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In the Forum: Audio Discussions
In the Thread: Simpson Microphones thread.
Post Subject: A vs. B vs. TimePosted by Paul S on: 9/12/2008
Well, you can count me among those who are perennially frustrated by all the unnessary stupidy that goes into most recordings, that's for sure, although I have several hundred records that I would like to keep for the perfromances that somehow survived the processing.
I do have redbook CD playback in my main system, as soon as I fix the short in my DAC, but I have always in the end preferred LPs, despite their very obvious flaws, not to mention the tedious playback rituals.
Of course I would like "better recordings", including better monitoring, in the rote, physical sense. The weird thing is that some of the best performances I have on on VERY obviously "compromised" recordings, and some of the "best sounding" recordings are MT of musical content.
Please do not think I am a "musical versus accurate" guy, because I absolutely have no problem with "accuracy" that includes the music. In fact, I think I prefer it. But what I just keep coming back to is that the Music has to be there as a first consideration, meaning I am not so sure that close attention to raw data end to end will necessarilly result in music.
I have been involved in some "live versus recorded" trials that I found more interesting for social reasons than for any ultimate conclusions one might draw from them about music.
The most "realistic" sound "reproduction" I have ever heard was many years ago at a Stereophile show in Los Angeles. They had hired a classical guitarist to wander around the show. I heard the guy at one point playing some Bach around the corner, but when I rounded the corner he wasn't there. What was there was Mark Levinson's stacked Quads playing high-speed tape via one of his modified Studers. I seem to recall he had used one of Bob Fulton's mics; but Time has a way of changing everything.
Best regards,
Paul SRerurn to Romy the Cat's Site