Musical audiophiles

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PRAT (whatever that is!?)

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Hee, hee! Risky thing to say on a Naim forum.

What I've noticed is that the musicians I know or have known that are keen to get good reproduction are only interested in budget separates, and would happily use something equivalent to a Yam NS10 (nasty speaker!)

My only ever audiophile friend is a Naim/Epos devotee, but he plays mandolin and bass guitar.

My brother is a very talented guitarist/songwriter and he is very open to accept the benefits of good hifi, although he can't afford one himself.

IMO 'HiFi+' writers seem to know their stuff about music, but not most other hifi writers.

matt

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Originally posted by Matt H:

quote:

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PRAT (whatever that is!?)

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Hee, hee! Risky thing to say on a Naim forum.

IMO 'HiFi+' writers seem to know their stuff about music, but not most other hifi writers.

matt

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Music seems to be some kind of superfluous irrelevance to many hi-fi writers. (No, not true, it has the same significance as interconnect cable!) At the opposite end of the spectrum, I subscribe to Gramophone magazine, and their hi-fi reviews, conversely, are crap! They have NEVER in living memoroy said a component was not up to scratch. They are all great value and usually concentrate on the music. Hmm.

When someone pays £20k for a hi-fi system only to listen repeatedly to Dark Side of the Moon, Aja, and Kind of Blue, you have to ask yourself...!

I'm not suggesting that hi-fi enthusiasm should go hand-in-hand with the ability to write a double fugue without any obvious faults in the voice-leading (part-writing), but I wonder what pleasure so many people get out of high-end hi-fi systems when they clearly know DAMN ALL about music?

Just one of those curious paradoxes, I suppose. I just brought it up on this forum because I'd noticed it and thought about it for years.

Ah well, just my perverse cast of mind perhaps?! I should get out more often!

EW

Think you are overstating the case guys. I read Stereophile and most of the reviewers worth reading: Art Dudley, Mikie Fremer, Wes Phillips and John Marks are obviously music junkies in the worst way, with eclectic tastes and a fondness for the obscure (which is where all the best music is).

There are some reviewers who contunally reference movie OST's for their reviews, and that's the biggest indicator of someone that's into hardware and sound, not music.

CL

I've noticed that a lot of musicians have really awful stereos; indeed I did until last year. It's often a case of 1) spending so much on instruments that really good hi-fi kit is out of the question, or 2) thinking it's unimportant altogether. Some musicians sort of "listen past" the flaws of whatever diabolical boombox or shelf system they have, and concentrate on the performance.

By the way, what does PRAT mean?

EW

I'm a musician with what, I could consider, a 'good' hi-fi. My studio monitoring system is a NAP 180/PMC TB-2's. However, nearly all of my musical collaborators have stuff ranging from a common £100 'high street' combo to a typical Sevenoaks set-up.

Partly this is due to musicians preferring to spend cash on musical stuff rather than hi-fi. However, several of them honestly don't care or can't tell the difference between a ghetto blaster to a high-flight system. Often they admit that the hi-fi system it's 'better' - but they just don't think it's really important.
These people generally have a good sense of what sounds good in the studio and often their work transfers really well to better systems.

I'm sure many of us have albums we think sound great produced by people who have very basic home systems.

Regards

Stephen

EW;

Hi-Fi reviewers in my limited experince, do seem generally to refer to favourite pieces of music. I guess they have to use good known recordings to do their their job?

If someone with a good system is musically stuck in the 70's/80's with Pink Floyd and Steely Dan; does it matter, if they are happy?

OK; a good system should make one explore new music, and I really enjoy socialising with the similarly afflicted (as I like to call them!) to swap musical discoveries. I also avidly listen to and record certain radio programmes to hear new and unknown music.

I think a lot of our bretheren here are busy family people, and do not get the time or opportunity to discover new music - and what they do hear on Radio 1 or 2 is either for 14 year olds or horribly bland - so they don't get much new music.

I have around 1,000 CD's and 300 vinyl albums. At 49 years of age, I love discovering and buying new music. But............ I'm divorced, and live alone with very few current commitments apart from work.

The great thing about the Naim guys of course, is that they are into music. Whenever I meet up with Paul Darwin at shows or my local dealer, we're always interested in the CD's we each have with us, and have swapped a few discoveries.

The guy who runs my local Naim dealership is a musician and knows a lot of musicians. Some have a decent Hi-Fi system - some don't.

PRAT = Pace, rhythm and timing. I kinda like the descriptive word 'zing'. A Naim owning buddy started me on this one - I think it's succinct and relevant to one of the aspects of as Naim system working well.

Takes all sorts.

Happy listening.

John.