Music. People seem to like the idea. Some seem more determined and like to listen to the stuff, maybe even a whole album or two. A week-long playlist will do just as well.
No shit yet. There will be lots of shit. Ugly, illogical, primal shit.
If some people have the money at hand to spend on stereo equipment, some of them will get good stuff, the stuff from specialised local shops, for example. They have shit and stuff to pay, they just want the best for their customers and their best in return.
Online platforms like Amazon will do fine and are probably cheaper than special needs care at the shop throughout the audio toy collection.
That is if what is wanted is available there or anywhere else online for interested toy players directly to order. Further down the line of increasingly more exclusive audio toy craziness, prices vary in the thousands in comparison to the similarly-priced competition without added functionality or anything other rationally fathomable, just no fucking way to tell what the difference is supposed to be. Examinations of the equipment under scientifically-thinking testing criteria is completely absent in the audio toy review press.
Bullshit right there. A lot of it. If whatever the advertorial musings of the audio press are based on is not science, then what is it based on instead?
Self-righteous tech-snobisms appropriated by obscure corporate identity admiration maybe, but I could be mistaken.
The people writing about audio gear like loudspeakers, amplifiers, CD-players, turntables and other stuff generally are there to peddle some esoteric nonsense, which in one case actually is called Esoteric Audio, a high-end brand of TEAC, if I remember correctly. Pretty clever branding.
There are differences in design, build quality and price in every bit of audio equipment imaginable. That is not really the core of the high-end lore. High-end audio gear is mostly over-produced, functional and shiny. So very shiny.
The amplifier above is way north of 20.000 bucks. There are speaker cables for around the same. Limited numbers produced in countries where there might not be children inhaling the good stuff all day, exclusivity and a solid portion of greed will end up at these and higher prices, not necessarily because it sounds oh so great. The amplifier above probably does its job very well, thus does not distort the audio signal. Other amplifiers at a fraction of its cost seem to do that as well. But what about the exterior? Cooling fins and holes. Okay. Maybe someone heroic will use it as a shield in an inter-galactic war.
Some other manufacturers - there actually is a lot done by hand - drill the casing out of a mono-block of aluminium. It does not have to sound better because of this though. All the exterior bling is fine, but it should be obvious that if there is so much care invested in something like a front plate, all the extra time will add up and be included in the price. Audio properties do not really matter that much in the high-end sector. Everything is good or excellent and there probably is no difference in sound once the build quality exceeds the threshold of audibility, tube fetish aside.
The most imposing designs seem to be much more relevant.
Robot-assisted open heart surgery equipment. It is a turntable and costs about 150.000 bucks. There are cheaper offers with good results as well.
Maybe not this model; it is about the same. There is some mild irony to be found at the bottom of the picture.
Audiophiles are obsessed with purity. At least on one side of the ideology. Only the best selected components most carefully put together will do. Then there is the tube cult with its seemingly very noticeable colouration - or distortion - of the audio signal. It seems to be intended and tubes are said to be out of production. That is a good start for exclusivity and all it can entail financially.
There are legitimate uses for high-end loudspeakers. Some say it is the only thing which really matters. Maybe. Maybe an amplifier with no extra distortion added would be a good idea if it goes into the professional field. Pictured above is a studio of Abbey Road. The speakers are the top of the line model of the premium range from the manufacturer. The other two rear speakers just like the ones in the picture are out of view. The electronics on the racks beside each speaker probably are pre- and power amplifier stages in mono, thus one of each for each of the five studio monitors. Professional pricing is not an issue here.
A good heap of the sound achieved in recording studios comes from the acoustic treatment of the room the studio is in. There is direct sound from the speakers preferred instead of reflected sound from the walls and the ceiling. It can all add up to thousands of bucks. A top audio engineer will have had good training and years or decades of professional experience in acoustically favourable conditions. Their understanding of sound truly should be exceptional.
If speakers of this quality - and every other one - end up in a small living room with glass surfaces everywhere and a lot of empty space, they will not sound nearly as good. So the audiophile buys all that stuff and does not really know what to do with it. Mostly, I guess. The lack of practical knowledge about his gear he can substitute with a lousy adjective collection some call a test.
There is no end to the freaky shit coming out of the esoteric audio circles. Apparitions which are set up in front of the speakers to treat the air for it to better transmit the sound waves. Really.
The illustration above is from a rogue audiophile magazine called The Audio Critic. They do the scientific testing routine and somewhat influenced the tone of this post.
Previous Topic
Index
