QE,
While I like to be able to appreciate not-amazing recordings the one caveat that's often key no matter what gear you have is SPL. A lot of terrible recordings are a lot funner to listen to if the volume is KCANK3D. I like to listen to Lorde - Royals often. It's fun and good, but it could have used a lot better dubbing and stereo control over the snaps and bass; it's a little short on dynamic range too. But if I turn it up, it's still a blast. On the other side, I can listen to Gold by Ryan Adams are medium volumes and have fun; he even uses a gritty microphone setup (still slightly dynamic).
The point is coming, and that's that we aren't all lucky enough to be able to blast loud ass music all the time, so some higher grade stuff can be a little more consistent.
Although this made me think about maybe doing something to allow more listening to more material. If you're cooking or something else, perhaps some omnidirectional and intentional space loading, or LCS, etc, might be a good option. The two channel setup that nearly needs it's own room is a curse in many ways. But for many recordings it's blissful. Perhaps even having speakers that you can turn on/off "room listening" would be nice. The other trick in my mind is to get speakers closer to the wall via benign less noticeable treatment (and or wall cut outs even).
Most people want to attain good listening anywhere, hence a gazillion plastic pieces of shit that ipods plug into. A few quality pieces, maybe even built into cabinets running a simple NOS DAC and a DSP that will correct the massive problems, could provide some nice sound. There's some stuff like that out there, Sonos etc, but it's not near where it could be. It doesn't send quality sound everywhere, it's pretty localized. You can do better with some bookshelves speakers on a wall somewhere.
