I’m as obsessed with the
Quest for the Absolute Sound as anyone else on this site (well, almost anyone;
that’s not an accolade I aspire to anyway). But I’m almost as often troubled by
my own obsession as I am gratified by it. I’ve never been what used to be
called a gadget freak; just as I use computers as tools for research and
writing, not as ends in themselves, for most of my life stereo equipment has
been a means to the end of listening to the music I love. But now that I can
finally afford really good equipment—things I’ve lusted after since college,
more than 40 years ago—I’m dismayed at the extent to which my love of music
has morphed into a love of music reproduction. So this little rant is a
chance to vent frustration, and to see if there are others out there who may
feel the same way. The rant takes a specific form: a book review.
Robert Harley’s The
Complete Guide to High-End Audio has been praised on this forum as a kind
of bible for audiophiles. It’s certainly as massive a tome at the Bible. And,
depending on your religious views, it is perhaps almost as full of Revealed
Truth or tendentious myth (take your pick). Moreover, I’ll concede that Mr.
Harley frequently reminds us, after going into great detail about some aspect
of music reproduction technology, that the last thing the reader should do when
listening is to focus on the details he’s just described—that we’re all in it
for the music, not for the equipment. Yes, he says this frequently (he says
everything frequently). And yet…
The book, in its Fourth
Edition, is 529 pages long (the Table of Contents alone is 9 pages long).
They’re big pages, too. Some of them—for the most part, the best of them, in my
opinion—are “technical,” explaining the theory of acoustics, “Sound and
Hearing,” basic facts about the physics of electricity, and so forth. Harley
writes clearly, but evidently has a mind that is organized like the
architecture of a Gothic cathedral, displaying the analytical excesses and
mania for hierarchies of Medieval Scholasticism. Like a lawyer, Harley seems to
think that every particular detail must be made explicit, even in situations
where symmetry (e.g., left and right speaker terminals) make half of those
specifics clear without actually specifying them. This habit gives very little
credit to the reader’s intelligence and makes Harley’s prose tedious. There are
chapters (each with multiple sub-headings) on Choosing a System; Preamps, Power
amps and Integrated amps; Speakers; Disc Players, Transports and DACs; Music
Servers; Turntables, Tonearms and Cartridges; Tuners and various kinds of
internet radio; Cables and Interconnects; Home Theater; Multichannel Audio;
Setup “Secrets” (in two separate chapters, one of these covering “Audiophile
Accessories”—i.e., tweaks); Specifications and Measurements—and, of course,
Appendices (A-C) on various topics not, presumably, already covered. Need I say
that there’s also a Glossary? Harley leaves no stone unturned. And yet…
I find the book
exasperating, and a manifestation of many of the problems with audiophilia in
general that lead music lovers down rabbit holes of fetish. Here are a few
specific problems.
Let me begin by repeating
myself, thereby following Harley’s example. Everything Harley says, he says
again and again, first in “introductory” chapters, then in the pages of
chapters devoted to the topic at issue (where the basic points are repeated
several times), then again in “Summaries” of those chapters, and then yet
again in subsequent chapters where the topic that had already been
discussed to death might possibly be construed as relevant. But maybe
“discussed to death” is undue praise, since mere repetition of the same
points is not, after all, a way of exhaustively examining any question. If
ever there was a book that could more profitably be read quickly and cursorily
than carefully, this is that book; it would be far more useful if it were less
than half as long. And, besides the chapters on technical matters I’ve already
referred to, there is really very little in it that goes much beyond common
sense.
Indeed, the theoretical
sophistication evident in the technical sections rarely seems to be much in
evidence in the evaluations or recommendations of particular choices facing the
would-be purchaser. And “purchaser” is the operative term here: again and
again, I have the feeling that Harley is a shill for the audio equipment
industry—not for any particular company, mind you, but of the industry as a
whole, since his book rarely discourages any possible equipment purchase. This
is not to say that he doesn’t tailor his advice for one sort of listener or
another; you’ll find plenty to confirm your choice of vinyl over digital (or
vice versa), of tubes over solid state (or vice versa), of SET amplifiers, or
Class A, or Class D, or expensive cables or power cords, without reference to
particular manufacturers. If you want to BUY, there will be pages in Harley’s
book that will encourage you to do so.
But this enthusiast’s all-in
attitude runs into various rhetorical problems, as it must. To cite just one
example: superlatives like “extraordinary,” “outstanding,” “significant,” “spectacular”
are used so often, at every stage of the music reproduction process, that it
becomes impossible to know what sort of weight to give them in any particular
context. If power cords can create a “spectacular” improvement—but so can
interconnects, and speaker cables, and power conditioners, and well-made racks—it’s
hard to know how much weight to give big-ticket items like amplifiers and
speakers and other basic elements of one’s system, not to mention undeniably
important elements like room acoustics and proper speaker placement. According
to Harley, they’re all capable of making “spectacular” or “significant”
improvements to sound quality. But “spectacular” is a strong word; there aren’t
many that are stronger. If an AC power cord can create such an effect, it’s
hard to know what adjective to choose in order to distinguish a boom box or an
MP3 on cheap ear buds from an uncompromising rig that costs tens of thousands
of dollars. That might perhaps be described as a “spectacular”
difference—although even here, such a superlative is in questionable taste. I
know plenty of talented musicians and passionate music lovers who can enjoy
even difficult to reproduce music on cheap ear buds almost as much as
they would on a system most of us would call “spectacular.”
And then, despite his
analytical care and thoroughness, Harley often contradicts himself, both in the
specific recommendations he makes, and even in his own application of his
knowledge of audio science in particular circumstances. For instance, in
discussing bi-wiring, Harley offers a (possibly) plausible explanation of how
and why it makes a beneficial difference—and then declares that “no one knows
how or why” bi-wiring works! Here is the relevant passage: “In a bi-wired
system, the power amplifier ‘sees’ a higher impedance on the tweeter cable at
low frequencies and a lower impedance at high frequencies. The opposite is true
in the woofer-half of the bi-wired pair. This causes the signal to be split up,
with high frequencies traveling mostly in the pair driving the loudspeaker’s
tweeter circuit and low frequencies conducted by the pair connected to the
loudspeaker’s woofer circuit. This frequency splitting…reduces magnetic
interactions in the cable, resulting in better sound. The large magnetic fields
set up around the conductors by low-frequency energy can’t affect the transfer
of treble energy. No one knows exactly how or why bi-wiring works [wait a
minute! Didn’t he just explain “how” and “why” bi-wiring works?], but on nearly
all loudspeakers with bi-wiring provisions, it makes a big improvement in the
sound. Whatever your cable budget, you should bi-wire if your loudspeaker has
bi-wired inputs, even if it means buying two runs of less expensive cables.”
Even on its own terms, The Complete Guide to High-End Audio
is self-defeating. Most of the “audiophile values” Harley identifies and
cherishes are subjective, not objective, and so not the kinds of things one can
hope to demonstrate or prove. At the very outset of the book, he quotes the
Hungarian-born scientist and philosopher Michael Polanyi (also recently mentioned
by our own Mahgister); that got my attention, as I studied Polanyi’s work with
one of his disciples at the University of Chicago when I was a grad student.
But Harley doesn’t seem to take to heart Polanyi’s main contribution to the
philosophy of science: that objective facts cannot account for what is most
valuable in human culture. Rather, it is not science, but art—poetry,
music, myth, religion, and other “acts of imagination”—that can provide the
foundation of meaning in life. Harley’s attempt at a systematic
compendium of objective facts, although it fails even to be this, more
conspicuously betrays his own many pleas that the reader not heed measurements,
statistics, and other facts but return to the music.
Just as Wine Spectator is wine porn, and Stereophile,
The Absolute Sound, and (gasp!) Audiogon are audio porn, Harley’s book
will find its enthusiasts. Harley speaks of “audiophile values,” and pays lip
service to the music repeatedly, but perhaps it’s time to think in terms of
“audiophile virtues” instead. Don’t get me wrong: I’m no prude, and
audiophilia is a relatively victimless vice, if you can afford it and your wife
can tolerate it. But the analogy is not gratuitous. Didn’t we all get “into
audio” because we love music? Shouldn’t a healthy love of music
recognize that, although endless purchasing and tweaking may bring slight
improvements in sound quality, the false promise of that ever-elusive fantasy
Object of Desire is a distraction from a reality which is, for all of us
audiophiles, already far sexy enough? I can’t speak for you, obviously, but
speaking for myself, it’s high time to get back to the music!
If someone ask me why i spoke about Goethe in an audio thread...
I will answer that like Goethe wrote a phenomenology of colors, we need right now a phenomenology of sounds...
Being an audiophile who has been in the obligation to make my own listenings experiments i discovered that not only myself but most people dont know what sound is ultimately....
The most important book written about the phenomenology of sound is a doctorate thesis written by an AFRICAN thinker...Akpan J. Essien "Sound sources"...( no Goethe quote in this amazing book which is about sounds but use the SAME phenomenological method Goethe used when he wrote about his colors theory)
He is unknown for sure and will stay so for a long time , he is on another track of research very different than traditional Helmholtz method and theory of hearing...
Amazingly i discovered with my own reflexion about "timbre" perception that i dont know what a sound is....And dont laugh because i discovered also that i am not alone there...
It is the reason why the most important audiophile virtue is "acoustic humility"....
😁😊
«It is not so much the fact that most people dont understand some phenomenon which is not so amazing after all, what is stricking is that they cannot even understand, and will never admit, they dont understand»-Anonymus Smith
«At some point humility is a springboard»-Groucho Marx answering the question why he is so humble "sometimes"...🤓
To complain that we spend too much time on music reproduction and too little on the music is a little like complaining that a cooking forum spends too much time discussing recipes and not enough eating!
Great observation! thanks....
but dont forgot that :
Sound is for a moment like sex, but music is eternal like love...
« Myself i want eternal sex and temporary love, could you accept the reverse?»-Groucho Marx 🤓
Goethe: "...it is possible to say that every attentive glance which we cast on the world is an act of thoerizing...Everything that passes is a symbol....
The last paper confirming this, is written by the foremost influencial researcher in neuro science : Karl Friston : A FREE ENERGY PRINCIPLE FOR A PARTICULAR PHYSICS
The "Markov blanket" mathematical concept used by Friston with deep results and which is a central mediator for life organization is directly related to what Goethe call a "symbol" and what he means by that....
Goethe is no less than Darwin by far in genius and insight in biology and his phenomenological physics...
Like i already said Goethe so well known he is, because of his literary genius, is by far more great in natural sciences and philosophical matter...But his genius is not reducible to only some ending simple facts or to some final discoveries at all, so deep it goes in mind and nature...Goethe explain to us how to use perception....His genius is a method...Whose fruits are the theory of color and his plant and animal morphology...
The biologist Wolgang Schad expose this method in a stunning 1,359 pages book and with the physicist Henri Bortoft are the best to describe Goethe method of perception...After Rufolf Steiner insights more than a century ago about Goethe...
Some geniuses are too high in intelligence to be understood before centuries pass after them...They are like Ramanujan for example "extraterrestrial" so to speak in their intelligence ability... The Bell gaussian curve distribution of intelligence by design cannot exclude some exceptional manifestation of the highest possible intelligence manifested time to time in human history with various levels...
One of the best example is the towering genius, perhaps the greatest of all times : Archimedes who developed a theoretical physic with applications from a mathematical method related to the concrete use of the actual infinite concept way before Newton calculus and Cantor actual infinite use in theory of functions...
It takes millenia to understand Archimedes method and not only his separated results...
Without even knowing Goethe it seems Friston just demonstrated among other things the rightfulness of the Goethe method of perception and of "EXACT IMAGINATION"...He solve this question by a bayesian thermodynamic of information about the deep optimization mechanisms under perception and action...
Some take Friston further creating a variational ecology...Confirming Goethe further...
«Symbols are like my wife always under a blanket»-Groucho Marx 🤓
Goethe: "...it is possible to say that every attentive glance which we cast on the world is an act of thoerizing.... Theorizing is inherent in all human experience, and the highest intellectual achievement...would be to comprehend that everything factual is already theory." Goethe's Faust ends with these great lines, which also conclude Mahler's Eighth Symphony: "Alles vergängliche / Ist nur ein Gleichnis." Untranslatable, but basically the same idea expressed in prose in the words I just quoted—so, something like "Everything that passes / Is but a symbol [or parable]."
The point is one mahgister has several times sounded, even by refering to Goethe: that "analysis" and "enjoyment," far from being opposed as femoore12 suggests, are inseperable. Enjoyment is not merely animal pleasure when it comes to art; that sort of "higher pleasure," as J.S. Mill called it, requires a mind, cognition. Indeed, mere "perception" itself does so as well, as (again) mahgister has often said. To perceive is to receive a certain kind of information through the senses—and then to interpret it, "make sense" of it, "understand" it (hence, "the understanding" in Kant, as the seat of "concepts" which make sense of what otherwise would be raw sense data: "intuitions without concepts are blind").
My original post had meant to suggest that there is a parallel here with our passions for music, on the one hand, and music reproduction, on the other. Yes, of course, the two go together, and are mutually reinforcing. But balance is what's needed, and there is a risk that, in our pursuit of "the absolute sound" (not Harley's magazine, but superlative SQ), we risk losing that balance, and forgetting that the reproduction system is a means to the end of listening to music.
Thank you, john1, for saying that you don't think I was being disingenuous, but my confession stands: this is not a music forum, after all, but an audiophile forum. To complain that we spend too much time on music reproduction and too little on the music is a little like complaining that a cooking forum spends too much time discussing recipes and not enough eating!
@femmoore12 -- I gotta disagree. The system -- from car radio to earbuds to state-of-the-art stereo to a live music experience -- is what sends the music your way. The better the system, the better it sends the music to you, and the better it penetrates your soul. Left brain vs. right brain? Heck! Let the two sides of the brain give each other a boost. They don't have to get in each other's way. Teach 'em to dance!
Why is there always this obsession to develop an analytical approach to enjoying art? Why can’t you just enjoy the beauty of the art without trying to smash it into a bunch of invidiual components that are no longer art? The system isn’t the music. Obsession over the system prevents you from enjoying the music and appreciating the art. Maybe it’s a right brain / left brain thing. This book is a left brain attempt to explain a right brain experience.
Very deep observation and question .....Thanks...
I think that this left/right brain polarity is not a problem...It is a living rythm...
The dissociation of this internal polarity, his gripping, his decomposition by accident,injury,or distraction, in an opposite external duality is the problem...
It is very possible to enjoy and analyse in the SAME ACT, the same gesture, sound and music....This ACT is called a perception...
Goethe explain in details his method of perceptive attention with his study in plant morphology for example...We can even discover the Goethe method in Da Vinci or Aristotle before him and we could isolate it in Archimedes in his foundation of mathematical physics...If i remember well Goethe call this creative skill the "exact imagination"...
When we hear music we can also at the same time see it....To the pleasure of directly feeling it with our body when listening and hearing it, we may become sensible and attentive to the contemplative emerging perception of his form,dynamic, texture,and luminosity ...
Each perception then integrate for the better, at the same time, a direct focus and a peripheral view, like it must be anyway...
Why is there always this obsession to develop an analytical approach to enjoying art? Why can't you just enjoy the beauty of the art without trying to smash it into a bunch of invidiual components that are no longer art? The system isn't the music. Obsession over the system prevents you from enjoying the music and appreciating the art. Maybe it's a right brain / left brain thing. This book is a left brain attempt to explain a right brain experience.
No, I can feel in every fibre in my being snilf was not being disingenuous. The nature of integrity & truth & how it intersects with our search for it in music, through its reproduction & how we examine this path through hearful analysis & exploration ouught to be a very pure thing & often is conspicuously not. Especially by the self apointe exemplars supported financially by all of us. Somewhat reluctantly too oftem. For good reason.
snilf validly points outconcerning Harleys Opus that it:
is organized like the architecture of a Gothic cathedral, displaying the analytical excesses and mania for hierarchies of Medieval Scholasticism....find the book exasperating, and a manifestation of many of the problems with audiophilia in general that lead music lovers down rabbit holes of fetish.
Our philosophical leanings exponded on in the comments here are not unworthy but in the context of what Harley's work badly injects into the process - it ought not to be ignored. Being a guide does not absolve Harley of offering profound guidance that is not indisputaby tainted by his (I wish there were a better word)...greed. The poetry & poetic nature of great commentary i.e Harry Pearson whom he gladly, vehemently milks as his official successor as the Editor of his magazine he founded ought to aspire to at least aping some miniscule bit of his talent. Instead he essentially spits on it by killing all notion of the poetic & eloquent HP represented. I can't make anyone grow a conscience concerning it, decent audio jounalism & especially if it propels the quality & value we seek. Look at it or look away. The truth of it continues regardless.
rvpiano: Bravo! Still...do you know the several Orpheus Chamber Orchestra performances of selected Haydn Symphonies? IMO, the best performances of those works on record, and superlative SQ as well. I wish they'd done more of them (to my knowledge, there are just six or seven CDs in total).
Thanks for many of the responses here. Perhaps my original post was a bit disingenusous, as several have pointed out. For one thing, love of music and love of recorded sound are by no means mutually incompatible! Of course, my point was one often raised on this forum: that the latter can too often take precidence over the former. For me, I guess, the love of music reproduction is just a further inducement to put the music on.
I'm just listening to a Haydn symphony performed by Toscanini in the 1940's on my iPad. I'm getting as much enjoyment (or more) as if I were listening to a state of the art sounding performance on my stereo.
@mahgister -- I’m at the tip of the top, of course. I’m also extraordinarily humble. So there!
How do you call someone who attack the messenger instead of debating honestly with the message content?
Pick a word that would be less offensive for you than the one i feel i could pick, precisely because i am like you, not so humble at the end or to begin with, yes, but at least i dont keep my blinders ...I try to not attack people in one line post WITHOUT any argument like child in schoolyard...
Try brain work and discuss my content....
If you are able to do that i will never cease to thank you...
I find very interesting what the OP stated about Hartley and his perspective compared to Michael Polanyi who was a first rated world wide scientist BEFORE being a rated world wide philosopher of science and a very important one...
What is lacking in science "objective" approach of acoustic is not only the values of the subjective experience but the basic observation that the sound sources object or instrument are linked to our body/brain....There is a common PARTICIPATION a common grounding in the world... The air waves are an image not the sound quality itself which quality emerge in 2 different way in the source and in the basin or body receptor...The quality come from this common grounding at the same time of the body sound source and the listening body...
The air waves are meaningful because they convey an image of the vibrating body to be interprated and INTEGRATED in an another body... The interpretation/integration is possible because of the common ground between these 2 bodies...
The "implicit knowledge" teach us that listening is unexplanable or impossible to understand without this common grounding ... Our explicit knowledge of acoustic suppose the air wave to be the sound quality itself....Our implicit knowledge , our ability to extract a vast amount of qualitative information from hearing and and playing a drum for example, contradict that explicit knowledge...Our implicit knowledge of hearing dont Interpret "air waves" to be the sound quality by themselves, but instead for our implicit knowledge, the air waves are only the "image" of the source object vibrating internal states, for the listening subject internal states resonating through the reception of the mediating air waves waves to the source internal states itself........
Sound qualification is a process in three parts , source-air- basin, not an air wave in itself.... ....
Humility come from awe in front of any phenomena like in front of a deep mystery...It was called science in the past...
Technological hubris is not science at all....
«The apprentice-sorcerer is not the master especially in the movie»- Groucho Marx 🤓
The ultimate criteria in my experience to decide when your audio system is "relatively" good comes to my mind when following in my listening experience these 3 successive levels tracks of this three scaled history for all of us :
First: almost all sound the same....And we even cannot distinguishes almost all the times a good recording from a bad one...Most people are happy with that and i was when i was younger and not an audiophile...People listen music here not sound...
Second: we can distinguish clearly some better recording from bad one ...But most appear not very good only a select group of favorite is perceived enough good...This level is the one where most audiophiles are....They listen sound before listening music...
Third and last level: All recordings now, the so called better one and the so called bad one are NOW no more divided at all in these 2 binary categories, bad or good...This is the GOAL to reach...We dont look for good recording sound anymore, we listen to music conveyed each time by completely different choices and means... And this differences increase the interest and the experience...bad recording are now more interesting than just bad... They speak....
Here we listen ALL music through sound qualities....No upgrade is needed even if one is attractive it is no more needed...Not because the audio system is perfect but only because it is relatively well performing....
For sure bad recording exist and good one, but now the majority of albums are ALL interesting in an acoustical perspective BECAUSE our audio system/speakers/room rightfully embeddded can give to us hundred of new sonic cues describing the original lived event acoustic settings and trade-off by the recording engineer.... Then listening to all this recording differences, never the same exactly from a recorded album to an another, is an EXTRAORDINARY acoustical/musical experience in itself...And like any extraordinary experience could never be reduced to a binary categorisation unable to describe the rich varieties of audio experience...
Where are you on this scale?
This will indicate to you the value of your audio system and the value of his rightfully or wrongly embedded working dimensions in your house/room/system...
Money is not an indication AT ALL... Save for naive people... Sorry...
The first audiophile virtue is acoustic humility....😁😊
The problem is not listening sound or listening music...
The problem is listening speakers or amplifiers without knowing acoustic and how it can change totally our total experience more than an electronical upgrade...Upgrading is a deceptive illusion in the light of acoustic science at least...
Then in acoustic sound could become music and music sound... And we can see them...
Sometimes we try to recreate the territory from the map...But NO map contains the territory in his wholeness....
But it is like lifting ourself up by the hair...
The sound body source or musical instrument is half part of the territory, the other half is my own listening body... Waves in air are only map....Nothing else...Like bats we read the map but unlike bat we think that the wave are the sound...Bat know better they look for the real territory: the vibrating qualitative body at the source of his resonant image in the air... Ask a bat or ask a blind people to know the truth....
Along with Simonmoon I can’t say that I’m not seduced by sound for sound’s sake. It is part of the hobby. But I believe that it can lead down a rat hole as it can easily turn into into the main endeavor, at which point the music, and the greater enjoyment becomes secondary.
I also think compulsively searching for tweaks leads down the same path.
Despite what I've said above. There are times I do put something on for the pure enjoyment of the sound.
Sound = resonant body source/ waves in air/ resonant hearing body..
In speech a sound is a feeling gesture of the mouth/ body before being an image vibrations of this body in the air...
Sound qualities are an information about a body source translated by a wave packet image and interpreted through and with my listening body...
I listen to a violin body vibrating note excited by the body gesture of a musician, i dont listen to the sound of air waves, i listen reacting with my body to these qualities actual in the vibrating object but potentially informing me by an image about this states of affair in the body source, informing my listening body/ears/brain if i pay attention... ...
Science being an open enterprise and a creative one we perhaps dont know ALL there is to know about sounds...
Before Goethe, Newton described colors without any reference to the fundamental perceptive physiology of color’s origin , unlike Goethe...Pay attention to this lesson in science by a mind not a bit less wise than Newton...
Perhaps acoustic pointing to " material waves" being sound itself, cannot explain the way sound convey very complex information to the listener about the composition,density, etc and other important informations like a doctor asssessing the different organs of his patient status by percussion, or a customer in Africa asssessing the value of a fruit or vegetable by listening the sound resulting from his percussive gesture or a drum player chosing different materials that sound completely different from one another: iron,copper,brass,wood,nylon cord ,steel cord etc or a blind person cycling without help with echolocalization, or any animal like dolphin asssessing material composition of any material body. or bats.. Remind yourself of the baby image by sound analysis detailing perfectly well the baby bodies density and features...
How the vibratory air medium convey this information to the ears/brain if not because we can feel, see, hear these real qualities in the world already with our own body
How computing ALONE and ONLY in the brain could ever give us the "feeling" of precise various timbre sounds corresponding to various different qualitative states and "nuances" or hues of a sounds palette ? The waves are not the sound indeed but the image of the sounded resonant percussed body...
We have developed powerful technology in sound reproduction without even knowing what sound is...Perhaps our link to sound qualities is not the results of a computing algorithm ONLY, but comes from a direct relationship of the various qualitative information conveyed by the real image of the resonant or percussed, or strucked, or plucked, etc objects or instruments with our own body...
Technology is not science, the two collaborated yes, but are very disctinctive...
Science has begun before technology and sometimes a mastering technology hide the new science to come... Question comes before answers, and somes ready made and powerful answers may kill the questionning for a long time...
We dont know what sound is....It is easy to verify studying what timbre is in relation to speech and music...to know what sound is could redefine all future technology linked to hearing in a complete new direction...Perhaps the sonic wave in my room communicate to me an information about the REAL sounding objects qualities which are recorded like a REAL IMAGE of this sounding instruments or objects.. This is why we can SEE music and sound...To each qualities coming from the resonant object or instrument correspond a precise experience in my body...Perhaps we hear WITH the body not only with ears and brain...
But at the end then some audiophiles instead of thinking about sound and music and their intimate relation through acoustic with their ears/brain/body really think that their experience come through their idolatry of the better and new electrical design...It is not false for sure...it is worst than that....
They plug a 100,000 bucks amplifier and call that an audiophile experience... Some engineers approve that...
But an half truth is sometimes worst than a lie and more blinding...
I’ve gradually come to the conclusion that music and the love of sound don’t have to be mutually exclusive. But the music MUST COME FIRST. After that the sound can be thoroughly enjoyed for what it is.
i DONT believe (as some evidently do) that every little tweak brings you closer to the music.
For the vast majority of audiophiles, I believe the music does come first. At least the relatively small sample size I have been exposed to. I am a member of the LA/OC Audio Society, the largest audiphile club in the world, and for the majority of the members I have talked to over the years, most care more about the music than the gear.
But that does not mean us "music first" audiophiles, can’t have a great time, a few times a month, with just listening to the sound of the gear for its own sake. Even going so far, as to playing some of those "audiophile approved" recordings, of which we really don’t like the music, but are great at highlighting some specific aspect of our systems.
Also, for those audiophiles that care more about their gear than the music, and that is how they get pleasure from audio, who are the rest of us to begrudge them their enjoyment?
i DONT believe (as some evidently do) that every little tweak brings you closer to the music.
I guess it depends on how the tweak effects the sound, and if that particular effect is what the individual is looking for...
If someone is looking for more detail, and more detail is a particular aspect in sound that helps a specific listener get closer to the music, and the tweak gains them more detail, then that tweak is successeful for that listener to get them closer to the music.
In the beginning of my music listening quest, I'd look for equipment that would produce music in the quality where I can clearly hear a guitar string plucked, then wonder who made that string. While I still like that sort of anylytical listening, I am more interested in musicality; in short, does my system make me tap my toes? I don't rob myself of either. I have a pretty good tube amp that cooks up some pretty amazing inner detail and that lit from within sound, and then I have the regular solid state stuff in an Esoteric A-02 and ML No. 33's to get my toes a-tappin'! Don't rob yourself of either experience. Life is too short to not do stuff you really like.
4 editions worth so far with constant shilling of it in the magazine he edits.
The fifth edition became available in 2015. In a few months that will be seven years. Some will be looking forward to a sixth edition anytime now - I'm sure it will be announced on these pages of authority.
I’ve gradually come to the conclusion that music and the love of sound don't have to be mutually exclusive. But the music MUST COME FIRST. After that the sound can be thoroughly enjoyed for what it is.
i DONT believe (as some evidently do) that every little tweak brings you closer to the music.
The truth of this observation became self evident for myself after just a few months of lurking on this esteemed forum. I'll say this just once - I learnt piano and violin at school in my pre-teen and teen years.
That is something I didn't appreciate at the time. However perhaps it is always a reason why I struggle to understand the cacophony of adjectives invented by audiophiles to describe what they hear. Some advocate "learning" to hear, which is I guess like learning a new language - it ain't easy for a lot of good folk.
As for Mr Harley's words - I always encourage reading, so they are alright for budding enthusiasts who may be overwhelmed by the esoteric garb that audiophiles have learnt to clothe themselves with to distance themselves from mere mortals, and if you are pre-disposed to forgive the many sins so eloquantly described by a few contributers here.
I've read other patronising books (sometimes they use the word ültimate, rather than complete, in the title), and they need a publisher with the fortitude to tell them a few truths.
I’ve gradually come to the conclusion that music and the love of sound don't have to be mutually exclusive. But the music MUST COME FIRST. After that the sound can be thoroughly enjoyed for what it is.
i DONT believe (as some evidently do) that every little tweak brings you closer to the music.
It's bad jounalism seeking to camoflage that with all the vogor in the world - by proclaiming it's a textbook (with all the dryness, stolidness & intentionally banal aspects not just firmly intact but celebrated as worthy in & of themselves). One not designated required reading by any official teacher on the subject, but rather the author conspicuously leveraging his postion in the audio reviewing world to promote his book. Which he goes out of his way to strongly imply is a text w/o coming out & explicitly saying so. This sounds a little sleazy because it is. snilf, a Physics grad (& likely more then that) makes that very legitimate point. Then he goes on to point out the sleaziness is not as absent as it nearly ought to be elsewhere. The intellectual & moral honesty of the book is questionable in spots as he relates. That Harley tries not at all to be eloquent, witty or even especially perceptive is just plain cynicism regarding his predessessor's (Harry Pearson's) legacy - while vehemently trying to milk it for all its worth, to sell this pretend text he refuses to call that. 4 editions worth so far with constant shilling of it in the magazine he edits. Pecularly self aggrandizing & in the respects snilf carefully & validly details. It needs to be asked whether it does not degrade whatever sacredness is in the pursuit of audio excellence. That it pretentiously does a little good as well (but less then other books mentioned here by commentors) does not somehow, magically cancel out the corruption/sleaziness mentioned here or by snilf. It both insidiously & not so insidiously browbeats readers with eternal obviousness while cheerfully breaking all the rules of even mediocre, highish quality journalism. What would Harry Pearson say of it? - is an incredibly (hardly too strong a word) important question to ask? The more you like audio & value any integrity & artistry in the pursuit of it (including in the professional writing of it by its official exemplars) thisal needs to be carefully considered & to ask: How shameless is this book in racing down these dead ends? Zero, a little bit more or somewhat more still? Rationalize as you like but please do not conflate forgiving with excusing. The stakes are a little higher then trivializing it that way.
@millercarbonyes I have his guide and have read it. Yes it is a very basic guide and I understand why you like it so much. It uses layman’s terms and does not go into the engineering weeds.
When I need to go into the weeds I call on people that have an EE and are involved in this passion of ours. Have a few in our company.
Let me preface this, with saying, that I am a music first audiophile. It is my love of music, that got me into audio in the first place.
During my serious, music listening sessions, I pay no attention to the gear.
With that being said, that does not mean there are times, maybe a coupld hours a week, where I love playing "audiophile", and just listening to the gear. And even listening to music that I may not love, but they are on the "audiophile aproved recordings" list, just to show off my system.
The enjoyment of audio gear, does not have to be black and white.
a cruel irony for many of us of modest backgrounds, is that by the time we are rich enough to own high-end gear, a lot of us are pretty old, and our hearing is not in as ready a state to enjoy the high-end sound, as it was when we were young and broke.
SNILF said: “But now that I can
finally afford really good equipment—things I’ve lusted after since college,
more than 40 years ago—I’m dismayed at the extent to which my love of music has
morphed into a love of music reproduction. So this little rant is a chance
to vent frustration, and to see if there are others out there who may feel the
same way.”
Addressing the above only, over the years, like yourself, I
was able to assemble a high end audio system which I enjoy greatly. Relative to your post above, there are two
truths that require further distillation, as it pertains to the perceived
dichotomy between the sound of your ultimate stereo Vs the love of music.
The first is, on a given piece of music, there are times I
prefer the reproduction of that piece on my stereo, as opposed to the live
performance of that same music in a suitable concert hall.
In the first case, the music “takes me there” to a greater
extent than the live performance. Note
in both cases, it is still all about the music and ones emotional response to
it, not as you say, “the love of music reproduction”.
The second truth is, when you attend a live concert (referring
primarily to unamplified music), you are listening to the concert hall’s
ability to render the instruments and their intonation, ie the music, to a satisfying degree.
In a sense, there is no difference between that and hearing
the sound on your stereo. It’s just
that, in the science of acoustics, we accept the live version as the reference
we strive for. And yes, in most cases it
is impossible to reproduce that accurately.
But is that really what you prefer, the live version? That is the question (and an enormous credit
to the efforts of the recording industry ).
Where you sit in the concert hall, and the very nature of the
concert hall itself has a huge impact on the sound and ultimately one’s
enjoyment of the music, in much the same way as the technology behind your
ultimate stereo. So your query, applies as much to the live concert setting as
it does to your home stereo.
In either case, it is always about one’s enjoyment of music
whether reproduced or live. There is no
dichotomy between one’s appreciation of the “sound” coming from your ultimate
stereo, or the concert hall and the “love of music”.
I recently read that our appreciation for Art is the search for Beauty. Sometimes our search for the best sound is far from that. Can the rich man get into heaven? How about the pompous man or the proud? Harley's book is not a guide to meaning; just a manual to turning on glorified radios.
I suspect the book is mostly for people like me. New to the hobby with very little knowledge. I’ve been enjoying reading it very much. Also +1 millercarbon. I need the repetition the book uses to help it sink in
I have only recently begun my audiophiliac journey with many miles to go before I sleep, I hope. However, I am really enjoying the trip now, as I slowly build my system, trying to place the musical performances before me and my listeners as to be astounded by the musical artistry, as well as the gorgeously engineered reproduction. That's right, I said, "astound". Because when it's good, that's how it feels to me. I now really listen to music. All kinds, from all sources, not just my intense rig. Wherever I hear it, I lean in. I have become a spirit-brother of listeners. I try to be still, centered, and let the sound flow. When its good it's just wonderful. When it's not so good, I try to work out why. What's going on with that piece? Is it the artist, the recording/mixing, the equipment, the room? I use my Audiogonolgy when I can, and I try to learn from those bad ones. But really, it's not as easy to identify what's "Good" or "Bad" as I would have thought before I got into this "hobby". A lot of music sounds okay, even over very mediocre systems, or by so-so artists. But when it's better than average, or better than that, and everything is clicking...well, there is just no substitute. I'll never stop pursuing better quality music and equipment to play it because the payoff of hearing music that just melts me is so, so worth it.
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