Some famous reviewers have atrocious listening rooms!

Reviewers exist primarily to promote product.

I can hardly think of a single review which came close to describing what I later heard in person. [OK, Alvin Gold reviewing the Ruark Prologue ll's, but even there he forgot to mention their sibilance).

The great majority of products that received glowing reviews turned out to be crushing disappointments in real life. [fully loaded Linn/Naim six pack was shockingly bad when I'd been expecting near perfection]

Time and time again I reminded myself to never again trust ANY reviews.

It's the oldest adage in audio but you really do have to listen for yourself.

Decades of reading reviews lead me to arrive at the conclusion that professional reviews in audio magazines were no better than what I might find in a consumer reports magazine such as the UK based Which?

Perhaps the only way to get close to the 'gist' of what something sounds like is by conducting a comparative review?

A straight head to head or a group test could highlight the difference between products and more usefully the strengths and weaknesses of each one.

However, these types of reviews risk giving offence to some of the people the reviewer needs to stay on good terms with and appear to be becoming increasingly uncommon these days.

Some of the more honest of reviewers, Andrew Robinson for one, have even talked about the the normally taboo subject of behind the scenes politics of reviewing.

I like the way he will always come out and tell you that you will need a subwoofer when describing any bass restricted loudspeaker. This is a huge deal and should never be casually glossed over the way so many do.

He also seems to have one of the visibily better demo rooms out there as well as providing a second opinion via his partner Kristi.

It's plainly obvious that he does not have to confine his impressions to only near field listening where the room must matter less.

@audiodwebe

Had I known about the listening rooms they use to review gear in the past, I would not have placed such a value on what they were writing.

It’s not just their rooms.

It took me ages, far too long, to realise that none of their opinions count for much.

Most of them have vastly differing tastes to me (safe and boring audiophile fare) and I’m not too sure about their hearing either.

Or their sincerity.

Nowadays I might read or listen them now and then, but strictly for entertainment purposes only.

@terraplane8bob

I recall posting a reference to a thread about "simple tweaks" to our systems and mentioned one of the easiest tweaks for people who normally wear glasses was to simply remove them ! Apparently the idea is still met with derision judging by this post in the current thread about reviewer’s listening rooms.

You just can’t take anything a reviewer says seriously.

We have no idea whether their hearing isn’t damaged or irregular in some way.

We don’t know the acoustics of their rooms.

We also have no idea whether they know anything about the way the human hearing system works. Or whether they even care.

A fair bit of sound, particularly at volume is heard via bone conduction slightly before our brains can register it.

Removing a pair of glasses is bound to affect the way sound is perceived by the listener and not least because of the lack of reflections.

Since vision competes with hearing for attention at all times music will always tend to sound clearer in a darkened room/ late at night or with ones eyes shut.

I usually notice a slight increase in the precise placement of voices and instruments immediately when I close my eyes.

Give your brain less to do and it will usually do it better.

Reviewers exist primarily to promote product.

Really? I used to review a bit, and have known many audio reviewers. I can’t think of a single one who thinks of themselves that way, or who approach their reviewing just to promote a product.

Does it matter how they see themselves?

Besides I was referring to paid professional reviewers. I find owner/amateur reviews to be generally far more relevant.

I can hardly think of a single review which came close to describing what I later heard in person.

Maybe you weren’t terribly good at, or didn’t put much effort in to weeding through reviews.

I have gradually improved at weeding out reviews which contain sins of commission, but I still can’t account for those which feature sins of omission.

To not mention issues that could prove problematic is a general malaise these days. We see it everywhere from a school reports to employer references.

The great majority of products that received glowing reviews turned out to be crushing disappointments in real life. [fully loaded Linn/Naim six pack was shockingly bad when I’d been expecting near perfection]

Ah, looks like you were maybe to high in your expectations regarding reviews.

So were tens of 1000s of others who were brought up on the UK press in the 1980s.

Time and time again I reminded myself to never again trust ANY reviews.

It’s the oldest adage in audio but you really do have to listen for yourself.

Why did you need reminding?

Once upon a time I took professional reviews seriously. After all, they were written by experienced journalists who usually spoke with a voice of authority.

As has been already mentioned several times in this thread, they are nothing such. In fact reviews are very little more than a rough guide.

This salient fact is not always apparent to those who are new to the big and often bewildering world of audio.

As the OP stated, it can be disappointing for audio novices to eventually discover that professional reviewers are not experts in anything at all.

Far from it.

They just have better access to a wider range of equipment than we do.

@audiodwebe 

And those reviews, at least to me, carried some weight simply because I didn't have access to anything other than those reviews. No stereo shop near me ever carried much other than mid-fi and lo-fi stuff.  And that is precisely why I am a bit disappointed when I see the rooms from some of these "rock star" reviewers. 
Like many, today, if I read a review, it's more for entertainment purposes or to see if said gear is something I want to research further.  Everything I read is taken with a grain of salt.  But back in the day, if a rock star said it, I believed it.  Young and naive, like many of us in the beginning of the audio journey.

I think it's a generation thing.

Once upon a time we were more prepared to believe most everything we read. That was the way we were brought up, I certainly was.

Whereas nowadays the world is a far more mistrustful place, and quite rightly knowing what we know about politicians, journalists, marketeers, algorithms, data mining etc

As @pinthrift says,

We live in times of distrust and suspicion.  We rarely give something, someone the time required for trust and friendship.

Whereas a generation once fretted over the murder of one president and the resignation of another, nowadays we don't even blink over carefully set up plandemics, the bombing of huge gas pipes causing untold pollution and unnecessary hardship, or the coming of an Orwellian superstate that believes in rule by fear, pumping out endless bad news hour after hour.

Different times different world.

Many still hope for a return to something approaching normality, but the rest of us try to adapt as the supply of red pills seems to also be dwindling.

It might be interesting to see what the members here would like to see in future reviews.

The first thing I look for in any loudspeaker review is some mention of its ability to make the distinction between the timbre of different musical instruments as clear as possible. 

Secondly, and almost as importantly, I like to see how it compares with known all time reference products, eg Quad electrostatics, BBC LS 3/5, JBL l100 original, KEF LS50, Harbeth P3, Harbeth M40, Revel Ultima Salon, Wilson Sabrina, KEF Blade as well as stuff from the likes of Monitor Audio, ATC, Wharfedale, Magico, Q Acoustics, etc etc.

Unfortunately I rarely see this in reviews.

Instead, the standard review usually goes like this:

A few words about the manufacturer, blah, blah, blah..

A few words about the components, construction, and if your lucky, crossover design.

A couple of generalised lines about the way it plays a few select pieces of music.

One short sentence thrown in discreetly that hints at possible limitations, and/or suggestion for the need of a subwoofer.

Finally, a suggestion of how this particular product should be on everyone's shortlist.

If you are lucky, you might even get thrown in as an afterthought some diagrams of impedance graphs, resonance waterfalls etc.

Basically, a whole load of non committal, non offensive carefully worded deliberately vague sales pitch.

Yes, there are a few exceptions such as Andrew Robinson, Amir at ASR for example who actually dare to put reviewed products into some of kind of comparative  context.

For that alone I guess we should be grateful.

@jea48 

To much may not be a good thing.

No, it certainly isn't.

No one wants to listen in an anechoic chamber.

Nowadays a lot of careful thought goes into the building of music auditoriums.

As far as I know the science behind such things is terribly complicated.

@johnk

As much as I distrust magazine reviews, and no longer believe anything the reviewers write, I still love audio magazines.

A few years ago I got rid of 90% of my collection (mostly tons of Hi-Fi Choice, Hi-Fi News, Hi-Fi World - and a few What Hi-Fi’s etc) but there were certain issues I couldn’t part with.

It’s difficult to say just what it is about these magazines that made me keep them, but it isn’t the veracity of the reviews.

Sometimes it could be a main feature eg a show/nostalgia piece or an interview with an audio luminary, sometimes it could be the music reviews and sometimes it could be a feature on some readers system.

I still have a few copies of the notoriously opinionated mid 1980s Hi-Fi Review. It was a riot to read but as I later discovered, it was also totally useless as consumer information.

Chris Frankland, the one and only, would regularly try to convince you of impossibilities such as that a Linn Basik arm was better than a SME, or that the Linn/Naim 6 pack was the bees knees etc.

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The Flat Response Magazine by Tom Tom Audio Nov 28, 2017

http://thetomtomclub.ning.com/m/blogpost?id=6506457%3ABlogPost%3A9465