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Bass at your ears? (Bass imaging)

This song 'James Blake - Limit to your love' has this weird bass that kicks in at about 1:00 into it. Now I have heard this song on a few speakers and it sounded great but when I heard it on the magico m2 I could literally hear the bass right at my ears as if I was wearing heapdhones. It was such a strange sensation. Is this indicative of the m2s incredible imaging capability or is this something else? This was in an irregularly shaped room with a big hallway to one side and hardly any treatment.
smodtactical

Showing 2 responses by audiokinesis

audiokinesis
2,724 posts
 
The bassline on that recording is a form of "wobble bass", which in and of itself does not explain the "claustrophobic" sensation. The size of the acoustic space is conveyed by the reverberation. A small space is conveyed by rapid onset and rapid decay of the reverberation.

If you’ve ever watched a scene where someone is in a box or buried alive and you can hear/feel how claustrophobic the tiny space is, it’s because that spatial information is on the recording.

Kudos to Magico for their speakers reproducing this effect spookily well, but they are not necessarily unique in their ability to do so.

Duke

audiokinesis
2,724 posts
 
My guess is that it’s part of the recording, and is probably deliberate.

If the bass was the only instrument recorded with little or no reverb then it would be the only instrument which would tend to sound "proximate", or close to one’s ears. Sort of like a recording of a whisper turned up really loud.  

Alternately the reverb could have a very short time delay, like what your voice would sound like if you were in a box.

Duke
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