GoodSoundClub - Romy the Cat's Audio Site

In the Forum: Horn-Loaded Speakers
In the Thread: Aporia - Silbatone Acoustics speaker

Post Subject: Snatch it back and hold itPosted by Joe Roberts on: 1/23/2009

Anyhow, a properly implemented multi-channel installation has immense among of advantages against single-channel including the geometry of imaging.

Imaging...another hi-fi delusion. I used to record the Philadelphia Orchestra. The orchestra does not image.

Imaging is a fun hi-fi special effect but very difficult to assess in a musical frame, except when the 3-D portrayal of a stereo is so whacked out (or overly foregrounded) that it interferes with the flow of musical enjoyment.

I am sure that you feel that since your Korean lobbyee made a single-driver speaker then a proper audio delusion is possible only by the bogus single-point radiation?

Not at all. Satisfying illusions can be achieved by various topologies. I do think that unnatural sound effects that are the artifacts of technology can interfere with the illusion. Which artifacts interfere is a matter of taste and preference and, perhaps, acquired listening habits. Some can listen through artifacts that bug other listeners to no end.

Remember that individual ears and brains are on the receiving end. This is a matter of perception and phenomenology.

I disagree with the whole concept of “perfect recreation” and “underlying delusion” that you trying to advocate [...]it is not where my interests and my experiences lay.

Precisely my point. If you are advocating perfect reproduction judged by standard of live music, this interest entails some serious logical difficulties, unless you believe that perfect reproduction is indeed possible.

The "live music" standard injects value judgments and taste into the evaluation procedure, even though it advocates an ostensibly "objective" standard. If all systems fail to achieve the standard, how can we choose among imperfect results?

Think about that dilemma.

Major failure of Aristotelian logic is illustrated here, basically the failure of essentialism: In short, summarizing experience in terms of logical categories, and believing that performing mathematical and logical manipulations on these invented notions is equivalent to living in the world of experience.

This is a deep cultural presumption in Western societies for the past 2000+ years, so there is plenty of company in this misguided mode of thought.

There is not Romy/Pearson association.

Lord, I hope not. But face the fact that both are dreamers and believers in technological perfection that can not be achieved. Idealists thinking they are objective scientists. Segmenters of the continuum. Confusers of two different domains of endeavor.

Until I hear a really solid objective way to choose among imperfect systems, this will be my assessment of the devotees of "the absolute sound." Sadly, there is nothing inherent in the live music standard that contains hints on how to perform the task of choosing among our shitty imperfect attempts at reproduction. This will always be a value judgment, as it should be.

Considering that you are uninformed about the inherited musical limitation of a single-driver topology it is very predictable what kind music you use for your audio appraisals.

Should I chuck my Buddy Guy records and listen to only Cantate Domino? Last time I heard that record, I vomited on my shoe.

If Junior Wells is a reference point of what music is all about then you might be right but I would wonder THEN: why to have any more the table-radio audio objectives to begin with…

I thought you said you liked blues harp?

If you can't enjoy Junior Wells on a half-decent table radio, you must be lost in audio la la land.

Sure, I'd rather be listening on something that enhances the experience for me a little bit more, but a table radio or stock Volvo car radio will certainly do in a pinch.

The way I know that some systems are better than my radio is that the emotional impact of the master harp blower, Mr. Wells, is more powerful and engaging. Here I am working from musical experience, rather than the technical superiority of the more elaborate setup.

I know very well what a harmonica played through an amplifer sounds like in my room, even though I suck compared to a master blues player. NO stereo can do this. It is neither fair nor reasonable to expect it.

If blues reproduction is a low standard, as you seem to imply, larger scale or wider-range inputs or whatever it is that you are talking about are even more elusive targets of ideal reproduction.

Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site