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Critic's Corner Discuss a review. Provide constructive feedback. Talk to the industry. |
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Critic's Corner Discuss a review. Provide constructive feedback. Talk to the industry. |
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In Reply to: RE: Art Dudley - Listening, Nov. 2014 posted by RGA on November 13, 2014 at 20:45:20:
Excellent points, RGA.
I'm reminded of several named reviewers from well-known rags who visited a distributor's home showcasing several very well-heeled systems. Including the room itself, we're probably talking $1.5M - $2M.
Now I want to be mindful here because there are a handful of well-respected and talented reviewers who really know their stuff, e.g. extremely well-trained ears, know and understand the differences between live music and reproduced music, etc.
For the rest who consider themselves "experts" but couldn't punch their way out of a musical bag if their lives depended on it, it all boils down to clownish self-deception and deception toward the naive consumer. As for those that employ such, they are the real charlatans.
Anyway, these clownish reviewers went on and on waxing eloquently about what they heard at the distributor's home. In fact, it seemed they pulled out every reasonable buzz word to relay the message to the reader they were in hog heaven, including "a level of sound only money could buy".
How do I know these reviewers were clowns? Because I've been to that home several times and when I consider the prices and volume of sales involved, the amount of money involved along with the sound in this room from both systems, I wanted to puke.
It wasn't terrible sound, just a nothing, non-musical, me-too, relatively flat and lifeless sound lacking in detail that one just might achieve from BestBuy if they knew what they were doing. I've been to homes listening to $20k - $30k playback systems that were far more musical than these $500+ systems. In fact, if I could not sell the gear for $$$, there was nothing in that $2M room that I coveted except perhaps the speakers and the porcelain throne in the adjacent bathroom.
But seriously, who's kidding whom here? Besides the sound, reading these clowns' writeups of their visit, the equipment, the distributor, and the mfg'ers, made me want to puke even more. When I consider these reviewers along with the handful of reviewers who visited my listening room (in almost every case I wanted to throw out into the street), I'm reminded that the emperor truly has no clothes.
And it matters not which frontal lobe they are exercising.
Those with truly well-trained ears in this industry (I'm not one of them) most likely amount to a very tiny percentage, like 1 or 2%.
For the enthusiasts, mfg'ers, distributors, etc, that's not a real problem. But for those masquerading as expert reviewers? It doesn't have to be like this. Jeepers, send these clowns off to classes, train them, hold their hands, spend quality time with them, or start supplying barf bags with each monthly issue.
As for any blind testing efforts? There's much to be said here too but for starters I'll limit my concern to just one point.
If the majority of "experts" participating in such an experiment lack well-trained ears, what's the difference between performing such tests with these participating "experts" and junior high students who are perhaps more intellectually honest?
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Follow Ups
- RE: Art Dudley - Listening, Nov. 2014 - stehno 20:22:03 11/23/14 (0)
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