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Can Bad Recordings sound Good?


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1 hour ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

My view is that over 90% of "Hi-Fi" is in the quality of the recording. GIGO.

 

My view is that the 90% lies with the integrity of the playback chain.

 

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The better the reproducing system the more transparently it will reveal what sounds like real (unamplified) sounds in a real acoustic space.

 

Correct. But the acoustic space may be completely artificial, being that of say synthesizer instruments, but it still completely works as a listening experience ... I would suggest Jarre here as a good example.

 

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The better the reproduction system the more it will reveal good and bad bits of a recording.Good bits of bad recordings can make the presentation sound less unpleasant, indeed pleasant if one is able to mentally tune out the bad bits.One can rediscover many old recordings in this way. The bad bits however are still revealed and no amount of system tweaking will overcome this if transparency is maintained.

 

The bad bits are discarded, unconsciously, by the listening brain - this has been repeated for me endless times; I have technically very poor recordings, where the dumbness of the mastering screams at me when the SQ is below par - but a bit of magic occurs when that level is improved; the flaws that I know are there essentially vanish like a mirage ... if I choose to really, really focus on the defects that I know are there, I can certainly hear them happening - but as soon as I relax that concentration, the music comes back; it supersedes the otherwise clear issues.

 

This won't occur for everyone - but I don't know anyone personally who is not "tricked" by their brain in this manner.

 

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Tweaking a HiFi system to make the bad bits of recordings sound "good" (less bad) = coloration. All recordings start to sound of the signature of the color chosen and one may gravitate to certain recordings that suit the color. In essence you convert a HiFi system into a mid or more likely Lo-Fi system. Radios and car stereos can sound 'good' with bad recordings because of the information discarded - you end up with a truncated, compressed, music-in-a-tin sound. This is fine to get the gist of the melody and rhythm especially for familiar tunes.

 

Nope. The latest active speakers I'm using are a perfect example of what happens: so far, I have done zero internally to these units; I've stabilised them physically, tidied up and organised all the cables that they use, and added some mains filtering - what they now present from recordings I have heard myriads of times, on multiple rigs, is close to, or the very same presentation as they have always given at their best ...they are an excellent shortcut to getting to what the recordings contains. Could they be better? Of course ... they still don't disappear, and the finest detail is still not forthcoming - but they do a damn fine job of it, so far!

 

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The other biggy with tweaking of course is the possibility of confirmation bias. But the emperor has no clothes if nobody else perceives it.

 

The trick with tweaking is to cycle through every one of one's difficult recordings if you feel good progress has been made - don't leave a single one out! If one has merely altered the signature of the distortion rather than "fix things", then there will be at least one that shows that "you are not there yet", 🙂.

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1 hour ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

 

From your post, this is about the only thing I agree with Frank . If the sound is totally artificial we have no reference point other than it sounds good or bad to you in an absolute sense. We still do know what  a 'live' amplified guitar sounds like

 

Many recordings are mixes of real, and synthetic sounds - an easy test is whether those sounds within it that are the genuine acoustic article come across realistically...some favourites here are vocals layered across a complex pop/rock soundscape, and the inclusion of a small string section, as backing, in some pop tracks - the latter should be as authentic as would be conveyed in a 'proper' classical recording.

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2 hours ago, Allan F said:

 

I don't see how can it be otherwise, absent disagreement as to what a "bad" recording is.

 

That's the tricky bit ... we need a list a "bad" tracks, or albums, which "most" people agree upon - I submit:

 

Adele 21

ABBA's Ring Ring

 

😜

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7 hours ago, Summit said:

 

any records that doesn’t sound very good doesn’t sound good because:

 

1. The record is heavily compressed. A good system is faster, airier, more open and more dynamic and have much better transient response than a bad system. All those aspects improves the better the system.

 

Indeed heavy compression is the hardest to 'tame'. Even with a system in a very high state of tune this type of mastering presents as a very aggressive, abrasive presentation - it's as if the musicians were playing at 11 throughout the song; there is almost no light and shade in the performance ... emotionally fatiguing, a single track's worth will wear you out. This is one place where remastering indeed will do a lot of good - I did decompression of a pop track where the use of compression was very simple; and this made a huge difference to the sense of the piece.

 

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2. The record lack bass and sound thin. A good audio system has a real density and fullness that a bad audio system is lacking. All those aspects improves the better the system.

 

IME all records have sufficient bass, and fullness - the density is there in the recording. Quite often when a setup reaches a high point the tables are turned - the "bad" recording is far richer, and more intense than nominally "good" recordings.

 

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3. The record has a harsh treble. A good audio system has natural sound that is smooth without smoothing over or loss of details and transparency. All those aspects improves the better the system.

 

Unsorted treble in a playback chain is the greatest vice that I come across - any harshness is due to flaws in the system. It may be hard to knock over all the little gremlins that do the damage here; but all the efforts made to achieve this will be well rewarded. There is real magic when one gets this right - play a track at high volume of a swing orchestra going full blast, recorded in the 1930's; the power of the brass ripping into it bowls you over - in a good way! 😉

 

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4. The recording sound bad because of artifacts and noise. A good audio system will revile those flaws more than a bad one. Those aspect is masked by the bad system so you can’t hear them as well.

 

Technical artifacts "disappear" when the SQ is good enough for one to completely tune into the musical presentation - this is an exact parallel to vinyl playback, where it's a well known characteristic that subjectively the pops and crackles get pushed aside, when the rig is performing at a very high level.

 

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This system can make even modest recordings sound really good. 

 

image.png.6c745530f3a8b2f822e06573389251a4.png

 

These have the potential to sound impressive - I have yet to actually hear in person a system using these that doesn't sound like it's trying to physically assault me; but I know this is due to poor setup of the driving chain - so I'm sure one day I'll come across some that are workin' right ... 😁

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@gmgraves said,


 

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So, it doesn’t matter that your comment was a non-sequitur? And that you are answering a question that nobody asked?

The fact is, Frank, that most commercial recordings are sonic junk.

 

No. Most playback setups add enough distortion, so that they sound like, "sonic junk".

 

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Where do you get the idea that I’m unaware of the advancements in playback hardware? Or that I don’t like such advancements? And finally, isn’t this revelation antithetical to your usual mantra that high-end hardware is not necessary and that all you need is some cheap mid-Fi equipment, a pair of boom-box ghetto blaster speakers and the famous “Frank method“ to get as close to the original performance as technically possible and make every recording sound like you are in the room with the musicians irrespective of that recording’s origin or quality? As I have been saying all along Frank, you are as full of it as a stuffed Christmas goose.

 

 

My mantra is that low cost gear gets enough right to deliver a satisfying listening experience - but, may require tweaks to deliver that. The previous NAD and Sharp combo had so many rough edges in them, especially the NAD amp - partly because of age - that I've spent ages debugging all of that. The new digital speakers have really surprised me, because they have done so much to avoid all the issues that I've had to deal with in that NAD combo - now, the new and the old are relatively neck and neck in SQ terms; the NAD still did some things better, and the Edifiers are ahead in other ways.

 

What they both do is deliver a good 95% of what I know the recording can deliver - my method is to keep pushing the envelope until what they can do takes full advantage of their engineering, without getting silly about it.

 

The advancements are that something like the Edifier is silly cheap for what it does, even in raw form - meaning far less tweaking is required ... it still surprises me how good they sound from a dead cold start in the morning; I haven't come across a rig before that did this as well.

 

Does "every recording sound like you are in the room with the musicians irrespective of that recording’s origin or quality"? ... No, but it has excellent potential - the throwing up of a soundstage is vastly better than most of the expensive gear I heard at the last hifi show, and overall integrity is of a very high order.

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2 hours ago, SJK said:

When I listen to one of my father's 10" jazz LPs, something like Meade Lux Lewis and Louis Bellson - Boogie Woogie Piano and Drums, I just don't care.  

 

 

 

Speaking of that style, and age of music, I have a whole CD stuffed with tracks of that era ... this can work quite marvellously, and my active speakers do them pretty well at this stage ,,, a sample - and this is the precise version of this number that I have,

 

 

Both the big band crescendos, and the piano hit the mark - Bev wants this CD to be played, ever day! 😁

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Since the Rolling Stones have now been added to the list of baddies, I decided to pull out the real roughie - the very first album, https://www.discogs.com/The-Rolling-Stones-The-Rolling-Stones/release/919169 ... I regularly used this 15 years ago, to get the last ounce of detail to come to life.

 

Hmmm, not too bad - but not as articulate as it can get - there are a whole variety of borderline aspects in the qualities of parts of the soundscape that can be used to monitor the SQ; for example, the tambourine used at times is a good indicator. What it strongly indicated is that more mains filtering is needed - definite gains when I pulled the plug on appliances, etc, on separate circuits.

 

Mono recording, and I was pleased to see that the phantom image tracked completely from in front of the left, across to the right speaker. Wasn't able to carry past the outer edge of the span of the speakers - but this is a good result at this point in the tweaking.

 

Does it sound, good? Ummm, this is a tough one - the recording quality in many areas is marginal; and requires absolutely pristine playback to pull it off ... some people would appraise it as a fail, at this moment; but I'm quite happy with the standard achieved so far.

 

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8 hours ago, bluesman said:

We’re all happy when our music at home sounds real and live and pleasing. But the question was  whether bad recordings can sound good. The answer is yes.  For me, a recording that makes Ron Carter sound even a little like Ray Brown is a bit of a bad recording.  But I love Dave Grusin’s Sheffield album “Discovered Again” anyway because the playing is excellent, the band is tight, and the music (although a bit too smooth-jazzy for me today) is fun to hear when I’m in the mood. It sounds good to me.

 

So we argue what it means to say what a bad recording is - if we come from the angle that the technical expertise used in making it decides that, then many recordings from audiophile labels fail - for me. I'm thinking here of a piano recording where the sound is swimming in massive reverb; a grand piano in the bathroom effect; and a chamber group album where the top string from each instrument has been removed, subjectively; or a modern soul recording where absurd fake vinyl pops and scratches have been added.

 

If the playback of a recording, any recording, irritates, annoys me - and I lose or have no interest in continuing to listen to it, then "badness" is in the air ... and that may be because the playback chain is flawed, or the technical decisions taken in the production of the sound don't ring right. For the latter reason, every time I see words like "Remastered by Mobile Fidelity" I lose all interest in having a listen ...

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6 hours ago, Summit said:

 

High fidelity is not about hearing and identifying those basic key characteristics. It’s about listing at records at home and not only identify who is singing or playing, it’s about getting the feeling that you hear those musicians live on a stage – that it sounds real and lifelike. But to trick us to believe that we actually are listing to real musicians live on a stage is next to impossible and we have to be satisfied by coming close to that. How close depends on type of music genres and the listener’s experience.

 

Certainly achievable to get the sense of listening to a live event - the intro track of Hot August Night is a brilliantly done piece which takes you to the action, 100% - a show off piece which all rigs should be able to pull off.

 

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BUT to come close is no easy task and everything from the recording to the room and audio system has to be superb for it to happen.

 

Agree. The closer you want to get to the ultimate, the harder it becomes - obsessive attention to detail is vital ... but most audio people aren't in the right headspace to do this, in my experience.

 

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Bad Recordings can’t sound good, because if they did they would not be bad recordings. It the same with audio system, we cannot use bad recorded music and hope to really evaluate the how good a hifi system is.  

 

I find the complete opposite - the worse technically a recording is, the more obvious are the modulations of the recordings flaws by the deficiencies of the playback setup ... it's a compound increase in what may annoy. Two very different, but high performing rigs will present a technically poor recording in precisely the same way - you will hear exactly the same areas in the sound being marginal in both situatiuons.

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4 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

Define "Good."

 

If Good is accuracy to the source, then yes. If Good is pleasing to the listener, also yes as its completely subjective.

 

Indeed. Listening to Hendrix, and his Marshall amp is having a hissy fit - it's making outrageous noises, which have nothing to do with the music; the valves are gargling away, oblivious to how they are supposed to behave. This is dreadfully poor, technically ... but don't we love it! 😉

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6 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

A meaningless argument at best. Who cares what a good sounding system does to a poor recording? Nobody WANTS to listen to a poor recording, and the only reason to put up with one is that the listener likes the musical composition and/or the artist, and the poor recording is the only way to experience either. My take on this dilemma is simple: Since the mid 1950’s, there is simply no technical excuse for any record company to release a poor sounding recording. The technical ability to make superb stereo recordings has existed since that time.

 

Because one cares about music ... 🙂. The recordings are the only auditory, umm, records of what happened in a particular place - and if what turns you on is the texture of live instruments and people creating such, then getting the best out of what's in the archives matters.

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5 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

Did I not just say that the only reason to endure poor recordings is that it’s the only way to experience the music that’s on those recordings? I think I did.

 

You used the word "endure" - IME a specific, technically poor recording can range from being an almost unbearable torture, through to being an energising, fully satisfying journey - depending on the state of the rig used to play it. I much prefer it to be down the latter end, thank you very much! 😁

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Another CD I use for monitoring,

 

essential_odetta__27901.1457478374.jpg?c

 

At Carnegie Hall; very, very low recorded level, almost still air some of the time  - I normally have to have this at maximum gain for it to be as loud as, say, a TV. Hard to get the voice right; the slightest issue, and the vocal becomes a bit of a caricature of what one would expect this type of singer to come across like. But get it right, and you have a live human being singing for you, just over there ... makes the effort to get it happening worthwhile.

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4 hours ago, Allan F said:

 

OTOH, if you view the question of whether bad recordings can sound good as whether they nevertheless can be subjectively enjoyed, IMO that is a different issue. They may "sound good", but not because of good sound. :)

 

Technically bad recordings sound good, because they provide enough information to the listening brain for it to completely automatically, unconsciously, divide the musical performance from the artifacts - anyone who hasn't experienced this happening, or who is unaware of what is happening, won't appreciate how this behaviour of the human hearing system works ... the closest most people get to being aware of this is when they listen to what they may describe as a "magic rig" - they will make comments like, "Wow, I listened to a recording I've heard a 100 times, and it was transformed! There was so much more there, and I felt like I was in the room with the musicians - it was an experience at a whole new level !" ... that's what happens when the brain gets enough data to discard the "annoying bits".

 

This was a pattern that repeated for me for recording after recording, over many years ... it took a while for the penny to drop - but now I know how to exploit this phenomenon; it's core to my "method", 😉.

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7 hours ago, Summit said:

 

It true that a good audio system cannot make bad recordings sound good, but a good system are not adding its own flaws on top of the ones already imprinted in a mediocre recording.  

 

There is another level beyond a good system not adding (obvious) flaws on top of the recording's ones - many of the remaining flaws in an ambitious system will be quite subtle, and the owner may be quite oblivious to their presence ... but they are there - it's the removal of them that leads to the specialness in the SQ that will seem like magic to many people ...

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37 minutes ago, firedog said:

KOB: I don't have an original vinyl version, so can't comment on that. But I have a 60's and 70's vinyl version and neither "sound good" in the technical sense: On those versions, and also on my 80's CD, listen to the horns as they enter in So What - they're distorted. Just one example. And in general the bass is weak and you don't get the real sound of a double bass in all it's subtleties. 

 

 

Horns distorted? I hear player technique here - "imperfect" blowing, so that a roughness intrudes at the end of the note.

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5 minutes ago, Audiophile Neuroscience said:

 

I find really esoteric (esoteric to me, subjective) jazz much the same way. A bit self indulgent and not terribly accessible. I know, heresy to jazz aficionados. Hearing it live is quite something else, again mesmerizing!! I will sit in a jazz club for hours. I am actually listening to more of the jazz classics now than ever before (some mentioned on this thread) as my audio system is the best I have ever owned. So, sound quality comes into it but I think there is more to it. Interested to hear what others feel.

 

Agree with listening to music outside one's comfort zone - the better the SQ, the easier it is to tune into sound sculpting which is way outside the normal - say, bizarre electronica, which is full of sounds like kitchen cutlery falling on the floor, etc, etc.

 

The point is that that one 'understands' why the musicians are creating the sounds they do; why it appeals to them to do so.

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13 hours ago, Confused said:

 On other occasions, I might listen to something in the car and think "this sounds terrible, it sounds thin and shrill, treble to slice your head off".  I listen to the same track on the home system, and yes, it sounds terrible, thin and shrill, treble to slice your head off, exactly the same issues as picked up on the lesser in car system.  So in these cases this is not in line with the fas42 philosophy, but a more simple "garbage in garbage out", if there are issues with a recording, a decent audio system will simply faithfully reproduce these issues.

 

This is the coalface ... I had this thinking 15 years ago; but lesson after lesson delivered by a "bad" recording snapping into shape weaned me out of it 🙂 ... these days, I go straight to the recordings in this category - they tell me so, so much about what the rig is getting wrong; so, very little time wasted in frittering away at the edges, making "quite decent" recordings sound a touch better ...

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19 hours ago, sandyk said:

 I was exposed to the real sound of the Bagpipes as a child at the local Caledonian Society, as my father and grandfather were born in Scotland. The men , including my father also wore a Kilt.

 

There's bagpipes ... and then there's bagpipes ...

 

 

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4 hours ago, Allan F said:

 

Fair enough. But that was not the original subject of this thread. Rather, it was whether the playback of a bad recording can sound good from a sonic point of view. Somewhere along the way, some have changed the substance of the question being asked, which naturally may change the nature of the answers to be anticipated.

 

I interpret "can sound good" as meaning that all the technical issues that "mar" what the actual performance would have sounded like, had you actually been at the place where the recording was made, are 'masked' completely, or almost so, by the brain being able to hear past the deficiencies ... this is a completely unconscious mechanism  - if you have "to think about it", then it's a fail ...

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50 minutes ago, Confused said:

I did say at the end of my post that "I think it is impossible to generalise with the "bad recording" issue".  So what is a bad recording?

 

... as has been asked, so many times 🙂.

 

50 minutes ago, Confused said:

Much of my post referred to my own subjective observations.  If there is something in the recording that irritates me, then a decent system will faithfully reproduce the irritation. 

 

The nub of it ... a "decent" system may faithfully reproduce that artifact - but, depending upon the makeup of the individual, the message of the music may override, mask the irritation. I have mentioned an appallingly bad mastering of a Gene Pitney's hits CD I have ... poor quality needle drops, and extremely hamfisted noise reduction applied to mend some of the mess; depending upon the quality, and state of the rig this sounds in the range of unbearably atrocious, through to being very difficult to detect - I find it remarkable that the human hearing system can compensate, when the conditions are right; many won't be bothered going to the effort of evolving a setup to this level, but the point is that this is something that's possible.

 

50 minutes ago, Confused said:

 

 But on any reasonably well set up system, if a recording has way too much treble, it will annoy me.  A decent system will faithfully reproduce the excessive treble.  With this being an aspect I am sensitive to personally, I will not be able to listen past it, no matter how "well sorted" the system

 

The treble may be "excessive" - but the amount of non-liner distortion impacting that frequency area is absolutely critical - do everything to reduce the misbehaviour below a certain amount; the mind then accepts the energy as being valid, and compensates. Yes, this may vary per listener; but so far I've found that if I'm happy with the treble, then those around me have no issues with the sound either.

 

50 minutes ago, Confused said:

 

But lets argue this point to the ridiculous.  Lets say you had a truly bad recording.  I mean really bad.  Not a case of a 60's recording that may have a touch of tape hiss or HF roll off, or a modern track that may be overly compressed and the mix a touch hot, but something truly terrible.  Maybe a track that has the treble boosted +50dB, and all low frequencies brick wall filtered below 1kHz.  OK - A crazy example, but surely we can all agree that such a recording would sound bad on anything.  As I said, we cannot generalise either about "bad" recordings or as to how one individual may subjectively react to such a bad recording.

 

If deliberately damaged to an absurd level, then of course there should be reservation about whether one could put up with listening to it. But assuming that it was mastered with the intention of being worthwhile hearing, then IME it can be pushed to the point of working as a satisfying experience.

 

I have hundreds of tracks, over a huge range of "being difficult", in every possible area that SQ can be unpleasant - complete success would be a rig that could handle every single one of them, one after the other ... turns out that the closer one gets to this point, the harder one has to work at refining things a touch more - I choose to do this; others won't.

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5 hours ago, Confused said:

OK - Reducing unpleasant distortions in the system is a good idea, I cannot see anyone would disagree with that.  But what if there were significant non-linear treble distortions in the recording?  Granted, a system without HF non linear distortions will reproduce the recording better than a system with HF non linear distortions.

 

What you say makes sense ... surely a recording with significant issues in the treble area will be hard to digest? ... Well, the practical side of it, rather than any theory about what may be happening, is that the mind has enough ability to "hear through" this, IME - there is a single source of the anomalies, that within the recording itself; which is not compounded, largely, by any in the playback chain ... the brain very, very quickly registers the 'signature' of the track, and extracts what it knows belongs to the music, and rejects that that doesn't. The addition of what is typically a variation of the style of treble distortion, from the replay misbehaving, is too much for the listening mind - and it gives up.

 

 

5 hours ago, Confused said:

 

But if you listen to an unfamiliar recording on an unfamiliar system and you observe these non linear distortions, how would you know if they were in the recording or generated by the system?  Or in other words, a perfect recording played on a system generating modest non-liner distortion would sound the same as a recording with modest non-liner distortion played on a perfect system.

 

I can think of a very specific pop recording, from the 80's, here ... female vocals, for a phrase or two, has the nature of those changing; on a lower performing setup you notice this, but each is "as good as the other" - but when pristine replay occurs, the voices sound very lifelike for the most part; when the switch occurs, it's obvious that they're going through a rather crude effects unit, which adds an autotune type of enhancement - but the quality of the electronics is not good; it's almost jarring, because the instant loss of vocal integrity is too marked - it's out of context with what was there a split second earlier.

 

Ummm, a "perfect recording played on a system generating modest non-liner distortion" is where a lot of audiophile rigs playing audiophile recordings are ... 🤪 😜 . How else does one explain that a particular, "perfect", recording sounds different on different rigs; or different when they change some part of a single rig ... hmmm?

 

I use familiar recordings on an unfamiliar rig - this is fast tracking to pick up the signature distortions of that setup; and then no matter what gets put on, the same flavour keeps coming through every time - you're always hearing the distinctive seasoning of the combo of components. This means certain recordings will sound fabulous, and others will be terrible  - the two sets of distortion are either in harmony; or clash badly.

 

5 hours ago, Confused said:

So yes, do everything to reduce the misbehaviour in the system, I agree.  But this does not eliminate the issue if the problem is in the recording any more than a perfect recording would eliminate the issue if the problem in the system.

 

Fortunately, this is not how it works - every thing I've learned over the years supports the idea that the better the playback gets, the better the chance that an "unlistenable" recording will come good. This "miracle" has happened too many times, for me to think otherwise.

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14 hours ago, Confused said:

 

 

To be fair, we are in the realms of the subjective here.  So what one person experiences might be true for them, even if others experience differently.  How could we ever know?

 

So far, those around me are generally in agreement when I feel a rig is in a good place - the few naysayers have always been, ummm, audiophiles 😝 ... their ability to listen to a system stinking with distortion, and "hear past it", always amazes me ... 🙂.

 

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First to say that I do see the value in what you are saying, in terms of a mindset to assist with improving a system.  Rather than "blame" the recording, look to see if there is something in the system that may be exacerbating the issue, something that can be improved or anomalies that can be removed.  Why not?  A quest to make all recording as listenable as possible seems valid.

 

Yes.

 

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With that said, I can see all this in a completely different way.  As an example, I have a small DAB radio.  It is not "high fidelity".  No recording will sound good on it, in the "absolute sound" definition of sounding good.  Yet, I can listen to almost anything on that little radio, it has quite a rich, pleasant, and mellow tone.  I can enjoy the music, and will almost never hear anything on it where I will think "this is a bad recording".  So in a way, all music and all recordings are "listenable" on that little radio, almost nothing irritates.  I guess in absolute terms, all the radio is doing is reducing everything to a common denominator of poor sound quality.  But it is not quite that simple, it is pleasant and enjoyable to listen too, but the lack of resolution and lack of full frequency response I think can mask a whole range of issues in the recording, to the point where although nothing sounds spectacularly good, nothing irritates either, so it can be enjoyable if the music appeals.

 

I come from another angle here too - the simplicity of the radio, as an engineered whole, means that a lot of the problems that hifi rigs introduce, by the way they are assembled, are absent ... the "nothing irritates" to me is a giveaway that what it's capable of doing, is being done very well - I give it a solid tick.

 

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When you move to a decent system, the situation changes.  The resolution and full frequency response of the system will bring issues in the recording into clear focus.  Yes, of course any problems in the system will likely exacerbate problems in the recording, so it is a fine and noble quest to try to eliminate such problems in the system, but even if you achieved a hypothetical perfect system, with zero distortion, errors or anomalies, then this system will just faithfully reproduce any errors in the recording.  At this point, the ability of the brain to "extracts what it knows belongs to the music, and rejects that that doesn't" would depend on the nature of the defect, and the subjective response of ones own brain.  To this point, I have a rough idea of how my brain is responding, most of the time at least, but little idea re the brains of others.  What I am pretty sure about is that my little brain would still be annoyed by certain anomalies in the recording, even when listening on a hypothetical "perfect" system.  I know my brain, there are some things it would never listen past. 

 

Well, I would be curious what I would hear if I listened to one of your "bad" recordings on your rig, and then have you listen to that same recording on a setup that I was happy with the tune of ... I have recordings that I wrote off for years, until one day I had a system in a particularly good state, thought "What the hell ... !", put it on ... and fell over ...

 

This repeated too many times - and it seems to be relatively general, IME. When I visit the audio mate up the road we work towards an optimum, and then pull the "heavy duty" albums out - these can be close to unbearable, or, a marvellous sound ride ... it all depends. Last visit, he had an LP of Ike and Tina Turner which had a last track which he didn't want to listen to ... well, it came - and it was magic; worked a treat ... he was nonplused about this - but, he had never listened to it before with his vinyl in such good order.

 

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Yet, I have been surprised by how some upgrades and changes to my system have improved my enjoyment of some "lesser" recordings, so I get the idea, I really do.   It is just I know my brain gets VERY grumpy in the presence of some recording problems, so this idea has its limitations, for me at least.  For example, I just know that there are some recording issues that my own brain could never "listen past", I know for a fact that it just is not possible.  OK - You could counter this by saying that I have never head a system with the full "magic" qualities, I could counter saying I know for a fact that no competent system would allow me to listen past certain deficiencies in the recording.  I do know my brain better that most though.

 

I have never had a rig in the best possible state ... each set of components will have own, unique set of pluses and minuses - don't touch the pluses!! But work hard on the minuses - the latter will always be ready to creep out and bug you, because they're "built in"; what one does to counter them may be marginal, and for a variety of reasons may not be good enough, at a particular time, to let the recording shine.

 

A good example is the album Adele 21 - my Philips based rig years ago struggled with this one, only in absolutely the best circumstances did this work; yet the later NAD combo dealt with it with ease ...why should this be so? Because, the remaining distortions, from the playback chain, clashed in the first instance; but weren't an issue with the other. Note, there were recordings where this scenario was reversed - there is no simple, "one rig is just better than the other!".

 

What one works towards is a setup with zero character - I'm hopeful that the current active speakers can get pretty close; so far the signs are very encouraging.

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7 hours ago, Confused said:

I'm an audiophile!  In fact, I am most definitely an audiophile in the dictionary sense of the word.  To be honest, I suspect anyone responding to my recent posts in this thread must be an audiophile too.  Maybe you are referring to some kind of sub-set?  Actually, thinking about it, having the power to hear past a system stinking with distortion could save a lot of money, and presumably make recordings stinking in distortion sound just fine too?

 

Everyone on this forum is an audiophile ...by definition! 🙃

 

What I was getting at is that often people who are audio enthusiasts are always listening for the presence or absence of certain, audiophile approved characteristics - to me, they are often missing the point that overall the sound is bad, and all the good things about "fabulous bass!!", say, are not going to make up for that ...

 

You've said a number of times that you've had the experience of having a "lesser" recording snap into a far more positive presentation - what I'm saying is nothing different from that - it's a continuous curve, IME ... the more refined the rig, the more capable it is in pulling off this bit o' magic. And, again, why it appears to happen is that just enough extra detail comes through, more cleanly, of the event that was recorded, for the mind to switch over into the "mirage mode".

 

7 hours ago, Confused said:

 

 

Here I can only agree. This would be far more interesting and enlightening than debating on a forum in text form.  A bit tricky at the moment though, I suspect you are over 10,000 miles away, and at the moment I risk getting arrested just for traveling any further than the local supermarket.  (due to the pandemic that is, I am not wanted by the police or anything)

 

Just as we're starting to lift ours ... 🙂. The good empathy between the political areas here, the states, immediately breaks down, of course - accusing the other of "not doing it as well!", 🙄.

 

7 hours ago, Confused said:

 

Noting the above limitations of all this, I think it would be interesting if anyone could post some YouTube clips or similar, maybe including bad recordings that they could happily listen to, or maybe some examples of recordings so bad or annoying in some way that they are not considered listenable, or any examples and variations of the theme.  Pairs of recordings each side of ones personal "listenable" divide would be excellent.

 

Yep, excellent idea.

 

7 hours ago, Confused said:

 

OK - I know YouTube quality is not ideal, but in the context of recordings on the margins of listenability, it should not be too much of a limiting factor.

 

Is anyone interested in doing this?  It might prove to be a catalyst for some interesting and enlightening discussion?

 

Adele's "Rolling in the Deep" is a tremendous roller coaster ride of energy and emotion - this comes over with such power, and impact .. this should not bug one in the slightest, in any area - it's all about driving intensity, and works a treat!

 

 

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