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Do you agree with John Atkinson (and me)?

 

Point 1: In the recent thread entitled ’How much is too much to spend on a system?’, I contributed this comment: "The hi-fi shouldn’t be worth more than one’s music library." I said that half-jokingly, a wisecrack that I knew might be disagreed with.

Point 2: In the 1990’s I became a regular customer at the Tower Records Classical Music Annex store in Sherman Oaks, California. The store manager knew a LOT about Classical music, but also made no secret of his distain for audiophiles, whom he viewed as caring more about the sound quality of recordings than their musical quality.

Point 3: In the early days of The Absolute Sound magazine, the writers occasionally mocked audiophiles who had a serious high end system, but whose record collections merely consisted of a small number of "demo" discs. Those audiophiles collect records that make their systems sound good, rather than assemble a system that makes their records sound good.

 

I make the above points as a preamble to the following:

In the past few months I have fallen behind in my reading of the monthly issues of Stereophile that arrive in my mailbox. Yesterday I finally got around to reading the editorial in the January issue, written by John Atkinson (filling in for current editor Jim Austin, who is recuperating from surgery, I believe). The final two paragraphs of the editorial read as follows:

 

"Back in the day, I did an analysis of Stereophile reviewers’ systems. The common factor was that all the reviewers’ collections of LPs and CDs cost a lot more than their systems. The same is true of me, even in these days of streaming."

"Isn’t that the way it should be for all music-loving audiophiles?"

 

Well, is it?

 

128x128bdp24
retiredaudioguy
26 posts
 

I think I was driven into the Audiophile passion by my passion for Music (classical).

I spent the 70s and 80s listening to LPs an a reasonable 'HiFi' system - Ohm Walsh speakers and I forget the rest.

I changed jobs in 1990 and one of my colleagues was a TAS & Stereophile reader and, knowing that my wife and I were avid music listeners he suggested I bring some of my discs (black or shiny) to his apartment.

It changed my life, I rediscovered what the Quad ESLs had given me in about 1970.

So, I guess for me being an audiophile is a means to an end, not an end in itself.  Though there is nothing wrong with its being an end in itself.

larsman's avatar
larsman
2,076 posts
 

@bdp24 - A friend of mine who used to work for the Banana Records chain and later Capitol Records used to be the manager of Cornell Hurd and the Mondo Hotpants Orchestra.... 

bipod72
152 posts
 

For me, it’s always been about music and enjoying music and finding a system that makes my music sound better. When my parents owned a record store in Denver in the 80s, the gear used in the shop was a couple of run-of-mill turntables, a few receivers, headphones for people to listen to albums to, and basic 2-way speakers for ambient music in the shop. None of that was fancy. Our home hi-fi was a Marantz receiver, bookshelf speakers, a TT, a reel-to-reel tape deck, and eventually, a CD player.

Listening to music was the primary purpose. I have fond memories of putting on the Stones’ Hot Rocks on the TT, sitting in my dad’s recliner and listening with headphones to that record over and over.

Now, I have music playing almost all the time at home with the family. I do dance parties with my kids, stream music for wall-paper purposes, and then when everyone else is in bed, I put my headphones on and do some purposeful listening.

To each their own I say. If you’re an audiophile forever searching for the next magic box that sounds better than the last and you only listen to the same 50 albums from 50 years ago, great. For me, considering my financial constraints of raising 3 young kids and 20yrs away from retirement, a good mid-hi-fi system to enjoy my growing music collection is where it’s at for me.

jl35
4,083 posts
 

It is kind of an appalling judgment about people and their situations that you know nothing about...and the idea that streaming doesn't affect the equation ???

mdalton's avatar
mdalton
508 posts
 

Here’s another way of thinking about the issue.  I catalog the jazz lp section of my 750 lp collection on Discogs.  According to Discogs, my 395 lp jazz collection is worth about $10k.  So let’s assume my total collection is worth about $15k.  That’s a decent amount invested, imho.  I also have about $100k invested in my 3 main systems.  But according to the music lover vs. audiophile paradigm, I’d be more of a music lover if I’d only spent $5k on a system.  This is an obvious logical fallacy.

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