My sacrilegeous question to audiophiles out there regarding parametric equalizer.

I especially like your blanket recommendation to just get some vintage small signal tubes and you wont need tone controls (thats exactly what they are). How do you know this? How do you know what sound the OP is looking for? What do you know about his room? Is it treated? How are his speakers are set up? Where Is his listening position in the room? Poor first reflections or standing bass modes (if this is the case) will not be solved by your magic tubes.

YOU need to go back and read; what I said was if you get good tubes you won't need an equalizer, not tone controls. All your other manic questions are irrelevant to what the OP asked about. I have no idea what his room is or what sound he's looking for. Do you always micro analyze what someone says? Do you like bananas? Do you always obey the speed limit? Do you understand? What did you have for breakfast yesterday? Did it sound good? Hilarious 

Only someone who is not an audiophile would ask such a question. Do you want to hear the band, or do you want to be in the band? Maybe the bass drums not loud enough; "Think I'll just turn it up a bit". "I do not like the tone and timbre of that clarinet, let me tweak it a bit; now that sounds just right".

Oh, the marvelous things one can do with an equalizer.

I have a 5 Band PEQ in my RME ADI-2 DAC. Very useful in fine tuning my sound.

@orpheus10 .. so does using an equalizer automatically make some not an audiophile? At the end isn’t it all about enjoyment?

@tubelvr1

I see you received the typical assortment of comments, mostly from the "real audiophiles" out there. I’d say, you are the one that wants some changes and so I’d do just that. Don’t listen to all the naysayers, you are not playing music for them, you are playing it for yourself. Be happy however you do it.

Full disclosure: I’ve had a number of graphic EQs over the years. But haven’t had one for 12-13 years. I recently bought a new system and it has no tone controls but the system it replaced did have them and I used them often. And to tell you the truth, occasionally I wish I had them now. Playing music is supposed to make you happy so play it however and with whatever gear you want. Cheers