Mood

My perception changes over time. I think I hear distortion that I hadn’t noticed before, or some detail is all at once smeared in a certain frequency range. I can check on my headphones, which are an entirely different system, to see if it’s just me or if I’m really picking up on a problem. 99% of the time it’s me. I hear the same problem on the headphones, or anything else I listen to. Sometimes things actually seem to sound very different. Other times they sound the same, but for some reason aren’t able to have a positive effect on me like they do when I’m in a good mood. What’s weird though is that usually when I’m not enjoying the sound quality much at all, I can still really get in to the musical styles and lyrics. So I keep listening, but purely as a music lover, not an audiophile. Most of the time I’m both.

Another perception I’ve noticed is that I’ll listen to a song for the first time, and be astounded by the sound quality, with a strong recollection of how certain things sounded amazing. Further listening to the same tracks I hear them different from then on, and it doesn’t seem as amazing. But the memory of it sounding amazing persists, and creates a sort of mythical place in my mind of that one special moment, lost somewhere in time and space.

@ghdprentice 

You have a gift! I cannot rely on my audio perceptions because they swing so much. I noticed this back when I used to play string bass. It would sound rich, warm, and full to me one day, and then thin, raspy, and scratchy the next. I thought it was just me, but a lot of musicians report this same phenomenon. 

Just curious, do you have perfect pitch? I wonder if that makes a difference.

@cdc 

Who said that music is like a condiment? I can think of ways it can be like a condiment. But then there's this guy who said interpretation is a condiment. So if music is already a condiment, we have a condiment^2 with interpretation.

My experience suggests that some systems might be more robust against the perceptual swings that some of us experience. Right now I feel that my system is in a robust state because I haven't had a bad sounding day since I set it up like this. It's been pleasing me consistently, and it also seems to get along with a wide variety of recordings. I've had this kind of setup before, and it seems to have something to do with creating a natural, tonal balance that's easy to accept and enjoy, but doesn't necessarily reach the zenith of ultra realism and detail that some recordings can offer.

This seems to come with a light handed touch on the crossover settings and driver equalization, and a minimum of room corrections. I think one of the problems with trying to tonally cancel out room effects is that it actually works to some degree! So, the sound coming from the speaker is not sounding like a typical sound emerging from within the room, and thus being colored by the room. But since our ears are naturally trying to filter out the room coloration because we pick up on the room sound the moment we walk in to the space, it can actually be confusing and unstable perceptually. So it might be better to not do too much of that. Maybe EQ down a major bass peak or two, but be extra wary of bringing up low areas, and definitely avoid any EQ up in the higher frequencies, or at least be very careful with it or any use of target room curves. I've played around a lot with such EQ, and it can be exasperating because it sometimes creates real magic, but just hearing something that doesn't work with it can throw your perceptions off for the rest of the evening. I think it's not just room EQ that can do this, but any speaker with an unusual tonal response, and un-even off axis response. Such speakers will occasionally create magic  that a speaker with flat, smooth response and good off axis never will. But often they will sound bad, and will require a fragile perceptual state to enjoy, unless they're just a match made in heaven for the particular room they are being used in.  

@cdc 

Thanks for the background info. From that perspective, I can see how music can be like a condiment.

@mahgister 

I agree there's a lot more possible in interpretation than just acting like a condiment. However, it's sometimes sort of true, when different interpretations are very similar.  I recently listened to a bunch of versions of "Jesus Was a Cross Maker." Judee Sill originally sang it significantly different than most everyone else who later covered it. But one guy sang it very similar to the way she did, so it came across as only "spiced' slightly differently.