(OT) A good informative read.

[alancohen]

I found this paragraph rather poignant:

Unfortunately, there are a great many people around today who have never heard a decent sound system. Home systems that consist of little cubes and one-note "subwoofers", MP3 players (with a cheap docking station perhaps) and generally pathetic live music systems have raised an entire generation of people who seem to think that what they have been listening to is "good". Anything that sounds different is likely to be considered "bad" - and that probably includes dynamic range. Almost nothing on CD or live is free of massive amounts of compression - everything is compressed to within an inch of its life, and everything is the same volume. Real bass (below 40Hz), good stereo imaging and overall clarity are generally missing from all the music sources and playback systems that are available for reasonable prices, and even some big-name (and comparatively expensive) systems are woeful. It's pretty hard for anyone to realise that a PA system sounds like pox if that's all one has ever listened to.

I fell into that trap. Convenience won out over quality. It got so bad that I almost forgot what quality was and what I was missing.

Before I started my journey back to real audio last year, my "system" had degraded to two little Advent satellite speakers and a KLH sub, with an Onkyo Surround Sound receiver and an iPod running Mp3s.

"Thankfully", I am not part of the younger generation and can remember what good audio was. When I started building amps, adding components and listening to the sound grow, it triggered those memories and I felt like Kevin Spacey in American Beauty when he finally woke up from years of living a half-dead life.

Gratefully, no matter how long a room is dark, a candle shines as bright.

The problem is we're still recording over-compressed crappy music these days. We should start a thread where we can list great recordings, regardless of genre, that can take advantage of our sytems.