I follow what you’re saying but if it were true, wouldn’t it also follow that most recordings balanced to match the “average home listening environment” would sound drier than intended when listened to on headphones? If this were the case, one would assume that post processing such as Crossfeed and reverb would be much more popular.
Perhaps the case is that when we place the sources (i.e. loudspeakers) in front of us, in a room, our eyes become involved, which subconsciously tips off the brain to expect some spatial cues from the sources before us. Perhaps this expectation doesn’t occur when we put the sources directly in our ears (where the eyes can’t detect them) because there’s little to no evolutionary precedent for such an occurrence.
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3) I really hate to say this, but I haven't been able to find any good recordings in the genres of EDM and punk rock. Candidly, I wouldn't use these genres as a reference for much other than perhaps less expensive car loudspeakers. The only recordings that have the quality to incite chills down the spine in terms of realism...are the ones that you say that you don't ever listen to: jazz, orchestral, and classical. These are the genres that have much higher average dynamic range, clarity, soundstage, and minute detail that sets great loudspeaker/room sound reproduction apart from the fray. For instance, data from a JAES paper on the subject:
I think that plays a big part here. Over the span of about ten years, I'd built a lot of speakers, and we always do that thing where we re-listen to recordings we know. At first, you think you've built the ultimate speaker, and after a few days you realize that the new speaker isn't necessarily BETTER than the old speaker, it's DIFFERENT.
But when I did my second set of Unity horns, there was a definite realization : my music sounds like crap. I read an inteview with one of my favorite DJs, and he said that he mixed all of his music on a $100 set of Logitech speakers. There's also a ton of DJs that mix everything on a laptop. Like, literally their laptop speakers. Because these guys make their money playing gigs, and they're sometimes doing two gigs a night. They're not Dave Grohl. (Grohl purchased one of the most famous recording studios in the world and installed it in his garage.)
Amazon.com: Sound City: Sound City-Real To Reel, Dave Grohl: Movies & TV
Thanks for the suggestion, but not interested in dipoles. I'll be using my 4 FTW21's sealed.
Knowing, of course, that it is easy to go off on a tangent and forget the major subject at hand, I do think that one slight diversion into the music genres themselves is apropos.
Some time back I assembled a digraph of music genres, as defined by Wikipedia, and came up with the following. Note the placement of the "hi-fi" and "lo-fi" genres with time is left to right:
It gets a little more complicated as you move into post-1980s music genres, where there seems to be an explosion of named music genres, for which I've dubbed "micro-genres". They're necessarily presented in indented list format, but you will find all of these defined on Wikipedia:
What you might see is, as time goes on, there is a drift away from an acoustic instrument, acoustic presentation/recorded music ethic to electronic and amplified genres with multi-tracking replacing simultaneous performance in real time, for which the term "hi-fi" really begins to get lost because you completely lose ambient sound and phase relationships of the recorded space in the recordings.
So I find this complicates the issue of "what constitutes hi-fi" and hi-fi sound reproduction. I believe in the past, many popular genres--even as far back into the 1960s--used a (mono) car loudspeaker surrogate--the Auratone Sound Cube 5c--and then later its replacement (Yamaha NS-10M), and the concept of "translation" of recorded music during mastering overtook the idea that better loudspeakers should be used in mastering, really abandoning the idea of hi-fi that was established in the late 1940s-early 1950s (before stereo).
You can probably guess what all this looks like (and generally sounds like) for this hi-fi loving aficionado. But it's a problem that we all tend to gloss over when talking about better loudspeakers and worse ones. It gets to the point where really nothing can be said in general about "better or worse" since the genres themselves are promoting a lower and lower fidelity reproduction ethic as time passes.
Chris
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Chris, you should start another thread for this topic but be advised, you’re looking at music exactly the way a modern, western consumer of prerecorded music might look at it. While this isn’t an impediment to amassing a rather large collection of prerecorded music (in fact it enables it tremendously), your conception has little to no bearing on music as a historical, global, creative art form.
Thanks Brinkman...that's entirely what I was referring to: prerecorded music, as in playing it back at home as a consumer.
The subject of my last entry is how do we assess the sound quality of loudspeakers that we might build or buy, and how difficult it is to get consensus on that one point because of the subjective way we use prerecorded music to assess that. It's about how we're not really getting agreement on what that standard is due to the state of pre-recorded music genres over time.
I actually have little to say openly about music genres as you imply. If I did, it doubt it would remain in this sub-forum (multiway).
Chris
The subject of my last entry is how do we assess the sound quality of loudspeakers that we might build or buy, and how difficult it is to get consensus on that one point because of the subjective way we use prerecorded music to assess that. It's about how we're not really getting agreement on what that standard is due to the state of pre-recorded music genres over time.
I actually have little to say openly about music genres as you imply. If I did, it doubt it would remain in this sub-forum (multiway).
Chris
I also think this is worthy of a separate thread. Even though it may come across as terribly elitist, I’ve sometimes wondered why people who mainly listen to modern studio music - amplified, processed, etc - bother with attaining high fidelity. After all, there’s no acoustic reference there. When using this kind of music for judging a system for reproduction of sound, the question can’t be “does this provide fidelity”, but rather “do I like this”. So it becomes like the title of this thread: a question of preference.
I agree there needs to be a thread on this, but I'm not sure I'm the one that should open that one up. I simply wanted to point out above that we really do have a very large uncontrolled variable in terms of subjective preferences of members here, and to add just enough definition to that problem so that others might also see that we really do have a problem talking to each other--sort of like a Tower of Babel problem. I can say my standard is better than thou's, but I doubt that is going to be agreeable. That's the sort of thread that I think will ensue if that subject is broached, and I think that may do more harm than good. Perhaps it's better just to mutually agree on a certain mix of music tracks as a reference for auditioning in each of the threads here rather than trying to set some standard for everyone on the forum. That's probably too hard.
Until we can agree to something like reference music discs, etc. for subjective preferences--like JBL does with its certified auditioner program at its Northridge plant, as discussed by Sean Olive in his blog--by enforcing the individual music choices themselves, I don't believe that we're going to make a lot of headway in this area and will continue to run headlong into sharp disagreements sourced largely from this root cause.
Until we can agree to something like reference music discs, etc. for subjective preferences--like JBL does with its certified auditioner program at its Northridge plant, as discussed by Sean Olive in his blog--by enforcing the individual music choices themselves, I don't believe that we're going to make a lot of headway in this area and will continue to run headlong into sharp disagreements sourced largely from this root cause.
Actually, no. The present discussion concerns preferences in loudspeaker "sound". If you move the last few posts, no one will read it in my opinion. In order to get people to acknowledge the problem, I think it should stay in front of them--in this thread.
I think it would be better if we instead just change the subject back to the OP's main intent, and leave all of this here as a placeholder.
I know ways to achieve consensus with groups (being part of my engineering profession's skill set)--the problem is that a lot of people will express symptoms of the "Abilene paradox" once music selections are made by the group. Those most affected are likely the ones that are not likely to go to the room acoustics forum, and the ones that others might consider here to be "not listening to hi-fi"--if you catch my drift.
Chris
I think it would be better if we instead just change the subject back to the OP's main intent, and leave all of this here as a placeholder.
I know ways to achieve consensus with groups (being part of my engineering profession's skill set)--the problem is that a lot of people will express symptoms of the "Abilene paradox" once music selections are made by the group. Those most affected are likely the ones that are not likely to go to the room acoustics forum, and the ones that others might consider here to be "not listening to hi-fi"--if you catch my drift.
Chris
I would disagree with some parts of this statement. If you step into one of those Tom Hidley designed control room and listen to the music there, you can't say today's recording industry has abandoned the idea of Hi-Fi. It’s nothing but Hi-Fi in every sense of the word. Even NS10M sounds amazing in those rooms. (BTW, I do not think NS10M is to be the replacement of Auratone nor car speaker surrogate). Also, I would be really surprised to hear someone says the the recent Kendrick Lamar’s Grammy awarded album has lower fidelity reproduction ethics. It may not be his taste, but SQ is unquestionably high and it is very tastefully compressed like what Rudy Van Gelder did for old Blue Note albums. I have no hesitation to call it Hi-Fi. Classical music industry also keep releasing amazing sounding hi-rez albums as well.
It’s true that we can easily pick up horrible sounding album today, and if we pick up one randomly, it would most probably be a bad sounding album, but the number/day of the albums releasing today is probably at least 100 times more than that in 50’s, so average quality is just lower.
I still do agree with you about multi-tracking and stereo that causes the phase mess is the enemy of Hi-Fi. Stereo is nothing but a 3D movie that projects cheap 3D image in front of us wearing stupid 3D glasses. It's funny to see we adult are keep discussing which 3D glasses give us deeper 3D image for 50 years.
BTW, I read that Dr. Toole always use only one speaker for listening test, but I'm not sure if it's a right way. Who listens to the music with one speaker today? Less than 0.01%, I guess.
ex recording/mixing engineer here. While the advent of computerised "studio in a box" has turned making music into a commodity, most pro sound folks spent a great deal of time trying to get the best possible sound quality given real commercial constraints.
Patrick's reference to Dave Grohl's Sound City, along with Muscle Shoals and The Wrecking Crew are fantastic examples of what was that will never be again. Worth the watch if you want to hear some great sounding multi-track recorded music and understand what has happened to the recording industry
If you want to better understand the issues with multi-track recording, Dynamic range compression, loudness wars etc., I wrote an article about it: Dynamic Range: No Quiet = No Loud - CA Academy - Computer Audiophile
However, I thought this thread was about music reproduction and not music production. The best we can hope to do is playback as accurately as possible what is on the recorded media, without any added distortion. That is if our goal is accurate sound reproduction.
There is considerable science from Floyd Toole and Sean Olive that correlates our subjective preferences to objective measurements. I wrote a summary of that here: NAD VISO HP50 with Roomfeel Headphone Review - Reviews - Computer Audiophile
At the end of the summary are links to presentations and AES papers by Dr's Toole and Olive with the deets of all of their testing which is both predictable and repeatable. Further, there is now a publicly available specification for Standard Method of Measurement for In-Home Loudspeakers
As Floyd says, accurate and preferred are synonymous: Speaker Shootout - two of the most accurate and well reviewed speakers ever made - Page 31 - AVS Forum | Home Theater Discussions And Reviews If the loudspeakers are well designed based on the above research, there is a predictable in-room frequency response measurement that correlates back to subjective preference of what a neutral or accurate speaker sounds like. If you read the material you will see what that in-room response is and can compare to your own speakers if you have the capability to measure with REW for example.
With a loudspeaker that meets that criteria, I find that the majority of multi-track recordings I listen to sound quite good and many simply excellent. And some are so bad due to the loudness war, that it does not matter what your playback system is. But I can say that all of the 500 recordings that span 40 years on this list sound good and appropriate for the time recorder over my system which is a combo of direct radiator and waveguide.
But still does not answer the fundamental question as to why folks prefer the Revel Salon 2 over the JBL M2, while their spins are almost identical...
Enjoy the music!
Patrick's reference to Dave Grohl's Sound City, along with Muscle Shoals and The Wrecking Crew are fantastic examples of what was that will never be again. Worth the watch if you want to hear some great sounding multi-track recorded music and understand what has happened to the recording industry
If you want to better understand the issues with multi-track recording, Dynamic range compression, loudness wars etc., I wrote an article about it: Dynamic Range: No Quiet = No Loud - CA Academy - Computer Audiophile
However, I thought this thread was about music reproduction and not music production. The best we can hope to do is playback as accurately as possible what is on the recorded media, without any added distortion. That is if our goal is accurate sound reproduction.
There is considerable science from Floyd Toole and Sean Olive that correlates our subjective preferences to objective measurements. I wrote a summary of that here: NAD VISO HP50 with Roomfeel Headphone Review - Reviews - Computer Audiophile
At the end of the summary are links to presentations and AES papers by Dr's Toole and Olive with the deets of all of their testing which is both predictable and repeatable. Further, there is now a publicly available specification for Standard Method of Measurement for In-Home Loudspeakers
As Floyd says, accurate and preferred are synonymous: Speaker Shootout - two of the most accurate and well reviewed speakers ever made - Page 31 - AVS Forum | Home Theater Discussions And Reviews If the loudspeakers are well designed based on the above research, there is a predictable in-room frequency response measurement that correlates back to subjective preference of what a neutral or accurate speaker sounds like. If you read the material you will see what that in-room response is and can compare to your own speakers if you have the capability to measure with REW for example.
With a loudspeaker that meets that criteria, I find that the majority of multi-track recordings I listen to sound quite good and many simply excellent. And some are so bad due to the loudness war, that it does not matter what your playback system is. But I can say that all of the 500 recordings that span 40 years on this list sound good and appropriate for the time recorder over my system which is a combo of direct radiator and waveguide.
But still does not answer the fundamental question as to why folks prefer the Revel Salon 2 over the JBL M2, while their spins are almost identical...
Enjoy the music!
You are talking about un/(re)doing EQ, I presume. Do you use a database or do you first work by ear?
Imaging and reverberation are different. Trying to specifically manipulate the soundstage with early reflections would be a challenge. If you can't get good sound from soffit mounting then maybe the higher frequencies are still seeing early reflections. Soffit mounting appears to offer more to a typical speaker in the lower ranges. The speaker would have to be designed for the intended position.
Note that I simply referenced Philip Newell's interesting discussions of control room monitors in his book Recording Studio Design, and in particular the discussion on the Auratone 5c and the NS-10M. If you disagree with him, then by all means...have at it. I have zero skin in that game.
As far as the comments on the "state of the art of present popular music mastering practices", I don't play around with the apologetics...and I actually wonder about those that do. Anyone trying to defend those present practices is pure BS because of what they're doing to the music--in my estimation. If you actually saw what they're doing, I think you'd agree.
Sorry guys--that's how I see it.
Chris
As far as the comments on the "state of the art of present popular music mastering practices", I don't play around with the apologetics...and I actually wonder about those that do. Anyone trying to defend those present practices is pure BS because of what they're doing to the music--in my estimation. If you actually saw what they're doing, I think you'd agree.
Sorry guys--that's how I see it.
Chris
I also think this is an essential question. I have lately become more skeptical personally towards horns and waveguides (i.e. I realize that I prefer direct radiators), and I'm trying to understand why. An obvious thing would be the difference in directivity. Wider dispersion = more envelopment and ambience, and all of that. But is that all there is to it? I'm not so sure.
Here are two things I don't think are sufficiently understood:
1. Low-level detail, and differences in "resolution" between drivers.
Both of these things are frequently mentioned in audiophile-speak, but it's difficult to pinpoint what it is objectively. Concerning low-level deail, this thread is still waiting for real experiments, for example: Low Level Detail: An experimental search and test.
And is there such a thing as "resolution" in drivers? Bushmeister wrote this in his comparison of his unity horns and his traditional speakers: "Next, drivers - there is no doubt to me, contrary to my science and 'measurements first' beliefs that despite the excellent measurements of my synergy speaker, the drivers in the 4 way systems dig deeper into detail retrieval and simply 'sound better'. I cannot quantify this with any REW measurements or explain it at present - this was most evident to me with the mid-high frequency detail and realism". Comparison of 'Xbush Sphere synergy horn', versus 'Balls of Prestige'.
There is lots of anecdotal evidence for this phenomenon - that some drivers just sound better, holding frequency constant - but I'm not aware of any good objective explanation yet. Can it be that direct radiators somehow allow the drivers to just play more naturally, somehow, compared to stuffing it inside a horn?
2. Are we really sure that horns and waveguides don't color the sound in subtle ways that are hard to measure? I recently discovered this excellent resource on horns/waveguides and the factors that can affect their sound: Factors Affecting Sonic Quality of Mid & HF Horns & Waveguides
It seems to me that very subtle resonances may be more common in horns and waveguides that what people have come to believe in recent years. If so, it may explain why some people still prefer direct radiators, in spite of the more controlled directivity and better dynamics one can find in horns.
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