Audiophile vs Music Lover – Which Are You?

pacifico · « **Reply #40 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 11:26 am »

music lover I cant afford or have the time to be a true audiophile. I'd never leave my house.

The_KiD · « **Reply #41 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 12:52 pm »

Definitely a Music Lover. I have a few extreme audiophile friends who cannot even sit through an album without constantly tweaking something in their rig to get that extra 1% they constantly chase after. And I mean moving speakers, changing positions of vibration devices, switching interconnects for different types of music, and a lengthy CD Treatment process before they even play a CD. It is pretty annoying after a while to me.

I am all for getting the best sound possible and trying new components and cables but listen to the music and enjoy it..

KiD

Soundbitten · « **Reply #42 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 12:56 pm »

My main aim was to get all my music to sound better on my system . So that meant conforming my system to the music rather than the other way around .

smargo · « **Reply #43 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 02:25 pm »

I am neither - I just love equipment - every 8 months i have to change - nothing satisfies me longer than that. Im in this hobby just to enjoy the equipment - i only like the music if im hearing it on a brand new system and im ony an audiophile when i spend at least $5000 every 8 months - not sure what im trying to say

thanks
smargo

mcgsxr · « **Reply #44 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 03:50 pm »

That is a tough one for me, and I suppose in the end it depends on how you define both.

I certainly love music, it has been a part of my life for as long as I have been able to ensure it has. I played violin for 9 years, trombone for 5, guitar briefly for 3 etc. I have owned audio gear of some kind since I was 10.

The hard part is this - I cannot listen to good music on a crap system. Nor can I listen to bad music on a good system.

Since I am willing to sacrifice some total FR extension for the coherence of midrange, I suspect I fall more into the music lover camp, but clearly love gear too!

Fence sitter I guess!

gooberdude · « **Reply #45 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 04:26 pm »

Definitely a Music Lover. My interest in audio is simply to get me 'closer' to what the live event is like, and 'closer' to what the recording engineers had in mind. the gear just gets me there.

I must admit though, that getting more into the gear (in some instances) has taken me farther away from the music. a double edged sword sometimes no doubt...

sts9fan · « **Reply #46 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 04:35 pm »

Take my gaer and give me a bose clock radio! All I NEED is the music!

woodsyi · « **Reply #47 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 04:38 pm »

Quote from: sts9fan on 26 Feb 2007, 04:35 pm

Take my gaer and give me a bose clock radio! All I NEED is the music!

Then why the agonizing post on what speakers to buy? Buy a Bose radio and get more music with the $1700 saved.

bprice2 · « **Reply #48 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 05:10 pm »

Audiophile = 1 part music lover (substantive) + 1 part gearhead (procedural).

Wind Chaser · « **Reply #49 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 06:36 pm »

One of the hallmarks of an audiophile is the “listening session.” It’s not about the music so much as the equipment. We gather together to spin some discs so we can scrutinize the equipment that is supposed to cause us to enjoy the music.

Audiophiles start off as music lovers, but somewhere along the way a conversion takes place in which equipment becomes the focal point and the music becomes a subservient means to understanding how good our system is. The system instead of being a means to an end, becomes the end all be all. You can be both a music lover and an audiophile, however usually one interest will over shadow the other.

sts9fan · « **Reply #50 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 06:40 pm »

Quote

Then why the agonizing post on what speakers to buy? Buy a Bose radio and get more music with the $1700 saved.

I agonize over it because I like nice speakers and I want them. I do not NEED them. Honestly I need music in my life or else I would go mad or madder.

Wind Chaser · « **Reply #51 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 06:56 pm »

Sts9fan is right. A music lover doesn't NEED any of this stuff. A simple boom box or even a Bose clock radio will do. Being able to play the music you like on demand is a bonus.

nathanm · « **Reply #52 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 07:14 pm »

I'll fess up. I started off as a music lover, but then I became mostly interested in cool-lookin' gear. Much more money spent on equipment the past few years. Even the storage cabinets I bought to hold my discs cost about $900. That doesn't make a whole lotta sense, does it? (well, they are dang nice cabinets, though) I used to be able to enjoy music on headphones, but I can't after hearing really good speakers. Also indicative of audiophile disease: I became fascinated with tube amps even though they just plain do not perform as well. They just look really really cool is all. *sigh* (this only applies to reproduction, with guitars tubes are sonically favorable)

Although part of this is just getting older and getting disinterested in current music, as well as the growth of over-compression abuse. But even the gear buying has thankfully stopped cause I spent too much money. I am grateful for being dissuaded from the cable sickness early on, although not before pissing $400 right down a rat hole. *doh!*

On a more positive note, I think what really defines an audiophile is simply the CONCERN for the experience of music listening and desiring greater quality. An audiophile could simply be a person who loves music, but feels it is better served by increased attention to detail. So yes, you can indeed enjoy a great song on a boom box; but the audiophile, upon hearing that song, desires nothing more than to transfer it over to the "big system" where the experience will be blown up into greater proportions.

Daygloworange · « **Reply #53 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 07:59 pm »

Quote

On a more positive note, I think what really defines an audiophile is simply the CONCERN for the experience of music listening and desiring greater quality. An audiophile could simply be a person who loves music, but feels it is better served by increased attention to detail. So yes, you can indeed enjoy a great song on a boom box; but the audiophile, upon hearing that song, desires nothing more than to transfer it over to the "big system" where the experience will be blown up into greater proportions.

I think you hit the nail right on the head there.

By that definition, yes, I am truly becoming an audiophile. With every system improvement I make, it definitely heightens my enjoyment more of the music. No doubt.

Guilty as charged.

I have no shame.

Cheers

weirdo · « **Reply #54 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 08:13 pm »

"concern for the music in greater detail"

I wish that were true in my case. I have to stop being one to be the other. Pursuit of musical detail and instrument separation is the audiophile in me. Pursuit of the relaxing/transcending musical piece is the music lover in me. These are not entirely the same person. Music is there when I need it to relax or excape TV. At those times, the accuracy of reproduction is significantly less of an issue. If I were properly grateful for everything in my life, including the fact that I am alive, have a good stereo,have time to listen to it in a warm home, the audiophile alter-ego might not re-surface. dk

Wind Chaser · « **Reply #55 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 08:26 pm »

After sitting in the sweet spot for a few minutes a girlfriend once commented something to the effect... “sure it sounds nice, but why be held hostage to a chair and just sit there aimlessly for hours on end doing nothing?” Good question, and then she asked – what might as well have been an indictment… “How much did you pay for this obsession AND selfish indulgence?"

She along with other women I have know seem to be of the opinion that high end audio is too cerebral and that tends to serve as an emotional barrier detaching one from the music. To a point I have to agree; we men do have a fascination with “the way music sounds.” That fascination is more intellectual and analytical than emotional by nature.

Audiophiles tend to dissect their systems attributes revealed by selected tracks from certain albums. Their most esteemed albums reveal the excellence of their systems capabilities. They may have many other fine albums in their collection, but because they do not have the same sonic merit that illustrates the systems potential, they don’t listen to or enjoy those albums as much. For an audiophile the fix is very cerebral.

Daygloworange · « **Reply #56 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 09:11 pm »

Quote

“How much did you pay for this obsession AND selfish indulgence?"

Yeah, uh-huh. I'm assuming this same woman has just the bare necessities in the bathroom, and only a few pairs of shoes, right?

Quote

After sitting in the sweet spot for a few minutes a girlfriend once commented something to the effect... “sure it sounds nice, but why be held hostage to a chair and just sit there aimlessly for hours on end doing nothing?”

Who's being held hostage? Aimlessly for hours doing nothing?

It's called chillin'. Some women don't get that. Would sitting there quietly reading a book, be considered aimlessly doing nothing? If it gives you pleasure and contentment, why does she not find it valid?

How does this woman chill? Shopping?

I'd like to know what she is passionate about in life. I find her remarks and observations rather shallow. Sorry.

Cheers

gilbodavid · « **Reply #57 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 11:10 pm »

I have a beef with audiophiles, they dont know what music sounds like. I'm probably wrong about this but I have played pianos and guitars more than I have listened to stereos, and in my teenage years spent so many hours playing my 1979 Hamer through a glorious tube amp alongside Clapton, Cale, etc on record. Pianists know a quality piano when they sit down and play it, they know a base register when their left hand strikes, they know what treble really sounds like when, like me playing my brother in law's concert Steinway, the magic happens. Why is it that my Taylor 314CE vibrates through my soul even when I play a simple Eminor chord, and I play it for hours and hours totally immersed in the sound, and my Yamaha cheapie stays against the wall hardly played.

What I look for in audio equipment is not the audiophile qualities, but the connection with the musician who is making the music. If I can find him or her in my living room like i find them live, and a Steinway does what it does when I play it, bearing its individual soul, then I am excstatic! For me so far this has meant One Thing Audio Quad esl57, Lenco on 50lb plinth, RB300 with cardas wire, Twl mod, and Denon DL103R, Sony 2000F pre and matching power amp. and only in certain places in certain rooms. BLAH

A case in point is Sade. I only realised how wonderful she sings, and how much her heart is with her when she sings when my esl57's appeared. Since then I have occasionally gone totally mad searching for the next peice of kit, but its only so I can get a bit closer to Sade, like i would do if she was in the room singing.

I have been saddened by all the audio shows i have been to in England, because the demonstrations of all the great and the good (yes i have heard most of the most expensive hifi ever made) in these rooms has been pitiful. For example, at Heathrow they are in generally very small acoustically all over the place rooms, and so what do the makers/dealers/disributers all do? bring in their biggest and most expensive speakers and destroy the sound at any volume with bass distortion so dire that a $200 boombox would have prevailed. I remember well the sole designer of Revolver speakers trying to explain to me how the "midbass" was affecting the acoustics slightly in his room. I left politely before screaming at him that it was ALL THE BASS AND ALL THE LOWER MIDRANGE and anything else god only knows! At that show 2 rooms were wonderful - a large avantgarde trio room (surprise surprise) and leema zen bookshelf speakers powered by an arcam AV amp and a shanling cd player. And did I hear a single one of the many people I saw there complain about all this. No. What do people think they are hearing?

Sorry to go on, first post pretty much for ages, and I'm feeling frustrated because i sold most of my gear to buy my house, and my amps are at the menders with dificult to find transister replacement problems.

Also, I must eat humble pie, because a modded t-amp i built and hated has suddenly sounded musical through some Shackman electrostatics and with my much maligned (by me) $4000 cd player! I'm gobsmacked, which leads me to wonder whether those damn audiophiles were right all along about system synergy... Damn Damn Damn

gilbodavid · « **Reply #58 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 11:12 pm »

And how come so many women love music and getting closer to musicians, but hardly any seem to suss that hifi can help them in both respects... ur hum....

PhishPhan · « **Reply #59 on:** 26 Feb 2007, 11:21 pm »

Quote from: Wind Chaser on 26 Feb 2007, 08:26 pm

After sitting in the sweet spot for a few minutes a girlfriend once commented something to the effect... “sure it sounds nice, but why be held hostage to a chair and just sit there aimlessly for hours on end doing nothing?” Good question, and then she asked – what might as well have been an indictment… “How much did you pay for this obsession AND selfish indulgence?"

Just get yourself a couch or a pair of chairs and you'll no longer be selfish as you can share your system with anyone... so long as you decide what you listen to.