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Do you agree with John Atkinson (and me)?

 

Point 1: In the recent thread entitled ’How much is too much to spend on a system?’, I contributed this comment: "The hi-fi shouldn’t be worth more than one’s music library." I said that half-jokingly, a wisecrack that I knew might be disagreed with.

Point 2: In the 1990’s I became a regular customer at the Tower Records Classical Music Annex store in Sherman Oaks, California. The store manager knew a LOT about Classical music, but also made no secret of his distain for audiophiles, whom he viewed as caring more about the sound quality of recordings than their musical quality.

Point 3: In the early days of The Absolute Sound magazine, the writers occasionally mocked audiophiles who had a serious high end system, but whose record collections merely consisted of a small number of "demo" discs. Those audiophiles collect records that make their systems sound good, rather than assemble a system that makes their records sound good.

 

I make the above points as a preamble to the following:

In the past few months I have fallen behind in my reading of the monthly issues of Stereophile that arrive in my mailbox. Yesterday I finally got around to reading the editorial in the January issue, written by John Atkinson (filling in for current editor Jim Austin, who is recuperating from surgery, I believe). The final two paragraphs of the editorial read as follows:

 

"Back in the day, I did an analysis of Stereophile reviewers’ systems. The common factor was that all the reviewers’ collections of LPs and CDs cost a lot more than their systems. The same is true of me, even in these days of streaming."

"Isn’t that the way it should be for all music-loving audiophiles?"

 

Well, is it?

 

bdp24
jl35
4,136 posts
 

It is kind of an appalling judgment about people and their situations that you know nothing about...and the idea that streaming doesn't affect the equation ???

mdalton's avatar
mdalton
523 posts
 

Here’s another way of thinking about the issue.  I catalog the jazz lp section of my 750 lp collection on Discogs.  According to Discogs, my 395 lp jazz collection is worth about $10k.  So let’s assume my total collection is worth about $15k.  That’s a decent amount invested, imho.  I also have about $100k invested in my 3 main systems.  But according to the music lover vs. audiophile paradigm, I’d be more of a music lover if I’d only spent $5k on a system.  This is an obvious logical fallacy.

sns
3,570 posts
 

Judging people based on the value of their music collections is a rather appalling prospect. Perhaps some skrimp and save just to have a mid grade audio system, not much left over for vinyl and cd acquisitions. These people don't have enough disposable income to continue to acquire more equipment or hard copy, system and music values are static. This just one example of making bad value judgements. Judging people by comparing values of equipment/music collections no matter the level of expenditure is pointless. Personally, I've never made any value judgements as to what media people use to listen to music or the amount of their expenditures on equipment or music. This may say something about the size of their bank accounts, but as to any readings of principles, ethos, etc, total nonsense.

bdp24's avatar
bdp24 OP
10,088 posts
 

 

A lot of the "Vinyl Community" posters on YouTube (they refer to themselves as members of the VC, the younger members undoubtedly unaware that those initials were also used when referring to the Viet Cong) mention how many LP’s they own. I’ve never counted mine, as I feel it is the quality of the collection that matters, not it’s size. That brings to mind the old Blues song "It Ain’t The Meat It’s The Motion".wink Maria Muldaur included her recording of the song on her second album, Waitress In A Donut shop (it’s in my collection).

 

bdp24's avatar
bdp24 OP
10,088 posts
 

 

@noromance: Lasagna, my all-time favorite meal, bar none. I do some cooking, but lasagna from scratch is above my abilities. The frozen Michael Angelo's I get at my supermarket is pretty darn good.

 

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