hmmm this post got kind of interesting. i think somewhere inthere is identification of the room as a huge factor but since the original post was about system goals.... conveyence of the ENERGY of the live experience is the conclusion i've come to. Does the system successfully convey the feeling that the musician wanted to get across?
I think that in order to get to the point of getting the emotional content across there is a baseline minimum of sonic info that needs to be conveyed and then i'm not sure what happens. I retubed my mono blocks with 6550 power tubes, NOS mullard driver tube and NOS inverter tube because it was getting kind of dead sounding; my old tubes were killed. No break in or anything the system rocked. foot tapping, head banging music was everywhere. i jammed for hours
Day 2: replace all the tubes in my pre with NOS mullards including some that were stupid money (i want to compare them with the $25 a pop reissues but i can't bear the possibility that i just spent way too much). Revisited the tangle of cords and interconnects and got that jungle back under control. i heard things i've never heard before. Background singers were more defined, little details everywhere. I had relocated some vibration control under the pre when i put it back on the rack...first listen i could hear that they needed to go back from where they came. Along with the details the sound stage was a tad flattened...i can live with that. But everything got polite. energy dissapated. no head banging, no irrepresable toe tapping just wonderful audiophile sound. kinda boring actually. I'm giving things a while to settle in and then maybe i'm gonna switch tubes again and sacrifice some details for that energy thing. live music ain't polite
