Are you a music lover or an audiophile?

[flute]

I can sum up that I like a neutral sound there should not be any coloration and live like.

 

[spirovious]

It’s not very difficult to get a Patricia Barber to sound good but it’s a challenge to get old Bollywood to sound good. I enjoy that challenge

Very true.
I have listened and enjoyed from single speaker valve Radio in my childhood.Then moved to stereo listening.The moment l tried to find an audiophile way in music,enjoyment turned into testing more and discomfort(especially old Bollywood songs).

 

[amitk777]

I would say critical listening definitely affects appreciation of music. I recently figured that I was listening to same old albums, doing little adjustments here and there. With the kind of options which are there now available on these systems, I believe it is never ending race.

 

[Mi_10]

Perhaps the biggest yet understated difference lies in the prefix of this thread's main header. It was always about Music vs Audio.

Music is Art
Audio is Science

Music is subjective
Audio is objective

Music needs instruments
Audio needs equipment

Music is about creation
Audio is about reproduction

Music is about passion
Audio is about perfection

Music is akin to God
Audio is akin to Temple

Greatest musicians all over the word, never relied on big audio brands to cascade their music! But even the greatest of great audio brands need tracks from musicians to showcase their equipment potential! Imagine they playing pink noise and test tones to wow people !

I used to be a crazy audiophile pointing digging out as many english words as possible to describe the sound, but the truth is there is no solace to this audiophile journey! Year after year Brands come up with more and more resolving setups (whether your ears are able to differentiate them is an altogether different story) There is never an end and ever if someone claims to have found one, it will be short lived.

On contrary, Music lovers find happiness at random places! Imagine hearing old Bollywood, Illayaraja songs in some remote bus stand, how about that small tea shop you see near the corner of the street, or the old pocket radio of an old man crackling in a crowded train!

 

[Nikhil]

View attachment 35641

Just want to clarify that although this graphic has been floating around audiophilia for a while it is not true. Alan Parons never said this.




.

 

[Nikhil]

Great topic! Had to give it some thought before putting something down.

I too have been listening to music for a lot longer than I can remember. Starting with a simple Philips Turntable that my folks used to have to listen to our vinyl while growing up. Having said that I do have a sound in mind now that I would like to have regardless of the gear I am using. When using my simple audio pc or my bedroom system I prefer a sound that is clean and without too much bass bloat. Once I have that in place it's all about the music.

I use diverse sources to listen to music that I like. Youtube, SoundCloud, Amazon, TIDAL etc are all fair game. Depending on which streaming service I use I now have DSP settings that tame the hash/digital glare out of the low res streams. And of course my main digital gear is reasonably well sorted for what I want.

I guess what I am saying is that the gear is important to get the sound I want.
I don't think I could handle bad sound no matter how good the material is.


.

 

[ajuvignesh]

Just want to clarify that although this graphic has been floating around audiophilia for a while it is not true. Alan Parons never said this.




.

Thanks for correcting that, sir. We mostly take our own music with us for auditioning the speakers. The quote can be true irrespective of who said it.

 

[coaltrain]

All music lovers are not audiophiles.
But all audiophiles started as music lovers.
So, the question should be: how much music lover is left in the audiophile that you now are?
Going by the responses here, some are more inclined to be audiophiles. They’re willing to forego music they may like, for music that sounds good on their systems.
Others are, first and foremost, music lovers. If the music they like sounds good on their systems, it’s a bonus.
I’m definitely in the latter camp.
Billie Holiday’s ‘Gloomy Sunday’, Jeff Beck’s ‘Blue Wind’, Coltrane’s ‘Afro Blue’, Tull’s ‘Slow Marching Band’ and countless other works of art will never sound ‘audiophile’ on any system.
But my life would be incomplete without them.
At the end of the day, I like the fact that both audiophiles and music lovers have music in common.
There’s no greater joy than discovering some new music you like. And both the aforementioned species can help you with that

 

[shafic]

My humble opinion is,
One who can enjoy the music with a simple set up even FM radio is a music lover.
One who has the ultra expensive setup but is still searching and upgrading for something better and better is an Audiophile.

 

[Fiftyfifty]

All music lovers are not audiophiles.
But all audiophiles started as music lovers.
So, the question should be: how much music lover is left in the audiophile that you now are?
Going by the responses here, some are more inclined to be audiophiles. They’re willing to forego music they may like, for music that sounds good on their systems.
Others are, first and foremost, music lovers. If the music they like sounds good on their systems, it’s a bonus.
I’m definitely in the latter camp.
Billie Holiday’s ‘Gloomy Sunday’, Jeff Beck’s ‘Blue Wind’, Coltrane’s ‘Afro Blue’, Tull’s ‘Slow Marching Band’ and countless other works of art will never sound ‘audiophile’ on any system.
But my life would be incomplete without them.
At the end of the day, I like the fact that both audiophiles and music lovers have music in common.
There’s no greater joy than discovering some new music you like. And both the aforementioned species can help you with that

Well said Coaltrain! You've nicely articulated what i too was trying to convey.

 

[arj]

All music lovers are not audiophiles.
But all audiophiles started as music lovers.
So, the question should be: how much music lover is left in the audiophile that you now are?
......
There’s no greater joy than discovering some new music you like. And both the aforementioned species can help you with that

My humble opinion is,
One who can enjoy the music with a simple set up even FM radio is a music lover.
One who has the ultra expensive setup but is still searching and upgrading for something better and better is an Audiophile.

Lets keep it really simple putting both of your posts together. The music lover goes for the music irrespective of the system and
the audiophile tries to understand the science right, to get more and more out of the system

In order to get more out you go from what you love to listen, one can shift to listening what you can test the system with in terms of music, but I would presume that not listening to and enjoying the music you love only means you have moved away of the hobby as any system which does not convey emotion has lost its basic function.

BTW It has been a personal learning for me as well as maybe till around 10 years back i somehow was listening to more of "Audiophile" recordings and less of the music i really loved that was also because a big component of that was bollywood music in the 60's-80s . thats when i heard Prems system in those days which despite being digital sounded amazing on hindi.
Since many of those CDs were not even available anymore, i got into vinyl and now have the right mix of music I love and thats what I play ! the "Audiophile "recordings are rare and in between just for a reassurance or a check

 

[antoniodias]

While heaven is for the holy, Music is to my ears. Music changes as per my moods. The church may have the best of music system in place for the choir to br amplified, and should there be an electricity failure, I tell you it sounds more sweeter and heavenly to my ears without any sort of amplification. Imagine the choir singing Sopranos, Altos Tenors and bass with just the church pipe organ and the acoustic piano blending in the voices of the choir, just plain and natural, with echo filling the entire church.

 

[Haribabu]

IMO, a really hunt for audio equipments starts when a music lover turned as audiophile.
the journey of an audiophile never ends but music taste may vary with our age age and environment.
I like bollywood old classics and few punjabi folk and traditional

 

[shafic]

I am reminded of the Hindi movie 'Black' in which the protagonist is a deaf and blind girl. Being deaf and blind she doesn't know anything about the world except through the sense of touch. But she is unable to recognize the things she touches. Then her teacher starts her journey of learning to know the things she touches. This opens up the 'world' for her to explore. She becomes unstoppable.

An audiophile journey can be compared to this. Here our forum and knowledgeable members are the teachers.

Once you start on this journey you need to invest lot of time, efforts and money too. It is also a never ending one. It makes no difference whether the system is vintage or modern one, the journey goes on.

 

[superczar]

My wife makes fun of me if I try to sit i the sweet spot with my eyes closed
Hence I now simply use airplay as the source without caring too much about the sonic quality and enjoy my music

In any case, the most fun I have with music is on what's (by quite a wide margin) the worst setup that I have - A Pair of crappy old Yamaha outdoor speakers facing out into the sitout!
And that's because they get used during late night Old Monk and Lagavulin sessions in the sit-out when old friends come over + with the added benefits of the mosquitoes in the garden adding to the sonic peaks with their humming !

 

[keith_correa]

I just cannot imagine enjoying music that sounds "not good" for whatever reason. I can listen to it, I can maybe appreciate it but will I enjoy it? I will not! And for me, music is all about enjoyment. Also, for me, enjoying the gear is an integral part - it comes with the territory.

 

[himadri]

When you are listening to music attentively and regularly for a few hours everyday for so many years ,it's mainly for the love for music .Optimising the gear towards making it more emotionally engaging ,pushed me towards audiophile pursuits. But it never came first ,music did.

 

[lalit09]

Music lover

 

[hifitoaster]

I listen to the lmited library again and again on every device I change. My interests are what's the difference, what's missing all the time. I Get tears in my eyes, when I discover something new which I never heard in that song before. Its hard for me to listen to music on a poor system even though the music and recording is good enough. I think I am an audiophile, despite the fact I don't own anything real hi end. I hardly can listen music passively. I cannot work at my office listening to music.

 

[soundbuff]

I honestly cannot listen to music that is poorly reproduced or broadcast. Recently I had gone to a friend's housewarming in a small town in Karnataka. Later, we found that a famous Yashagana troupe was performing in a village temple not too far away. We drove through for an hour through pitch darkness to reach there. The Yakshagana performance was superb. Some Seth from Mumbai was hosting it. It should have been a lovely open air concert. However the sound was absolutely un-bearable: unrealistically loud, horribly distorted and harsh as hell. I sat through it for half and hour, then left the place went to my car and locked myself in to avoid the pain. A lovely performance destroyed by the electronics and more importantly a poor understanding of public broadcasting. My friends however sat through it for another hour or more, although they agreed that it was too loud. Seems our thresholds are quite different. Whether that makes me less of a music lover I don't really know.