Listener fatigue: what does it really mean?

B, nice. I've got a serious thing for lady singers (I know, not the preferred
nomenclature). Trying to think who can hold a candle to Trixie. Tanya
Donnelly, pre-Belly, the track Not Too Soon from Throwing Muses, with her
her screeching like a cat, is near-orgasmic. Early Heather Nova, especially
the live stuff, before she went all silly, is pretty fine. Jess King, her first
album, has one track on it that is devine (I Believe in Angles) -- thought I
fear you won't be able to find it anywhere. Had a real soft spot for Fiona
Apple's first album, before she went right the hell off the wheels. More
recently, working on the start of a thing for She Keeps Bees, but it hasn't
really taken hold yet. Sandra O and a couple of tracks from Yea, Yea, Yeas
are top notch. Don't love all of it, but when she's on, she smoulders
something fierce. (Watch the video for Maps off of their first album. I
challenge you not to love it.) Margot Timmons, of course. Not every time,
but when it's on, it's the very definition of an irresistible slow burn. Oh, and
apologies for totally hijacking your thread...;-)

IMHO, one of the reasons for the listener fatigue is from a physical energy of sound. The sound has a physical energy and sonic energy. The p energy is what pushing the sound away from the speaker. We hear the S energy pushed from the P energy. What we want to listen is the S energy. Not P energy! For example, the beginner golfers hit a lot of slice balls. This slice ball flies straight at the beginning of the flight of the ball. The golf ball starts go to side way after hitting and pushing energy from the golf club (P energy) dissipated and weakened. P energy is forceful energy from an object and they hurt human ears like a sonic boom. S energy is a natural movement of the sound. The unbalance of P energy from the tweeter and the woofer causes discomfort and fatigue to your ears and brain. The unbalance of S energy will generate just tasteless of music sound. ***A sonic boom is the sound associated with the shock waves created by an object traveling through the air faster than the speed of sound.(from Wikipedia.com)

The bright sounding speakers are OK. I love shimmering, sweet, dazzling, and splendid high frequency as long as P energy between the tweeter and the woofer is balanced. I enjoy the bright S energy, but I don’t want the P energy from tweeter. We control the S energy with the volume level. If the P energy of the tweeter on any speaker can be controlled, we can easily make a musical sound system.

Some tweeters equip a plastic or metal cover to control P energy. The side effects are loosing a big portion of S energy and whirling turbulence of sound waves. We can’t get musical satisfaction from thin and diffused sounds. These speakers with a cover sound usually not musical. If they are musical, that’s from woofer. Not the tweeter. How musical can they be without the high freq? Mediocre at their best. The woofer and tweeter on the speaker should be P energy adjustable without loosing S energy. So, this hobby/passion for hi-end music could be little easier.

The physical energy is very easy to control. P energy dissipates after hit an object while S energy bounces. Simple! We need a sound wave guide that kills/reduces P energy and bounces S energy to a listener.

Just my 2 cents.

Mihorn,

That's a unique way of breaking things down that I had not heard or thought of before applied to home audio. I have some background in geology (though it s been awhile) and the concept of P and S waves as they relate to seismic waves rings a bell.

Are you a seismologist?

It's an interesting perspective on sound that at first take rings true to me.

I also agree with Mihorn - loud volume itself has a physical impact on the listener. I experience it every day on stage at work, though it does help somehow to be causing some of it as well, blowing back at it, if you will. This is definitely a contributing factor to listener fatigue, if one plays one's home system too loudly.

If one follows some of the principles of Feng Shui, the ancient art of organization and energy control, you know, things like getting rid of old newspapers and old magazines and books, he should notice an audible decrease of distortion, especially when the volume is turned up. The distortion I'm referring to when the volume is turned up has nothing whatsoever to do with amplifier clipping, nothing so mundane, but everything to do with information fields, Audio's dirty little secret.