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High End Audio Sounds Crap!

I certainly don't want to listen to a PA system rather than my hi-fi - I Know which I prefer!

If we are talking about small scale un-amplified music then yes, a good hi-fi in a good room can sound incredibly similar. Part of the problem I think is managing to forget what you know about your environment , close your eyes and believe your ears.

Large scale un-amplified stuff like orchestra is more difficult because it invariably takes place in a large room where the reverberation is a bigger part of the sound. You can't fully reproduce those acoustics from stereo as the direction of arrival of the reflections is key to the sound.

Multi-channel music reproduced in a damped environment should be able to get very close indeed to a real live performance. The extra channels can be used to give a sense of real acoustical environment with real directional information. Unfortunately many multi-channel music recordings use it for special effects instead of environment immersion.
 
Cable Monkey said:
Very funny thread. Why? Because the writer of the article makes one huge mistake in stating that he has never heard music from a speaker sound as good as live music. That despite the fact what he was listening to on that street was almost certainly amplified via a PA system through, you've guessed it, speakers.

The biggest significant difference IMO is acoustics and room interaction. If everyone acknowledges that the same live performances can be compromised by the acoustic properties of the venue, why not accept that when trying to reproduce that at home most of us have not done enough to minimise the effect of acoustics on our systems. The same applies to a lesser extent to studio produced music where TonyL quite rightly states that the aim might be to get as close as possible to the perspective of the man at the mixing desk. But I suppose we should never forget that the absolute aim is to walk away after a session with your records or CD's relaxed after enjoying what you have just done.
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Good point - I was thinking along the same lines. Why not try putting a top end hi-fi in the venue a piece of music was recorded in then listen. Try a choral piece in the church it was recorded in for instance - I'm sure it would beat my crummy room.

mat
 
JTC said:
PS. 99% of gigs I've ever been to have sounded inferior than the sound of what most of us here get from our stereo systems. Sure, gigs are louder but the sound is often distorted and uneven. What's wrong about the whole premise of the original post is that expecting a studio or even studio-post-processed live recording to sound like a live recording is just wrong. They're very different things.
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You haven't been to a gig that i'm engineering then! I only do smaller scale gigs but Some of the results i ( and the musicians) have achived are stunning and no hifi system i have ever heard will come remotely close:D
 
My own 'take' on this, is that 'hi fi' long ago became a specific set of parameters, which had little to do with actual music. 'transparency' 'soundstaging' 'neutrality' 'prat' and so on and on.
HiFi equipment has never begun to match the live experience, and a key reason isn't physcis...it's that hi fi equipment favours artificial, hyped, reproduction. Reviewers favour a sterile, slightly bright, electro-mechanical sound. That's what manufacturers make because that is what the market wants. It's largely our fault for putting up with, and praising, rubbish reproduction


if you think I'm joking, have a listen at any hi fi show. What an ugly racket, and yet the fans sem to love it.It baffles me. We could do so much better, if we demanded better.
 
I think there are two reasons why recorded music doesn't sound like live music, (amplified or not).

a) Dynamics

Most studio recordings are compressed, a lot are massively over compressed. Even at live events that are amplified the engineer will use some compression, but generally they use less as large pro PA rigs have much higher SPL capability before compressing.

The answer, more judicious use of compression in the studio. Mantra should always be absolute minimum that is required just to be able to let the vocals be audible through the music etc.

b) Equalisation

Used with abandon during mixing. Why? well predominantly to make things "easier to follow". Unfortunately most live events don't have such clarity and so buggering around with EQ only makes acoustic instruments sound unnatural and we pick up on that very easily.

If recording studios stopped trying to get everything to "cut" through the mix, (or at least were much more subtle about it), then we'd have a far more accurate recording to reproduce. Though it's likely to make a lot of people unhappy when they hear what some real cymbals sound like at 90dB+

Predominantly though IMO it's the compressing to death of the individual instruments and the mix overall that really is the deal breaker. I'd prefer to see a system more like that in some Blu-Ray/DVD players where you have a "night time" mode that limits the dynamic range of the system. Then at least when we know the neighbours are out and are in the mood we can listen to music with a far more accurate, (to live) dynamic range. The rest of the time we can use wide-band compression, (maintaining the relative dynamics in the music), that brings the whole sound down to socially acceptable levels and still be able to follow the quiet passages. But importantly it would be our choice to implement it and to what degree.
 
The article is just confirming what the more astute fishers believe that true High Fidelity is impossible to acheive.
Tailor your system to a sound that you could listen to forever and you've arrived at your own take on High Fidelity.:)
I have:) (£400 ish)
 
A well set up Funktion 1 or Opus system will change your mind about live audio.
In fact I'd hazard Opus CS750's with a sub will make you contemplate selling the hifi!
 
My gear seems to trick my dogs so that when I am watching a film and a door opens the dogs are off looking to see who is "breaking in". If there is a dog barking they are all over the house looking for the other dog and so on. When I was working on a recording of Bella (now departed) Jago (who grew up with her sat next to the speaker and lay down and looked so sad (yes, dogs grieve) I had to stop using that sound.

Dogs have much better hearing than humans and are fooled so I reckon its probably fit for purpose.
 
fox said:
My stuff seems to trick my dogs so that when I am watching a film and a door opens the dogs are off looking to see who is breaking in. If there is a dog barking they are all over the house looking for the other dog and so on.

They have much better hearing than humans so I reckon its probably fit for purpose.
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Your system'll be the dogs bollocks then.
 
The closest I've heard to being fooled into thinking a hifi was live music has always been when listening from outside the room.... sometimes some distance away. This must mean something!?
I've only once actually thought I was hearing live music that turned out to be recorded and that was as above, actually from down a flight of stairs from the hifi and about 50 yards away!
 
Mescalito said:
The writer of the articler is, of course, 100% correct. Unless you are listening to something like a very well recorded solo acoustic guitar, no hi fi even gets close to the real thing. It is a facsimile, and in most cases, a poor one.

Hi fi is methadone to live music's heroin.

Chris

Chris
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I wouldnt call a Gyrodec high end, clearly this fella needs to upgrade.
 
Arkless Repairs said:
The closest I've heard to being fooled into thinking a hifi was live music has always been when listening from outside the room.... sometimes some distance away. This must mean something!?
I've only once actually thought I was hearing live music that turned out to be recorded and that was as above, actually from down a flight of stairs from the hifi and about 50 yards away!
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yes I've had similar experiences at home and at a hotel audio show.

Had to queue at a room where a drummer was playing, when inside it was the Sheffield labs drum record. Very convincing from outside.:)
 
A bit of a strange comparison, IMO, electrically amplified music through a PA rig to electrically amplified music through a living-room hifi.

If it were plain acoustic instruments, I'd be more sympathetic to this point of view and to the difficulty of the task for the hi-fi.

I regularly hear live music in opera houses, concert halls and churches, and whilst it's true that there's nothing like the real thing, it's also my experience that a decent hi-fi playing a good recording offers a more rewarding sonic experience than the worst seats at some venues.
 
I also agree with the blogger's observations. A so-so system is much closer to a so-called high end system than either are to the real thing. I have had similar experiences when walking towards live musicians without seeing them - I just know by the sound that it's live.
The same goes with classical concerts I've been to - brass instruments have an attack & stridency missing from the best systems.
When it comes to amplified concerts, my system always sounds better but lacks the excitement of actually being there & being part of the shared experience. They are diffeent. All this doesn't stop my own system sounding gob-smackingly good either!
The writer was grandstanding when he said crap. It does highlight that spending silly money is for silly people - the law of diminishing returns is confirmed!
 
Good hi-fi is mostly far better than live music, which is highly-overrated IMO. If you want to hear "live music" on your hi-fi, play Oasis' Definitely Maybe, which is essentially a live recording in a studio.
 
The main advantages a typical PA system has over a typical hi-fi system are:

(a) Volume - PA systems are usually over 500W and often much, much more. But this doesn't tell the whole story, as good PA speakers are high-efficiency designs, so each watt produces more sound output than a watt through a typical hi-fi speaker.

(b) Low-end (bass) frequency extension. This is closely correlated with the size of the bass driver. PA bass drivers are usually 15 inch or 18 inch designs. Whilst sub-woofers of this size can be deployed in a hi-fi system, typical hi-fi bass drivers are much smaller.

(c) Environment. Large rooms filled to the brim with people sound different from a domestic lounge with a few people.

I suggest that our ears can notice these differences.

Hi-fi systems have advantages over PA systems too. I own both. I listen to my hi-fi in my lounge and my PA system when providing sound to large numbers of people in large rooms. If I swapped them over, I don't believe it would work as well in either case.
 
Blzebub said:
Good hi-fi is mostly far better than live music, which is highly-overrated IMO. If you want to hear "live music" on your hi-fi, play Oasis' Definitely Maybe, which is essentially a live recording in a studio.
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Fair point. One of my favourite albums. Excellent music*. Poor recording.

To get the full effect, you would have to play very loud, through a PA system, to a large room of people.

* Possibly some would disagree, but they must be forgetting just how exciting this sounded at the time, before Noel, Liam and co released a ton of rather similar sounding sequels. Or possibly, there were not young then. Basically, you can disagree if you like but you are wrong ;)
 
It does seem that sometimes the highest ending systems can become so sophisticated all the liveness is refined out
 
Sit in the last rows of an average concert hall close your eyes and listen to a symphonic concert. Any very good hifi can do "better".... Just take away the excitement of being in a live event, concentrate only on the sound quality (maybe also take some measurement equipment) and then you'll realize that things aren't always what you believe.
 
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