Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site

These thoughts come in the wake of Romy’s recent encounter with a certifiable fringe dweller who, IMO, is not just illustrative in the generic hi-fi nutbag sense, but also in the there’s-more-to-this-nutbag-than-his-worst-would-suggest sense.  By this I mean that if one looks at the products this guy offers in the context that he himself has established, then likely there is nothing there but expensive OCD nonsense.  But if you bring your own knowledge and objectives along while exploring/shopping, then some of the stuff this guy offers might turn out to be useful.  Like it or lump it, it is often the nutbags who “push the envelope”.  Sure, it can be tough dealing with zealots; but who else can we trust?

I hope it is understood here that although I am making a case of “Romy’s” guy (who shall remain nameless herein), I am really talking in general terms about a specific type of audio component developer/supplier.  You know, the sort where you browse the website (or store) with trepidation or even foreboding because of the stench that you notice right away and then it eventually pervades the place?  I mean, how can you take seriously the claims of a guy who (it turns out) listens to (and so, presumably, evaluates) all his “SOTA” components with nothing but electronic music delivered via Celestion 600s in a 10 X 10 listening room?  For instance, can “The Best IC in the World” be determined from this set-up?  I am also trying to get a handle on the sort of acumen required to make one’s way through the insane asylum/minefield/marketplace in an attempt to make any headway in this hobby.

The fact is that to wind up with anything useful from exploring/shopping you must either be supremely lucky or you must bring with you at least some sense of what you want and how to get it, ie you must have some “background” against which you can compare and contrast the statements and claims made by others, in order to evaluate their statements, claims and components in your own context.  There is an approach, I think, that makes it possible to find and adapt useful components from almost anywhere, from Radio Shack™ to Sound by Singer™.

With respect to the “marketplace”, who knows why so many audio tweaks are nut jobs?  Clearly there is a form of audio psychosis that is contagious.  As in the case of religion or “science”, ideas about audio seem to get into the brain like worms that just eat away all reason and obscure the power to truly discriminate.  But is it reasonable in the first place to judge components from the claims their purveyors make?  Maybe partly, but experience and reason also suggest that the only meaningful proof of a component is within one’s own context.

I have wrestled for some time with the ideas of “better” versus “different” versus “accurate” versus “musical” and I have come to the conclusion that many of the conclusions I arrive at are subject to change.  Also, I have pretty much abandoned label-specific loyalty, if only because others’ conclusions also appear to be subject to change, sometimes without checking with me first.

I am trying to think of any component I use that remains stock.  My Ortofon MC3000II cartridge and matching T3000 transformer and my ML2s are about it.  I think I have futzed with everything else in one way or another.  This does not take into consideration the fact that most component manufacturers supposedly design a “line” of components that are meant to be “synergistic”, ie, the lot of them working together is supposed to do “better” than the sum of the parts.  Wouldn’t it be nice if this were true?  I think it would be nice if anyone could just design something good and then leave it alone for a while without effing it up in the name of a “II” or “S” designation.  A particularly narsty example of this syndrome is all too common, when the “improvements” are really just cost-cutting measures or some other form of pandering to current “market” expectations.

But I have to give credit where credit is due: to the few nutjobs out there who really don’t give a tinker’s damn about anyone else’s opinions, even in cases where others’ opinions happen to be right.  These guys just keep bopping along to the sound of their own drum kits, regardless of common knowledge, public opinion or poverty.  Like suffering zealots everywhere, they may even derive a certain grim pleasure from the notion that they are “right” (and others are wrong).  So, who really cares about parts, anyway?  These guys would kill or be killed over whether or not a part should be cryogenically treated, or whether it sounds best oriented length or width-wise along the sun’s vernal axis.

Which brings me to the idea of “difference”.

Years ago I did not scoff at the notion of power cords making a difference, even though I had yet to hear any such difference myself.  Then, I heard a difference.  As far as I am concerned, this is the stuff of madness, because, as it turns out, I have for years been able to “hear” pretty much any and every change I make to my system, down to a single resistor or jack.

Whack?  Youbetcha!  But you can’t tell that to the poor souls who are “out there” dedicating their lives to exploring and categorizing the differences that they either do hear or that they think they hear.

Many years ago, as an undergraduate, I was required to serve as a “lab rat” in a series of experiments that ostensibly dealt with hearing.  Subjects were asked to listen to words recorded onto a reel of tape and indicate to the researcher any change that was detected.  In one series in which I participated, a word was repeated a few times, and then I continued to listen and note it as the word subtly “morphed”, like this: Ship; ship; ship (etc); schick, shit, sip, etc., etc., with the “differences” vague but at the same time clearly audible to a careful listener.  Only, guess what?  It turns out that the “reel of tape” the subject watches un-spool is really just an elongated “loop” of one, unchanging (and so, unchanged) word; meaning that any “differences” “detected” in this experiment (and there were plenty of subjects, and they all “heard and described the changes”) are in the mind of the subject rather than on the tape.  Take a few minutes with this one.

So, here we are, adrift on the great big sea of audio tomfoolery, without a metaphorical paddle.  If we can on the one hand hear any and every change in our systems, then this implies that everything is worth considering.  If we are prone on the other hand to confuse what we do and don’t actually hear, then although everything may be worth considering, does it make any difference we can certainly identify as an “improvement”?

All these rhetorical questions I offer up as my part in building the New Audio Tower of Babble, where any and all changes will be tried, codified and [com]piled until we ascend finally to the Sound Absolute.

Meantime, I will continue to just take the periodic flyer on stuff that “sounds like it could be good” in the sense that the “facts” as I presently understand them suggest a candidate.

As for running the gauntlet of whack-os who guard the temples that enshrine the SOTA components, I guess I’ll keep taking them on a case-by-case basis.  No, I will never pay just to browse a fancy Manhattan salon.  But I might well make nice to some drooler with air caps in Boise.

Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site