LP "listening bars" trending... but why not digital?

[ednaz]

Article below talks about a craze that began in Japan (as so many seem to) and is now spreading. People are creating bars and cafes with high end audio gear, and carefully curated libraries of amazingly recorded and rendered (in the owner's opinion) vinyl. People come to have a drink or two, and quietly listen to what great music on great vinyl, selected by the DJ, sounds like through great gear.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/03/dining/vinyl-records-listening-bar-kissaten.html

 

Got me thinking... I believe that "vinyl" may be the least important part of the concept. Selecting the right albums it seems to me would be most important. I know a lot of music that sounds crappy on even the best DAC based system I've heard, and sounds no better (or worse) on vinyl, and vice versa. When someone wants to hear "what my system can do" I know there are a set of specific albums I go for, where I know the recording and engineering were superb. 

 

The quality of the components, seems to me, would also be big part of the "wow factor." Most people have never heard what a great tube amplifier can do for music, or what great speakers can sound like, versus what most people can afford.

 

Got me thinking about taking the same physical space concept - smallish bar or cafe with the space properly engineered for audio listening. The right diffusion and absorption on the floors and walls, that would sound as good with two people in the room as with 50 people. (I heard tons about how bad the Sydney Opera House was initially if there were empty seats.) 

 

...but with a digital source.  If you were going to build out a digitally based "listening bar", what would you choose for the system, from DAC to the speakers?

 

Keep in mind that setups that are magnificent if the listener sits in a six cubic foot sweet spot probably aren't the best choice. My two main systems are based on speakers that produce nice engaging sound staging no matter where you sit or stand (within reason).  

 

Also interested if you're of the opinion that even with the best digital sources it's not possible to get to a huge "wow" factor where people would seek out the place and return frequently.

[ednaz]

On 6/4/2019 at 9:38 PM, AudioDoctor said:

 

 

IMO you're completely missing the point of these places. There will be no sweet spot. The music is what matters. The medium is probably less important but it's neat that it's on vinyl. Also, the music is not the draw, it's a benefit. Everything else has to be there as well. No one is going to come to your cafe is the coffee is bad and the pastries suck just because you're spinning vinyl.
 

What you're describing is an audiophile listening space, not a cafe that also happens to spin vinyl.

I'm not missing the point. First, there are speakers (I've heard quite a few) that are unimpressive outside of the sweet spot, but breathtaking inside. I know that for certain from shopping for speakers for my two main audio systems. 

 

I AM talking about an audiophile listening space. The current description includes "that also happens to spin vinyl." I don't think many people have heard how amazing the jazz studio recordings of Rudi Van Gelder sound through top end equipment, or have heard how much better the recent digital remasters sound than the original issues on either CD or vinyl. There are some "live at" albums that are palpably three dimensional. 

My question is, would people choose to come drink in a place with the best of the best sound quality and music selected that's best of the best production, instead of at a place where people talk over the sound system because it's no great shakes. I know that in my younger days, there were one or two people where everyone else wanted to hang out because the audio system was head and shoulders better than anywhere else. 

[ednaz]

23 hours ago, Foggie said:

I can see Japan pulling this off.  Here, umm not so much - just another fad, fake, hollywood, kooky, popular, look at me - well at least for the most part😉

 

Yeah, not beyond notice that the three places in the US where it's caught on are New York City, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, where apartments are small and expensive.

[ednaz]

On 6/7/2019 at 3:56 PM, bluesman said:

You have to understand the Japanese and Asian culture in general to understand this and the many similar activities that pervade their lives but are absent from the cultures of much of western civilization.  This isn't about sound quality or hardware or any other specific element of the experience - it's about the experience itself.  It's about sensory input, awareness, and serenity.  It's about how it makes you feel as you immerse yourself in it.

 

 

I worked as a marketing and new product development consultant, and I have hundreds of stories about products or distribution that rocketed to ubiquity in Japan or Korea, but couldn't ever make the leap to other countries. Watched dozens of banks try to do kiosk banking they way they did in Korea and Japan,, with zero success. Brutal failures, in fact, where customers didn't just shun the kiosks, but voiced very strong and nasty opinions.

 

I've booked trips to NY and LA to visit the setups there. I've also gotten interest from a couple of small and mid-size colleges to do a six month trial in a coffee house style space - no alcohol - but it'll produce good information on the attractiveness of the overall "superb audio system" aspects.

[ednaz]

On 6/7/2019 at 4:30 PM, bluesman said:

As for distillation, it began in Asia - they were distilling and drinking fermented rice and mare's milk as far back as 800 BCE.  It spread to Greece by the next century and it was actually an Arabic alchemist who invented the pot still in about the 8th century.  The modern Japanese whiskey industry as we know it today dates to about 1930 and the establishment of what became Suntory.  But sake dates back about 2500 years in Japan, so they're way ahead of us in the wine world.

 

History is a little bit off. First mentions of beer brewing in the Middle East in writing were in Persia, around 7000 BCE, and you'll find it in the written records in Persia, Sumeria, Egypt. Since the first written mentions are 7000 BCE, they'd clearly been at it for longer than that. Egyptians were brewing beer and fermenting wine at industrial scale during the pre-dynastic period, 3100 BCE.  Bakers were also beer makers. They took loaves of bread, soaked them and immersed them in big jars to ferment.  (The royals and rich folks drank wine... beer was for the workers.) The wheat they used is now called emmer, and they also used rye. Later on (around 2000 BCE) they also brewed using grains instead of using bread. You'll find beer containers in the pyramid rooms where workers were interred.  Egyptians were distilling alcohol to drink second century BCE, which is where the Greeks learned it.

I'm part of a group that's using yeasts made from scrapings from bread bowls and beer jugs, taken from a couple recently opened tombs, dating to early Dynasty,  to make Egyptian-style breads and beers. (we're also experimenting with yeasts reclaimed from other historic time periods.) Yes, it does taste different. Yes, it genotypes differently from other typed contemporary yeasts, although someone's now in Egypt picking up samples to test.

[ednaz]

On 6/7/2019 at 4:27 AM, CatManDo said:

On a related note, there is a japanese music collector - Tony Narumiya - who organises "record concerts" for up to a dozen people in his listening room, playing records on his high end system. Here also, the main focus is on vinyl. I wonder how difficult it must be to keep people quiet for an entire LP side.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BxWEYu1A1K9/

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BsmNCShAmxb/

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BtHgqAxAMM4/

 

In the 'burb of Detroit where I grew up, we used to do something similar. A couple of us had sound systems that were very different from our peers. (I was a working musician and actor, so I had decent money compared to most teenagers. I had a couple of friends who were also working musicians or actors.) Weekends, people would bring their latest album acquisitions to one of our places, and the whole group would sit and listen. Rock, blues, jazz, classical, Eastern European Folk... Never had any problem with people staying quiet for a complete album side, don't remember anyone shushing anyone else. Might be that the various intoxicants that were involved had something to do with that.

[ednaz]

Just now, bluesman said:

 

I appreciate your knowledge and experience - your beer history is, of course, correct.  But beer is not a distillate, and I made no mention of or reference to beer.  I was responding to a comment about whiskey and wine.

 

Perhaps read the whole thing. Distilling spirits to drink was happening in Egypt second century BCE. An offshoot of the alchemistry focused distillation that had gone on for many centuries before.