what they needed (this was during the years that the aerospace industry was in full swing and Long Island was flush with engineers and technical types.) They were not interested in impressing anyone but themselves. and they did it all as a way to more fully enjoy the music. To them the system was a means to and end, not the end itself.I was very fortunate to mentored by some of these Hi-Fi veterans. One of them had a saying that I thought was a great philosophy. He used to tell us that you are not a "real" audiophile unless the value of you record collection exceeded the value of your hardware. While his verbiage may be a little extreme the pint is a valid on. If you spend more time obsessing with the mechanics of your system than you do enjoying music o through it, you are kind of missing the boat. While I have many discussions about this  philosophy during my journey through this hobby, your post is the first time that I have ever heard a discussion of why we stray from it. Nice job. 

[StereoNut]

Maybe this is the answer...???

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aM9LJuRHshs&feature=related

http://www.soundwagon.jp/

 

[mdconnelly]

There was a time years back where I started 'labeling' my best sounding CDs with a little green dot on the edge so that when I needed my 'fix' I could quickly find a CD that could provide it.   I did something similar by placing all of my 'audiophile' LPs in a different location from the rest.  In looking back, however, I've discovered that I all too often tagged what sounded best on my system rather than what music I personally liked best.  

So I can totally relate to this thread and Rich's rant!   For me, there is the audiophile 'fix' where I want my system to sound as good as it possibly can, and there is the musical 'fix' where I totally and completely want to get lost in the musical event.   This hobby all too often takes us down that first rabbit hole.  But personally, I find that it's the musical fix that stimulates far more fulfilling brain chemistry.

[StereoNut]

For me, there is the audiophile 'fix' where I want my system to sound as good as it possibly can, and there is the musical 'fix' where I totally and completely want to get lost in the musical event.

It's nice to hear (pardon the pun) that you understand and have experienced my dilemma here, Mike.

I'll be the first one to admit that I own a number of "audiophile recordings" because they are just that.  They may all be great recordings, but not all of them are great music too.  Yes, I will use some of these ("audiophile recordings") as "Test Records" for evaluating changes or tweaks to my system, but they're not my first choice in listening for the sake of the music itself.  Then there are some that are truly gems in one's collection, that satisfy the need for both "audiophile sound" and great music.  The problem is that these recordings are usually the exception to the rule.

What I still can't "wrap my head around" is why the two "fixes" you mention above have to be mutually exclusive events...??? 

Bill

[BobM]

The old Jazz at the Pawnshop syndrome. Great sound, mediocre music. How many of us have that lying around and haven;t listened to it in years. I bet if we all preened our music collection just down to the things we actually listen to and love the CD and vinyl racks would not be warping under the weight anymore, and our nervosa would shrink like a pee-pee in cold water. 

It's all about the music, lest we forget. So if the music isn't being served properly then you might be an "equipmanist". You might be an equipmanist if ...

- you only buy music that "sounds good"
- you bought something because it cost more than what you had, not because it sounded better
- you drool over the Stereophile equipment guide, and save those particular back issues
- etc.

[JLM]

The desert island dilemma:  If you could only choose between super system that only a handful of recordings sounded good on or a medicore system with a big collection that sounded good, which would you choose?  Seems like you've got the super system, congrats.   

The devil is in the details, in this case too much detail (resolution). 

I'm an engineer, so my day is all about numbers.  Hell I dream in numbers and geometry.  So when I retire to the mancave, its to relax the analytical side.  Some systems (Lowthers come to mind) are hyper detailed.  I don't want to know what the vocalist had for breakfast or how much lint is in their belly button.  Those systems "force" me into analytical mode where I came to listen for the emotive affect. 

After decades I've found that improved imaging provides a "natural" sort of resolution that doesn't overload detail, but provides better focus (like a new prescription for your glasses).  Objects may appear smaller, but sharper/clearer.  I also find this sort of system to be less fatiguing as my brain isn't working as hard to "make sense" out of what I'm hearing. 

[mdconnelly]

"Equipmanist"!  Great term that I have often resembled! 

Less so now on the equipment front perhaps because I'm extremely happy with where my system is now.   But I am quite guilty of seeking out particularly well recorded music and definitely appreciate the music reviews of TAS and Stereophile because they rate the sonics as well as the music.  Yet - it still must be music that emotionally engages me - and that's true whether I'm listening on my main system, or in the car, or soaking in the tub with earbuds. 


   

[Regg]

Classic Rock recordings--where SQ is literally all over the place--have always been the most troublesome for me. Various pressings of the same album on vinyl can sound vastly different, and the 'audiophile' pressing isn't always the best choice. The various reissues in the digital realm aren't that much easier to sort through either, especially for the more popular titles.

http://www.pinkfloydarchives.com/Articles/DSOTMCDM.htm

Dark Side of the Moon may have cycled through nearly a dozen masterings since it first appeared on CeeDee in the early eighties. I've heard about four or five of these, and they all sound different--as do the various reissues of even lesser known titles from that era--mostly because of EQ choices, but also due to tape selection, and in some examples I've heard, possibly because Dolby A was misaligned.

Hard to say if the latest remaster will always be the best choice, but if it's been brickwalled,  jacked up and tweezed out to sound all sparkly and 'modern'...maybe not.

[richidoo]

I remember discussing this with miklorsmith here on AN. He wanted a lower resolution preamp and I didn't understand that. He was on the way down, I was still on the way up, thinking more resolution was always better. I had to go through it myself in order to understand the double edged sword of resolution and high end playback. If your system exceeds the quality of the creators' of the music you are asking for trouble. 

Bill, there are all kinds of ways to add in some euphonic distortion to your system that will let you keep the low noise floor you have gained with the AMDs, and still cover up nonlinear shit under the lousy recordings with linear lovely sounding distortion. You dredge out the mud in the noise floor of the system, then you fill it back in with chocolate fudge. The fudge is not perfect original signal but it sounds beautiful and covers up what's annoying in a controlled enjoyable way. You can have vanilla creme or strawberry gelato if you prefer...

I'm talking about signal tubes, paper or plastic drivers, transformers or chokes in the signal path, (I won't say vinyl but I'm thinking it ) things that everyone loves the sound of them but not because they are low distortion. Magnetic hysteresis (3rd order harmonic) is universally loved distortion and it's in transformers coils, pickups, voice coils, tape. Maybe a 1:1 "isolation" transformer from Jensen would be enough, or a tube buffer, "warm" ICs, or something like that. Even better would be something easy to bypass so you can get the full dose of your Mapletree and Chesky type CDs. But I think you would enjoy those just as well with the sweetner in place. The linear distortion would smear the non linear distortion on the bad recordings just enough to make them sound lovely too, but not enough to ruin the edge of the perfect recordings. Nothing will fix the soundstaging issues, except getting out of the sweet spot.

I don't think there is anything wrong with resolution itself. When you think about it, real life sounds are infinite resolution, and sound pretty good! I do think that the more revealing the system is, the easier it is to hear the subtlest distortions in the gear and tracks. These are harder and harder to eliminate with increasing resolution you get when you remove distortions. This is what makes the price of exotic gear climb so high. Dimishing returns. You can never fix the recording quality though. Few recordists are as obsessive as audiophiles. So if you have a very low distortion system, eventually you need something to mask that for the recordings that aren't pristine. I think most audiophiles don't have this problem because budget "high end" gear has enough distortion still in there to not make classic recordings sound bad. Brands like Lamm and AR balance resolution and distortion nicely, but they are not budget parts.

It is possible to get unhooked from detail. I listen to midfi speakers and Pandora, and enjoy it just fine, for now... You can never forget the memories made under the influence of dopamine, it marks peak experiences as "read only." So better speakers are coming.

[Barry (NJ)]

P.S. - I have witnessed (heard) what the effects of correct polarity can be at your place, but I unfortunately don't have the availability to do that with my system. 

You can't swap the positive and negative wires at the speaker terminals 

[JLM]

When you think about how ultra close recordings are miked, its little wonder how (with the right equipment) we can hear more (exagerated) than live. 

[mdconnelly]

Of late, I have been dwelling on much of what this thread is about...  about getting back to the music and away from the critical analytics of this hobby - or at least how to best balance the two.  One of the things that have helped me in this direction has been none other than Triode Pete's power cords.  I find that they are all about PRAT and musical engagement and very little about the myriad of analytical terms often used to describe the effect of wire.

Don't throw anything at me just yet ... while I realize that this smells very much of BobM's 'equipmanist' mindset, I also think it is very much in line with Rich's comments on resolution exceeding the quality of the recording and what it takes to balance that.  Can power cords help with this?  Sure.  Is it just me rationalizing yet another purchase - this time a bunch of power cords?  Hmmm...   perhaps. But...

Most of us would fully agree that power cords can make a difference, right?  So if one cord creates blacker blacks, tighter bass and extended highs and the other gets you up dancing on the strum of the first chord, which would you prefer?  Think about that... it's actually a tough question to answer.  At least, it has been for me.  And... it is not restricted to power cords.  These are two somewhat different roads to travel in this hobby.  How often have we really asked ourselves this question as we listen to various and sundry gear?  

[richidoo]

I had to choose between two speaker cables with those characteristics, one was very dancy, sunny warm ring, the other silent and clear.  I went with the silent one, but I still enjoy hearing the dancy SCs when I can on friends' systems.

I evaluate tough choices like that by noticing how much I listen over a longer period. Do I sit there and get into the music, or am I reading or thinking about other things? Whether I actually crave listening or if I have to "make an appointment" to remember to do it tells me how inviting the system is and if i need to change something, or go back to when it was more inviting. Also how good you feel after a long listen is a good clue.

In your case the 20A inlet makes borrowing cords to try out kinda difficult at least on the amp.