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Are You Happy?

On another currently running post a number of people have commented that the majority of their digital music collection is unlistenable. One person said 90% falls into this category. I don't get it! Have these people purposely assembled systems to make their favorite albums sound bad? Do they sit and audition equipment while thinking to themselves "hey, this is great, I won't be able to listen any of my Rolling Stones, but wow does it sound good." Why would someone do this to themselves?

As audiophile we are all a little crazy, but these people, IMHO, have gone one step beyond. Please help me to understand what's going on?
onhwy61
tubegroover
2,320 posts
 
Artemus - my condolences to you for your tastes in wine, "sorry couldn't resist". Speaking of wine or any alcoholic beverage for that matter can't improve on a really compressed bright digital recording. I don't know of any recording studio that did it worse than Motown. Sound quality certainly wasn't a criteria, but I sure do love a lot of this music, part of my formulative teen years.

Just got a CD of the Four Tops recently and really in truly will not listen to it again on my system. It just makes my ears ring. It is without a doubt the lousiest recording in my collection. Ah I might listen again but the volume will be very low. Usually a bad recording doesn't bother me too much if I love the music.
seandtaylor99
1,262 posts
 
I have about $3000 in hardware and a similar amount in software. I'd say 80% sounds good, 10% sounds amazing and 5% not so good and 5% unlistenable.

For once I'm glad I don't have more money. Sounds like it makes people really unhappy with their systems. This seems to spill over into the threads on Agon.
onhwy61's avatar
onhwy61 OP
5,327 posts
 
What got me started on this thread were comments elsewhere by Twl and Justacoder. I appreciate the fact that they chose to respond. I hope they didn't take my comments as personal attacks, since that was not my intent. I was merely trying to learn and encourage civil conversation.

I am an equipment junkie (yes, the first step is to admit you have a problem) and I get pleasure from configuring and endlessly reconfiguring my music system. However, the enjoyment of music trumps any equipment related considerations. In the past there have been times when I probably lost sight of this truth, but an incident two years ago got me back on track. I heard a 1931 recording of "Stardust" by Louis Armstrong. It's the most amazing piece of music I ever heard, yet it has absolutely zero audiophile content. It's bandwidth limited, filled with crackles, mono, numerous crackles etc. I've come to the conclusion that great music makes everything else irrelevant.

BTW, for those recordings that are overly bright I use a digital equalizer. There's really nothing you can do about over compression.
kthomas
911 posts
 
Seandtaylor99 - I agree with your percentages - that's exactly how I'd break down my CD collection. There are definitely CD's I'll never put on again, but it's a small %.

I disagree that alcohol can't improve a bright, overly-compressed recording. If it changes your mood, lightens you up, and gets you to take the focus off the recording and put it back onto the music, it has "improved" the recording. Drink enough, you might get out of the sweet spot and dance around the room :-)

artemus_5's avatar
artemus_5
1,994 posts
 
Twl & Tube> Definitly tongue in cheek. Just remembrances of a misspent youth. Concerning poor recordings, I was truely let down the other day when a friend brought over a cd of The Righteous Bros. Best Of. I love Unchained Melody but this was terribly bright. Quite a let down
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