How Do You Listen to Music?

Reminds me of my old auntie sitting there knitting something whilst Coronation Street was on.

for me , being tobyjug , my proper listening is always accompanied by some alcohol, nice red wine or strong Belgium beer or English ciders.   So I don't listen as I'd like that often for health reasons.  I have often wrangled with this phenomena- why do I often need a substitutive device to get in a natural state to be receptive of musical stimulation - and I can enjoy listening when stone cold sober - but there is something for me that just ignites listening through the lines and having a deeper resonance of understanding some material when reality has been ofset a little.

TOBYJUG posted:

but there is something for me that just ignites listening through the lines and having a deeper resonance of understanding some material when reality has been ofset a little.

Nothing wrong with offsetting reality... slightly. Canada is set to legalize marijuana. Expect sales of Naim gear here to plummet.

Glad I am not the only one to particularly enjoy a listening session when stimulated by a rather nice single malt (or two). Hic! As a pub landlord I have to be particularly disciplined or it can get ugly. Slippery slope and all that!

I bet with my newly-found relaxed style of listening I could knit a belter of a cardie and enjoy music at the same time. Might have to learn how to knit first though!

Spot on. It does change our habits. Just not the same for everyone. I've always listened while working on something that isn't mentally taxing but for much of my job I need quiet and concentration.

Two (point 5) big changes in the past 25 years.

• In the early 90's I went from playing discs on random to listening in order end-to-end. The trigger for this was an A&R Cambridge A60 amp and Arcam Alpha One CD player. Music just made more sense as a narrative instead of a collection of tracks.
• Late 90's I went to an all Linn setup (Mimik II, Majik, Keilidhs) and then stopped listening to portable audio. The Sony Discman went to a friend as I didn't see the point of listening on the go to something that sounded so much less than what I had at home. 

The point 5 comes in from the fact that in 2000 I sold everything and moved to the far east with only the shirt on my back. So the only hi-fi was a string of MP3 players. Got into home cinema but never used it for music. Cheap and cheerful Onkyo microsystems and doing everything with the ear beads in was the story until 2013 and I bought only a handful of music in those 13 years. Then dropped GBP 24K on a Naim system in one go (I had been saving like a little kid for 7 years) and BANG! The MP3 players never got used once. Background listening greatly reduced. Buying tons of music each month. And listening mainly done in serious sessions where I can really appreciate it. So it was like coming full circle twice.

Much of my 'reading' during listening sessions is music related at the moment. I am taking the opportunity to explore a lot of new stuff via Tidal on my iPad. So the reading (in reality it is music surfing) and listening are quite closely linked at the moment. This is possibly why I am able multi-task (listen and search for new music) successfully.

Who said we males can't multi-task.

Bugger, I have just split my single malt. Clearly multi-tasking does not stretch to typing and drinking at the same time!

In some ways it's a reflection of our ever busy lives. There's always something that needs to be done, often on the computer. I usually have music playing on the system whilst sitting with the laptop and at these times I tend to play from the hard drive. Like you Nigel I can still enjoy the music but for serious listening the vinyl gets a spin.

Although I love my 282/HCDR/200 rig and listen to it any chance I get (and yes I do play Vinyl a lot), I find my Chord Hugo sounds great in the car on my way to work (I drive 30 minutes one way) and then while at work sometimes when I need to block out the ambient noise and chatter - (open plan), I plug in cheap headphones (5 quid) and it still sounds great to me.

Sorry Naim, but you just can't beat the portability of the Chord Hugo . 

But then even the Chord Dave can't beat that portability either.  It won't work in the car, and I don't want people at work staring at it if I ever purchased one 

For a long time I used to feel envious of the Bentley Owners who have Naim in the their cars (although I would never buy such a car even if I won the lottery - I am a strictly only a BMW fan) but now with the Hugo, I feel I got a car Hi-fi that may be just a good, or even better.  

Of course sitting in front of an expensive hifi does offset reality anyway,  and with increasing quality and investment interest is piqued as to what it offers over lesser equipment.

hifi can only do what's asked of it by what music is played, and with increasing possibilities from so much material - listening can be plagued by the tyranny of choice.

TOBYJUG posted:

Of course sitting in front of an expensive hifi does offset reality anyway,  and with increasing quality and investment interest is piqued as to what it offers over lesser equipment.

hifi can only do what's asked of it by what music is played, and with increasing possibilities from so much material - listening can be plagued by the tyranny of choice.

Despite the cost of the gear, the quality of the recording and mastering plays a huge role in the listening experience for me. Source first begins in the studio and on to the mastering process. I find myself more inclined to give repeated listens to quality recordings that present my gear in its best light.

I sit down and listen with my ears!

Music played on a decent system - one that presents the music, not just the sound - draws me into the music, no matter how inexpensive the equipment.  When played on a system that destroys the music, it pushes me away (I've had to walk out of shops just because the music was played on such an awful system).

I never use background music, if I'm listening to the music it'll draw me in and I'll stop doing anything else apart from feel the music and it's multiplicity of layers.  If I'm intending to do something else I'll do that without music, otherwise I'll stop that and start listening to the music instead.  For me it has always been so.

joerand posted:

Despite the cost of the gear, the quality of the recording and mastering plays a huge role in the listening experience for me. Source first begins in the studio and on to the mastering process. I find myself more inclined to give repeated listens to quality recordings that present my gear in its best light.

For me (unless the equipment's so poor that I can't listen to anything through it), the order of importance is...

How good is the musical rendition?  (An excellent recording never makes up for less good musicianship).
How good is the recording?
How well doe the replay chain retain the involvement factor in the music?
How well balanced is the replay chain?

From the last you'll see that I don't support the 'source first (at all costs)' argument - it just leads to monkfish systems where the colouration and lack of resolution in the speakers makes a nonsense of the faithfulness of the rest of the system.

Any point in the chain from the original performance through to the listening room can be the weak point that limits the quality of the reproduced music.  And any weak point that I hear too prominently will cause me to turn off the music and to prefer silence.  A prime example of this being all those disgusting 1980's and 1990's muddy systems that were so excessively popular at the time.

...yes I hated those 1990s muddy systems , it was farmageddon.

I used to listen, and still do mostly with the intention of it being background music whilst I crack on with work on the computer. However with each upgrade I find that the it sounds so good that I'm unable to concentrate on the work at hand then end up having long, serious listening sessions. This is doing my productivity no favours

Re working with music, I find that electronic music is great for focussing attention. Baroque also does the trick. Avoid anything with words.

Jan-Erik Nordoen posted:

Re working with music, I find that electronic music is great for focussing attention. Baroque also does the trick. Avoid anything with words.

Agreed, but I have to have it on very low otherwise it can become too distracting again!

When the music calls, take a short listening break, bliss out then return to work refreshed. Smokers get nicotine breaks, music lovers need music breaks...

TOBYJUG posted:

... some alcohol, nice red wine or strong Belgium beer or English ciders.   So I don't listen as I'd like that often for health reasons...

Some more glaze required?

Jan-Erik Nordoen posted:

Canada is set to legalize marijuana.

Ah, we're in the future already... Italy is about to legalise poverty.

Joking.

Massimo Bertola posted:

Jan-Erik Nordoen posted:

Canada is set to legalize marijuana.

Ah, we're in the future already... Italy is about to legalise poverty.

Better than 1970's USSR; they made it a criminal act to be unemployed.

And the saying from the time goes "In Pravda  you'll find no Izvestia, in Izvestia no Pravda".
Pravda means "Truth", and was the name of the Russian Communist Party newspaper.
Izvestia means "News", and was the name of the Russian Government newspaper.

I'm not sure how to go from there back to the topic. But it does renew my appreciation of living over here. Now that it's safe to plug Canada again.  

nigelb posted:

Anyway I love the more relaxed, but still involving, listening experience. I listen longer and hence enjoy more music. It allows me to listen to many more new (to me) artists and as a result has expanded the horizons on my music appreciation. After all isn’t that what it is all about?

I think so. That and sharing it.

Some times, I think music is being channeled to my soul - by the inspired genius of those who composed it and those who performed it.

Sometimes I find myself listening to the recording technique, the acoustic venue, the added reverb, the digital conversion artifacts, the electronics, the vibration influences, the speaker crossovers, the radiation patterns, or the effects from my room.  This often in the pursuit of my passion for  understanding and improving music replay.

Sometimes music is my time machine back to my youth - those songs that "hook me" for yet the many-hundredth time.

Sometimes music is the sound track to my life.

It is all good...

Charlie

CharlieP posted:

Some times, I think music is being channeled to my soul - by the inspired genius of those who composed it and those who performed it.

Sometimes I find myself listening to the recording technique, the acoustic venue, the added reverb, the digital conversion artifacts, the electronics, the vibration influences, the speaker crossovers, the radiation patterns, or the effects from my room.  This often in the pursuit of my passion for  understanding and improving music replay.

Sometimes music is my time machine back to my youth - those songs that "hook me" for yet the many-hundredth time.

Sometimes music is the sound track to my life.

It is all good...

 

Charlie

Well said Charlie, and I think we can all relate!

I think my listening habits are similar to that of Doctor Steve.  If I need to multitask, I will have iPad in hand, and use it to stream something via UPnP, Deezer, Concert Vault, or if I am really distracted and can't think of what to listen to, I'll let Radio Paradise take control.

But when I go to the trouble of starting up my turntable, and queueing a favorite record, the iPad almost always gets closed after a track or two.

I listen to music in a darkened room. A small red spotlight illuminates my turntable. I love closing my eyes and getting completely lost in the music.  I always feel wonderful afterwards - it's like getting a brain massage!

ATB.

Hook

CharlieP posted:

Sometimes music is my time machine back to my youth

I still play LPs I bought in the mid-70's and find it amazing how powerful a time machine that music can be. Stark memories of saving for a treasured album, the paper route, mowing lawns, etc. Playing that album over and over again. Soon other memories of bygone friends ensue. I'm back in the bedroom of my teens where the music has never since sounded quite as real or exciting.  Maybe that's part of the holy grail some of us chase with upgrades; recapturing the glory of the music when we first heard it as new. It may sound better with better gear, but might never sound as good.