Rock and Roll Snobbery

Good post, Jim. I often have very musical experiences with poor to middling stereos, even sometimes with my girlfriend's dreaded Bose Acoustimass, and certainly in the car. The sound gets out of the way, and I hear the musical line, the gestalt of the song or whatever, if you will. And then I scratch my head and wonder WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING with the home system. :-)

It is like "ceteris paribus, music reproduced by better equipments is more enjoyable." :) And, that everything encompasses a lot of things (too many to list). With that in mind, I stopped being a true audiophile (not too long for the audiophile career anyway). This certainly is not an attack on people with different philosophies. I redirect that money into guitars and various related gadgets anyway -- a similar path in a slightly different hobby.

There are two primary reasons for the use of compressors in producing rock/pop music. The first use was mentioned earlier by Phild. Compression is used to limit the dynamic range of music so that the average recording level can be raised to produce louder volume levels. Right or wrong, there are strong economic pressures upon artist to produce loud music. The second use is actually more prevalent. Compression sounds good on rock/pop music. Properly used, compression give rhythm oriented music a wonderful crunchy sound with good body. Compression can tighten a groove. Listen to the early Kinks "All Day & All of the Night" or virtually any period Led Zeppelin. Unfortuantely, some engineers are over doing the use of compressors and too much compression can take the life out of music. Like most things in life, a little moderation is a good thing.