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General audio topics that don't fit into specific categories.

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I Need More than Three Years................

Posted by Todd Krieger on December 10, 2010 at 17:39:10:
Try 15 or 20 years............

If you're familiar with my posts, some of these comments wouldn't be shocking.........

1. The intermingling of asynchronous sample rate formats in both digitized recording and playback. 24/192 mastered CDs and 24/192 upsampled CD playback. IMO, this has introduced a new and indefinite generation of both awful-sounding recordings and awful-sounding playback (in spite of hype to the contrary), and is likely the root cause of the decline of the CD amongst consumers and the sonics in recent recordings. IMO this has been the single biggest setback to the advancement of high-fidelity sound reproduction.

2. The ghastly widespread use of Antares Auto Tune (and other pitch correction applications) in which performers using it are touted as “exceptional talents”. (I wouldn't have a problem at all with Auto Tune whenever its use were to be disclosed.) And the proliferation of other "trickery" to dupe the audiences.

3. The practice of claiming electronics and cables “sounding the same” is an excuse to design products and recordings that the designers want to deem as more than adequate, yet underachieve to end user ears. The designers would rather question the consumers than improve the products. Over time, this has driven a wedge between the audio design community and the high-end audio community. (As an engineer personally, I think the audio engineering community has become both technically corrupt and technically inept.)

4. The lack of realization in both the music and audio industries that digitized audio alters the perception of recorded music, and has hindered the natural enjoyment of music. The masses have not realized the perceptive hindrance, yet have been losing interest in music aside from what is socially relevant. And the subsequent loss of appreciation of both musical artistry and high-fidelity sound reproduction.

5. The best in audio is not the high-priced glitter touted in the magazines, but the reasonably-priced products designed by the local builders.

6. The decline in standards in music have been caused mainly by a network media that spotlights and glorifies certain music genres (modern pop, hip-hop, prefab) while obscuring and ridiculing others (classical, traditional jazz). Most "Awards" programs have become nothing more than a showcase of the network media glorifying its own prefabricated "stars".

7. Unless RFI is ever addressed in digitized audio, high-resolution formats will never become popular, and will never overtake LP and Redbook CD as the preferred formats for most audiophiles, and MP3 for most consumers.

8. The best-sounding digital audio sources by and large were manufactured in the early and mid 1990s. Modify the output of these products with a decent analog stage, and you'll be amazed.

9. The decline in high-fidelity sound reproduction and the decline in music over the past 20 years have been mutually intertwined.

10. The proliferation of ghastly expensive audio gear is mainly driven by the frustration and desperation audiophiles have had in attaining satisfactory performance, yet rarely being delivered such performance.