[James Tanner]

http://www.openculture.com/2012/02/neil_young_on_the_travesty_of_mp3s.html

james

[PRELUDE]

Good morning James,
Very interesting interview and I like the donkey as well.

Any way, What he is saying is true but I have different opinion on this.
Let's say I want to encourage a young one to go this way and after a while he gets frustrated because he cannot find his favorite music in this format then what??
In compare we have few different music genres here and there and about 80% if not more of them are jazz and classical.
If the music lover is the serious one, he/she would love to see the copy of that album in his hand and love to see it in his collection but not to be surrounded by few hard drives.
Again and again this is all about marketing and if there is no money this would be disappear also. Some times I compare the music download with car warranty because of big similarity that they share. How many times you went to car dealer and they try to sell you warranty on the brand new vehicle???
One sells man That I know of told me that, we do not sell a lot of cars in this days but we sell more extended warranties which makes more money for us instead of selling the vehicle itself.
Now if you look that how this download business works, then you can realize that they very similar to each other. Why make Cd's and press LPs and spend all that money to make what we could make by doing nothing but let the consumer to download their music at home. Now if the sound is good as well, that would be the excuse for them forever.

[Phil A]

Neil Young is one artist who cares about the quality of his music catalog

[Mag]

IMO the issue here is that the consumer is being sold an inferior product, and the music industry is getting away with it.

What other business can you sell a crap product and expect to succeed?

The evidence is that great recordings were made as far back as the '60s. Yet today you can purchase an album from an artist, not all artists, and it sounds veiled. You know they could have sold it in a pcm format. Instead they sold the music I'm thinking dvd here, in a compressed Dolby which is inferior to even the cd format and sounds like crap.

[brucek]

IMO the issue here is that the consumer is being sold an inferior product, and the music industry is getting away with it.

Who would notice?

Everyone is quite content to walk around with crappy ear buds, fed from their I-phone, listening to MP3's.

I don't see anyone complaining.

brucek

[JerryM]

Who would notice?

Everyone is quite content to walk around with crappy ear buds, fed from their I-phone, listening to MP3's.

I don't see anyone complaining.

brucek

 

You need to get out more often. 

[Laundrew]

Who would notice?

Everyone is quite content to walk around with crappy ear buds, fed from their I-phone, listening to MP3's.

I don't see anyone complaining.

brucek

Great observation 

Cannot help but get the feeling that a great deal of individuals today are not very fussy about the quality of reproduction of their music - almost as if they use music as a condiment while out and about during the day. In my situation, a simple car audio system or my iPod is all that I require while away from home.

Be well...

[Andre2]

Just watched the interview... It is clear that he cares a lot about music in general, its quality, and music community.  Great guy, really.

[brucek]

In my situation, a simple car audio system or my iPod is all that I require while away from home.

Off-times I think the audiophile worships the equipment a bit too much when it should be about the music. I'm guilty of that myself. My main system is probably in the $45K range, and I fuss with speaker positioning and all the nonsense that audiophiles like to obsess about.

The fact is, I know I enjoy the music more on my second system which consists of a simple el-cheapo Denon receiver and a rag-tag set of speakers. I never fuss with it, I just listen to music. A lot of the music is MP3, WMA, YouTube, etc, etc. It's about the music. Same goes when I'm in my car. I love my CD's in the car. The system sucks - who cares.

brucek

[terry parr]

i remember reading somewhere that steve jobs was quoted as saying, in effect, that (the i-pod generation) is the first generation of young people who value convenience of the music delivery device over the fidelity of the music.  it would be awfully ironic if indeed he did say that. 

whether jobs actually said that or not, i don't know.  but it does seem to be true that among todays' young crowd that ease of use and portability trumps sound fidelity.

younger people these days don't "sit and listen" to music anymore, anyway.  not like we did. 

 

         

[James Tanner]

i remember reading somewhere that steve jobs was quoted as saying, in effect, that (the i-pod generation) is the first generation of young people who value convenience of the music delivery device over the fidelity of the music.  it would be awfully ironic if indeed he did say that. 

whether jobs actually said that or not, i don't know.  but it does seem to be true that among todays' young crowd that ease of use and portability trumps sound fidelity.

younger people these days don't "sit and listen" to music anymore, anyway.  not like we did. 

 

         

There's a big difference between listening to music and collecting it 

James

[Andre2]

after listening to this interview, I am asking myself: should I add an analog vinyl system to my digital only system   

[rajacat]

Off-times I think the audiophile worships the equipment a bit too much when it should be about the music. I'm guilty of that myself. My main system is probably in the $45K range, and I fuss with speaker positioning and all the nonsense that audiophiles like to obsess about.

The fact is, I know I enjoy the music more on my second system which consists of a simple el-cheapo Denon receiver and a rag-tag set of speakers. I never fuss with it, I just listen to music. A lot of the music is MP3, WMA, YouTube, etc, etc. It's about the music. Same goes when I'm in my car. I love my CD's in the car. The system sucks - who cares.

brucek

Why don't you chuck your 45K system and just listen to mp3's in your car and main home system? That would certainly simplify your life and get rid of an unhealthy obsessive compulsive disorder. A side benefit would be that you'd waste less time posting on audiophile forums where, for the most part, your disorder gets reinforced.

I'd do that if I was in your situation since this hobby in supposed to be about enjoying the music.

Personally, I don't have that conflict since I enjoy listening to music on my tweaked home system, both lossless digital and vinyl  much more that my car system. When I'm on a walk or away from my home system, I enjoy just being fully aware of my surroundings, extraneous sounds and all. I've never owned an ipod type device and don't want poorly reproduced music to be constantly blaring into my ears/brain.
You'd probably enjoy your 45K system more if you didn't subject yourself to mp3 oversaturation.

[James Tanner]

after listening to this interview, I am asking myself: should I add an analog vinyl system to my digital only system   

I think what he was saying was 192/24 digital files are equal in his opinion to analog LP's. MP3's have 5% of the content of 192 or LP's. CD's have about 30% of the data.

James

[terry parr]

i guess music has just become secondary in a lot of young peoples' lives these days.  they just don't seem to value it like a lot of people (who are now my age) did.

people don't come home like me and sit and listen.

guess it's due to all the fine programming on television these days.   

in "hi-def", no less.

seriously, there are other distractions, too.  my generation didn't have the internet (where you can come off as a pompous ass, know-it-all on an audio discussion board where it's sometimes enjoyable to make fun of the younger generation,  who lack your insight and sensitivities).

and let's not forget gaming.  we didn't have "grand theft auto", either.   

hell, if i would've had all that at 16, i probably would've totally missed "aja" by steely dan coming out in 1979. 

i just dated myself.  but, even if i would have had the distractions that young people have today, i still think i would've enjoyed that album just as much as i did back then.  i hope that i would have.

seriously, i look at it like this.  (even though this isn't the be-all and end-all to the discussion).  but with all the information available on the internet today about sound and music reproduction, if anyone's interested in improving their music listening enjoyment, then the information's out there.  everyone knows what "google" is.   and if they don't care, then they won't bother looking.  it just won't be important to them. 

it's important to me.  but, if everyone were like me it would be a very boring world for even me to live in. (it would be a smarter, friendlier place.  and we would all be having more fun if everyone were like me.  but, i digress).   

it's a big world.  we're all different.  and there should be room for all of us.

my sensibilities arn't offended if i hear someone with a hearing impairment listening to lil wayne with their windows down while we're both waiting at a stop light. 

i just think to myself:  "ah.  another music lover."  ha. ha.  and i'm also thinking:  [this post has been edited for content which some may find offensive]    

[terry parr]

just kidding, guys.

i haven't been "edited."   (at least not yet, anyway).     i put that on there. 

could we say that neil youngs' argument is, for the most part "falling on deaf ears?"

no.  it's falling on tin ears.
 

[Andre2]

I think what he was saying was 192/24 digital files are equal in his opinion to analog LP's. MP3's have 5% of the content of 192 or LP's. CD's have about 30% of the data.

James

Yeah, I think you are right.  My system includes an dac that can accept 192/24 format, and I have some three "albums" (can we still call them that?) and they sound pretty good, and much better/denser/more detailed than their cd versions.