Music first or sound first?

When the sound is right, the music is first. When the sound is off it gets in the way and takes our attention and we find it first.

Last night I happened to listen to Street Corner Talking, and Sticky Fingers.  Street Corner was wonderfully recorded, given it was 53 years ago, and totally engaging still.  Sticky Fingers, while being one of the top 3 Stones recordings (IMHO) is hit and miss, track by track.  Do I love the music?  Absolutely.  Does the sound make it less desirable for me.  Absolutely.   

+1 @wolf_garcia 
 

Nothing beats live music in a good room.  So there’s that too. 

Would have to be music first. I'm perfectly happy working on projects around the shop listening to a cheap Ali-Express bluetooth speaker, but the real magic is when I go to the listening room, sit down, and LISTEN. 

Myself having 40 years in Audio and having owned a Audio store.

I find it distracting and find myself picking apart my system at times and looking to rebuild my system to my standards,  being  semi retired it is not as easy now to buy as frequently as I would like to .for myself $40-$50 k is what I consider a good midrange system by today’s standards,especially since everything went up by 20%+ since covid.