If we look back in time, there certainly has been a shift in the ideology of the recording process. In the old days, recording was about just that recording. The final sound developments basically came from the instruments themselves. The concept of simply getting a natural or more "real" reproduction of that recording was the highest ideal.
Once the 60's arrived, musicians started manipulating the sound of the acoustic instruments not only with "The Electric" instrument, but then with the amplifier and finally adding effect pedals and so forth.
The next evolution was to then manipulate the recording even further in the mixing room, all in the name of "for the good of the art". This of course has now become common place for the majority of commercial releases. Finally we arrived at playback units that are manipulating the sound and this is now standard protocol for the digital age, and "digital" is the ultimate manipulation back and forth between digits and analog converters, sampling and bit rates and other (dare I say it, lol) nonsense.
Love it or hate it.
I suppose many feel that all this has gone too far, and now we have things like Apple's "Garage Band" where our youth culture is making music without real instruments, just using samples to be tracked virtually. This is nothing really new and started way back with things like the mellotron synth, and I think there was a predecessor to that also using analog samples.
If you think the studio is a legitimate venue for artistic manipulation and should be justifiably linked to the musical creative process, there is little arguing that the digital age is truly the pipe dream of the 1960's.
I would argue that manipulation comes with a sonic cost. As soon as you start manipulating, you start loosing what is natural. Although adding compression and reverb and so forth has it's glittering audio spectacle, it is leaving the world of reality.
As much as some might love a gorgeously produced rock album like Steely Dan's "Asia", there's a lot of manipulation going on there as well. Certainly a textbook use of compression to get everything smoothly into the sonic teacup. Not an easy task I might add.
This is why many audiophiles are likely to gravitate toward Jazz and Classical music where "honestly" is promoted more than would be found in the rock world or post rock recordings.
Having some kind of benchmark for natural is the easiest way to evaluate your stereo system.. hence "The Stereophile"
How can you really know where "truth" is if you are only listening to heavily produced or over produced recordings.
What can be the true point of reference for "dance remix #35?"
Getting back to the point of this thread, where are the real recordings? and can someone do it again the right way? and if so, is there a substantial enough market out there to support it to rationalize the initial investment? Or does it simply become an act of audiophile philanthropy?
How much longer before it is too late? and knowledge becomes lost on how to manufacture tape machines and so forth?
