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High End is Dead?

Browsing used audio sites such as Audiogon and the Marts, high end gear ads are dominated by several dealers. Non-dealer ads are usually people trying to push 15+ year old off-brand junk at 60-70% of MSRP (when they were new). They don't sell anything. You could slash Wilsons, Magicos, etc, 50% off retail and no one will buy them.

No one buys if it costs more than 1k. It's not that they're not interested -- the ads get plenty of views. It's that the asking prices are just way over the ability of buyers to pay. Fact is, if you see a high end piece for sale it's probably by a dealer, often times trying to push it at 15% off retail because its a trade in, but also often they are taking a good chunk off the price 30, 40 sometimes 50% off. They can be famous brands with a million positive reviews. No buyers.

Are we just poor, and that's all there is to it? 
madavid0
michaelgreenaudio's avatar
michaelgreenaudio
1,019 posts
 


60’s-80’s HEA was very much in the mainstream. The market was progressively balance top to entry level. Marantz, Mac, Pioneer, Technics, AR, Advent, Hitachi, JVC, Klipsch, Altec Lansing, Quad and several hundred other brands, all being part of a united audiophile world. It’s when the Stereophile type Magazines teamed up with cottage industry manufacturers, that the divide began to take place and the Stereophile & TAS club separated itself from the mainstream. For those of us who lived through it, the sides taking was very clear (Harry & J Gordon never denied this). The formative brands of home audio were pushed aside with these 100,000-250,000 listeners being told they (mainstream brands) were now inferior to the smaller bench based companies. Of course it wasn’t true, but the magazines found their market and the split happened. So the millions of clients that were shared before, went on their marry way while the HEA success would eventually fade with age. And that’s exactly what has happened. It’s not a bad thing, it’s just reality. When HEA removed itself from the mainstream, within a couple of years the HEA started to decline. Everyone could see it here in Vegas when we were at the Convention center and Sahara. As soon as that location split happened further away from the convention center the crowd size was cut 75% that very first year. It was like the new blood vanished, and excuses started being made from then on, plus false growth.

it’s like this

Walk up to someone on the street and say do you know who Toyota and Lexus is, and they will tell you of course. Now ask that same person if they know who Sony and Rogue Audio (just using you guys as a name example, you make great products). They’re going to know Sony, but will say "who is Rogue". HEA took itself out of the mainstream, and from that moment forward limited itself to a smaller crowd, with a few of the companies breaking through, but most of the HEA brands we see at these trade shows are never going to grow beyond that because they have no sustaining interest built up. And as I said earlier now that they have all but left the main CEA (CES) arena it will even be harder for the HEA to be noticed.

Don’t get me wrong, the audiophile world is exploding with hobbyist including in home listening clients. They are just still so so about the HEA or don’t even know it exist. I don’t see how that can grow if all there is is HEA trade shows and not tied to the innovative electronic shows. Plus, picture younger home entertainment buffs looking at gigantic amps sitting in the middle of their living rooms. There might be a thousand or two of these guys out there, but that’s about it.

The home entertainment hobby is changing and it is exciting to be a part of it, but it is quickly taking on a new face.

nkoner, I would say your chart is pretty much on the money

And as Geoff says "Coming back down to reality" that’s what I see as well. Where ever that reality ends up at, I don’t see it being what we saw 15 years ago in HEA with these super complicated systems that only provided one sound. Music is far more variable than a guy sitting there with a huge system with simply a volume control to get them to accurate sound.

If I wasn't going to use my room and system as a tuning device, why wouldn't I go with headphones? The whole idea is to use your in room system as a tool to dial in the conditions of the recording. Where HEA lost this is and always has been very strange to me. If I was only going to go as far as plug & play I'd be using my cans.

Michael Green

www.michaelgreenaudio.net

ghasley
2,502 posts
 
@audiopoint VERY well said. I would add that the next generation of music consumers may have no desire to have multiple racks of gear in a dedicated listening room shut off to the world. A multi box shrine with its sundry rituals to some aspiriation that no one else aspires to can get pretty lonely. There are likely stamp collectors sitting in some dusty, lonely room wondering why no one shares their passion, buggy whip collectors are likely feeling it too! But using these same paralells, the eccentric stamp collector is likely mourning that this new generation has lost its desire to send communiques when in fact, there are new ways to communicate. Buggy whip collectors mourn the apparent lack of desire for propulsion by the new generation when in fact there are new ways to motivate propulsion.

Humans find new and more efficient methods to accomplish their goals. Are they always better? It depends on whats important to you and what you value. Is it the trip or the destination? Many felt the world came to an end when the great transoceanic ships were being displaced by air travel. They assumed incorrectly that everyone thought the important part of the exercise was the journey and for others it was the destination. Do you use your gear to listen to music or is music the necessary component so you may listen to and play with your gear?!?!?

Music will always be consumed by man, it just might not be consumed by a solitary old white guy closed off in a converted garage (while his ‘88 Camry bakes outside with peeling paint) with padded walls debating electronically with distant strangers the merits of a blue fuse or a black fuse in the power supply to the power supply of their turntable motor. If this statement hits too close to home then you might consider getting up out of your specially crafted chair that is both comfortable and yet not so absorptive as to damage the soundstage of that 1958 recording bootlegged out of that acoustically challenged lower Manhattan basement club of a heroin addicted clarinetist playing the 100th version of some show tune. The sun is probably shining outside and there is an amazing hike waiting just for you! There are new friends to make and socialize with and dine with and share the joys of life and music will likely be a part of some of that experience. The multi box shrine will be there when you get back.
michaelgreenaudio's avatar
michaelgreenaudio
1,019 posts
 

Hi ghasley

"A multi box shrine with its sundry rituals to some aspiriation that no one else aspires to can get pretty lonely."

I have heard people say this before in HEA, but I've never personally experienced the lonely side. Maybe it's just me and the friends I attract or am attracted to. I have never hung out with people who didn't do music, or who didn't have these cool listening rooms. Whether it be a recording studio or playback room. I don't see how this could ever get boring, lonely or anything but exciting. In fact we go so long it runs into the next day many times.

I'm an artistic type and have always been around folks who couldn't wait to get to their listening room. Last night for example, four of us were sitting down in our outside common talking about what we were going to be listening to later. When we were done gossiping I'm pretty sure we were all grooving on our choices for the evening. I know downstairs was cause he was vibrating my floor :)

How can music ever get lonely, one? And what's wrong with wanting to do nothing but music? HEA audiophiles many times sound like listening to music is a chore. I don't think I have had one day in my life where I have ever felt that way.

Michael Green

www.michaelgreenaudio.net

ghasley
2,502 posts
 
@michaelgreenaudio

I agree with everything you’ve said and the reason is its the music that moves you and your crew. Thats cool. It also sounds like you live around others who share the passion and thats really cool.

You also have to admit that the extreme stereotype I was describing exists in the wild. When I lived in Southern California, I would occasionally swing by a dealer’s shop who will remain nameless. He or she(yeah right) would encourage people to bring their own music. How many (insert the stereotype of your choice) different high end enthusiasts does it take to figure out that the various nuances of a Diana Krall album where you can hear her breathe between phrases or the merits of the various pressings of Kind of Blue are not too relevant to most people. LOL

I recently visited a shop owned and operated by some 30 something bearded, workshirt wearing dudes spinning some vinyl by the Avett Brothers and there was plenty of craft beer being consumed and the conversation among the people, of both sexes, was off the hook. Now Im 55 years old, but I can easily pass for 52! It was inclusive and lively. There were tubes and solid state harmoneously living together like we could only dream of for the Middle East. No fuse talk, no cable talk, just music, humanity and fun. Not one of them was bemoaning the end of HEA, they were enjoying HEA but were doing so differently than their parents. Its no different than any other time in history, each generation believes the old rules don’t apply to them and they are right.
teo_audio
2,197 posts
 
So it's not dead, it's just ... pining for the fjords.
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