Tony L
Administrator
A picture of Abbey Rd in the early to mid 70s, where no one had the slightest clue what Dark Side Of The Moon should sound like…
what really happened during the late 70s early 80s in the hifi press
- Thread starter davidismynaim
- Start date
A picture of Abbey Rd in the early to mid 70s, where no one had the slightest clue what Dark Side Of The Moon should sound like…
I think Stereophile, when J Gordon started it, was the first 'subjective' mag, they didn't do any technical reviewing for many years, did they?
https://www.stereophile.com/content/altec-7-electro-voice-patrician-800-loudspeakers
https://www.stereophile.com/content/dynaco-pat-4-preamplifier
The latter refer to some simple FR measurement but it wasn't published. But the words 'They just sound very good' is there.
sideshowbob
Champagne fascia aficionado
I doubt *anything* can play Dark Side of the Moon enjoyably...
Tony L
Administrator
I’ve never seen any early issues of Stereophile, I started buying it intermittently in the late ‘80s-early-90s. Would be interesting to read some.
Sue Pertwee-Tyr
Accuphase all the way down
That’s probably an inevitable consequence of the democratisation of hifi. Once it starts to become popular, and no longer the exclusive preserve of the technically literate, prospective purchasers need something other than a technical treatise to guide them. That’s just life. If you want to keep hifi for those who understand how it operates, it’ll stay in its niche and the manufacturers will stay in their little sheds.
poco a poco
I'm Jim
All the early Absolute Sound issues in the small booklet format upto about the end of 1998 when Harry Pearson became more and more erratic with regard to the frequency of publishing and it changed to A4 format were pretty good and set a high standard for how subjective reviews should be written, but rarely are. I had a long ongoing subscription and before the change it was really difficult to get my copies delivered. The frequency became more regular, but the amount of advertising had increased and the quality declined. I think Pearson had sold out by this time, but remained as editor. Maybe the fire that pretty much burned down his house and destroyed much of his record collection had depressed him. I stopped my subscription not much after.
One of the best points of all the earliest major long reviews was the equipment was always listened to or commented on by more than one reviewer. Not only to see if there was agreement, but to make sure that they were consistent with the review criteria and standards that Pearson had outlined.
Tony L
Administrator
I’d be very interested to see sales statistics (balanced against growing population etc) as I’m not convinced there was any more popularity in the ‘80s than in the ‘70s and before.
Hi-fi had always been a fairly popular market until comparatively recently when smartphone and computer technology arrived. Now it is unquestionably a niche. Given just how many old Leaks, Quads, Thorens, SMEs etc from the 50s, 60s & 70s still survive to this day along with huge numbers of Japanese receivers, direct drive turntables etc I suspect they sold in at least the quantities of the ‘80s black boxes.
I don’t know many figures off the top of my head, though I do know that the Quad 33 & 303 sold in the region of 120,000/90,00 units though their time in production (more 33s due to the 405 being released). The Garrard 301 & 401 sold around 7000 a year throughout the production run from 1954 through to the early ‘70s. Admittedly these were broadcast units so went to pro-use across the world rather than just UK audiophiles, but I’d be astonished if any other UK hi-fi was shifting in anything remotely like those numbers in the ‘80s. I’d be very interested to see annual figures for the LP12, Planar 3, Nait and other key items just to get some historical perspective here.
I still maintain the ‘80s marketing thing was a fashion/trend/movement more akin to new-wave, synth-pop, Thatcherism or whatever that just brought a new spin, a new ideology. If anything I suspect a lot of people found the typical high st BADA dealer rather intimidating compared to the past generations of box-shifters like Laskeys etc as there was far more ideology and groupthink.
Tony L
Administrator
I grabbed this lot off eBay about 5 years ago just out of curiosity as I’d never read a copy before and they seemed well respected. I started a thread in the classic room somewhere as I was impressed with them. Great writing in a really nice format. The other one I missed entirely was The Listener, which is annoying as the late Art Dudley was my favourite Stereophile writer of more recent times.
poco a poco
I'm Jim
I did at one time have all of those except your Vol 1 no. 4 and a couple of others in the first few volumes that I was mainly given by a friend before I took out a subscription. I perhaps stupidly passed them on to someone else. I now only have all from number 33 from 1984 to number 150, 2004 when I stopped my subscription.
earlofsodbury
Wastrel.
Upgrading your SP 25:
1. Find a suitable skip.
2. Heave it in there.
3. Go and buy almost anything else.
4. SHHHH!!! Never, ever, admit you owned an SP 25.
;-)
Arkless Electronics
Trade: Amp design and repairs.
The DM101 is vastly better than an LP12! It's one of my all time fave TT's, along with the Xerxes.
The Logic DM101 was probably sunk by the review in Hi-Fi Choice. Good example of a less than glowing review.
"so far all the Logics I have seen produced quite a strong smell when running; this has been identified as hot resistors in the lamp and motor control circuit"
"but a weakness is present in the sub chassis springing which is believed to have limited the ultimate performance attained. Logic have had this matter in hand but they have not so far provided us with a solution"
"so far all the Logics I have seen produced quite a strong smell when running; this has been identified as hot resistors in the lamp and motor control circuit"
"but a weakness is present in the sub chassis springing which is believed to have limited the ultimate performance attained. Logic have had this matter in hand but they have not so far provided us with a solution"
When they did figure out what it should sound like, James Guthrie remastered it on ATCS.
A picture of Abbey Rd in the early to mid 70s, where no one had the slightest clue what Dark Side Of The Moon should sound like…
“As this is a conceptual work, we agreed that I should mix the entire album and then play it to the individual bandmembers for their input. That way, they could experience everything in context.” Guthrie made sure that all of the bandmembers experienced his mixes through the same ATC speaker line that he created them on. “ATC speakers are simply fantastic. I cannot say enough about them. The imaging is unlike anything I’ve experienced. The dispersion characteristic is exceptional, and the speakers always remain phase-coherent.”Guthrie used five SCM150ASLs and two SCM0.1-15 subwoofers.”
https://www.mixonline.com/recording/atc-loudspeakers-found-dark-side-moon-373243
Darren L
Egalitarian
I grabbed this lot off eBay about 5 years ago just out of curiosity as I’d never read a copy before and they seemed well respected. I started a thread in the classic room somewhere as I was impressed with them. Great writing in a really nice format. The other one I missed entirely was The Listener, which is annoying as the late Art Dudley was my favourite Stereophile writer of more recent times.
I given about 100 or those early Absolute Sound and Stereophile journals back in the late nineties, most of them dating from the late 70's through to early 90's, they were all about the size of small novels, colour jacket or cover photo and black & white photos inside, not many though. I remember some of those covers.
Arkless Electronics
Trade: Amp design and repairs.
The late 70's/early 80's was when the rot started.
Before that time hi fi was a technical hobby and reviewers were proper engineers whose word was law. Donald Aldous, Gordon J King, Angus McKenzie, Barry Fox, Stanley Kelly etc etc
Reason, common sense and above all science ruled the roost.
If you had suggested wires or mains or equipment supports play an important (or any!) effect you would quite rightly be laughed at... I still do laugh at such people today of course.
The problem was that sales people, marketers, took over... especially one's working out of Glasgow and Salisbury...
They made a pact with dealers and magazines etc at a crossroads one murky night which probably involved summoning the devil...
They decided far more profit could be made if everyone who knew what they were talking about was banished, everything that mattered was forgotten... and hi fi was sold in the same way as unscrupulous tailors sell clothes to mythical emperors....
It's been going downhill ever since.
Before that time hi fi was a technical hobby and reviewers were proper engineers whose word was law. Donald Aldous, Gordon J King, Angus McKenzie, Barry Fox, Stanley Kelly etc etc
Reason, common sense and above all science ruled the roost.
If you had suggested wires or mains or equipment supports play an important (or any!) effect you would quite rightly be laughed at... I still do laugh at such people today of course.
The problem was that sales people, marketers, took over... especially one's working out of Glasgow and Salisbury...
They made a pact with dealers and magazines etc at a crossroads one murky night which probably involved summoning the devil...
They decided far more profit could be made if everyone who knew what they were talking about was banished, everything that mattered was forgotten... and hi fi was sold in the same way as unscrupulous tailors sell clothes to mythical emperors....
It's been going downhill ever since.
Tony L
Administrator
Not to my mind. The SACD layer of the anniversary disc is ok, but it doesn’t stack up to a good early UK vinyl copy. Something very obviously missing to my (and many others) ears. The CD layer is pretty poor with compression and even clipping (well documented). Any Guthrie digital is beaten by the early Japanese CDs IMO.
Martyn Miles
pfm Member
Stereophile does superb speaker reviews.
Having an interest in LS3/5as, I always read Ken Kessler’s reviews.
Now they’ve got worse.
His Falcon Acoustics & Rogers Classic LS3/5a reviews were not good, in my opinion.
Waffling on about Whitesnake and other obscure bands.
No real depth to the reviews.
His Stirling V2 from early 2000 was much better.
I looked up Stereophile reviews of LS3/5as, Falcon, Graham Audio, etc. and they were
excellent.
Real depth of research and writing.
Lots of facts in table form, etc.
HFN speaker reviews in general just ‘get going’ and then end suddenly.
Arkless Electronics
Trade: Amp design and repairs.
Sam Tellig could be entertaining in Stereophile.
Dowser
Learning to bodge again..
Again your black and white view does you zero justice Jez - you are mostly correct but, for instance, the last new Hi-Fi purchase I made was for 2x 4m lengths of Linn k400 from a Linn dealer in Chiswick I guess late 90s to early 2000s. They were disgusted that I just bought the raw cables and connectors off them (for more, from memory, than my Nad 3130 cost me some 4 years earlier), not believing I’d be able to solder the bananas on myself. They cost more than my amp did! But guess what, they sounded vastly better than the dual 2.5mm mains cables I was using until that point between Nad 3130 and modified 737-rs… Oh, wait a minute, I mentioned bi-wiring…shit… LOL
Robert
Tapehead
Bring back the little HFC A5 books. Those were excellent and i loved the format.