I hate my Altecs

[cradeldorf]

i cannot shift my focus away from the flaws and anomalies of the recording and production enough to enjoy it.

You hit the nail on the head there Bowtie, I spend the majority of my time looking for anomaly's instead of ingesting the performance as a whole. well that and continuously changing the settings to make everything sound good.

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Craddledorf you really should look into a pair of G's in very big, very stiff cabinets....

Too much money to risk on that adventure. Point source is wonderful but I think there are better matched systems than the 604 offers. Your asking an awful lot of a 15" to go to 1600 hz and sound good doing it. Also a HF horn should be of equal SPL or lower than the woofer SPL to really blend nicely because of the directivity they produce. Attenuators will do that, but at the expense of killing the open natural tone. I will admit they are great for impressing your friends with ear deafining loudness with zero distortion, but after you've impressed all of them your stuck with a system that just doesn't cut it for everyday listening. It was a fun journey and a great learning experience but time to move on. I won't toss the 604's into the fire until I hear the alternative.

[alancohen]

You hit the nail on the head there Bowtie, I spend the majority of my time looking for anomaly's instead of ingesting the performance as a whole. well that and continuously changing the settings to make everything sound good.

Funny story: When Steve Vai was attending Berkeley COM in Boston he was in a band called Masterpiece with my best friend growing up, David Rosenthal. Steve spent a lot of time transcribing Frank Zappa music. As the story goes, one late evening a knock came to their front door and it was FZ's driver looking for SV. It seems FZ got a hold of some of these transcripts and was amazed that SV analyzed the music so accurately, he even transcriped the mistakes made by the musicians. FZ offered him a job an the rest is history.

So there might be something to gain from looking for mistakes in recordings if you're writing it all down, otherwise just enjoy the show.

Speaking of which, live performances are rarely flawless. I saw Diana Krall recently and it was not one of her better nights. I chose to enjoy the experience for what it was, regardless.

[analog addict]

I'm sure Diana looked good whatever noises were coming out of her mouth at the time. I'm sure Elvis enjoys it even when she is yelling at him to take out the garbage....

[Alien_Shore]

You hit the nail on the head there Bowtie, I spend the majority of my time looking for anomaly's instead of ingesting the performance as a whole. well that and continuously changing the settings to make everything sound good.

Someone linked the Michael Fremer article "Why we need audiophiles". In that, Fremer was being questioned about vinyl hiss and pops on his extravegantly-priced system:

Shouldn't a $350,000 stereo system be completely free of such impurities?
"It's like when you go to the symphony, and the old men are coughing?same thing," Fremer says. Necessary impurities. Reminders of being in the real world.