Audiophiles, I Summon Thee
The best thing I've ever done for my music listening enjoyment in the last decade wasn't to buy any fancy new electronics, surprisingly. It was to reduce background/outside noise in the room I listen to music in the most.
Definitely posts on this forum.
Off-season wrote:
This guy thinks way too much about speaker grills:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkVvwS38dj4
So "audiophile" might be a stretch, but I'm going to buy either the Axiom Audio Air N2 or the Sonos 5 this week. Anyone have experience with either or both?
What's your go-to song for testing a new system. I've finally committed to a major upgrade to my car audio. What song will let the system shine, and demonstrate whatbits really capable of?
I'm guessing the Mountain Goats isn't the answer.
I'm guessing the Mountain Goats isn't the answer.
Depends upon what I'm testing for, but Propaganda's "The Murder Of Love" is great. Huge frequency range, plenty of dynamics, lots of reverb.
Off-season wrote:
What's your go-to song for testing a new system. I've finally committed to a major upgrade to my car audio. What song will let the system shine, and demonstrate whatbits really capable of?
i'd argue that "testing" and "letting it shine" aren't quite the same thing.
to me, "testing" is critically listening to the audio system to determine how well it is performing, how well is it reproducing the playback material, evaluating its fidelity - and making corrections as needed. first criteria for selecting what to play is familiarity: do you know what the music is supposed to sound like? have you heard it a million times on other good sound systems? here are a few "reference albums" that i've read are common among audio engineers when tuning a system:
- Steely Dan: Aja
- Donald Fagen: Nightfly
- Dire Straits: Brothers in Arms
- Boz Scaggs: Lowdown
- RATM: s/t
- Jay Z: Black Album (especially for cars and other subwoofer-heavy setups)
- AC/DC: Back in Black
- Peter Gabriel: So
- The Eagles: Hell Freezes Over
- Leftfield: Leftism
(aside/true story: in 2000, i went to a untz untz untz festival where my friends knew the organizers, so we were let into the venue before the festival started - this allowed us to get killer camping spots. the main sound system was brand new, and after the festival it was going to be used on tour by the rolling stones. the festival was its test run, so some serious audio engineers with cool gadgets were on site. we were woken up one morning by 140 db of…. Joe Cocker. they played some sort of greatest hits album/collection. i had a quick chat with one of the audio guys, and he said they used Cocker because of the dynamics, full spectrum of sound, and familiarity.)
"letting it shine", on the hand, is akin to showing off in my books: make the listeners feel those subs, get blasted by clean sound at high volumes, "bet you've never heard <insert band name here> sound THIS good!!!", etc. you still want something that was well recorded, but what would be "best" in this case is much more subjective. it's less about critical listening and fidelity, and more about blowing the listener's sock off. for some people that will be metallica, for others it'll be the three tenors…
Steely Dan - Aja
The end
The end
Thank you!
sweetcell wrote:
here are a few "reference albums" that i've read are common among audio engineers when tuning a system:
That's a lot of time to spend in your car just to test your sound system…
A couple of quick hits just to make sure it's dialed in, then take your massive cross country roadtrip with Sweets list.
To test placement, balance, connectivity, I start with Oasis' "D'You know what I Mean" - there's a one minute intro with sounds all over the place before the mix of guitars drums and bass come in.
To test the bass/subwoofer levels I use Daft Punks "Doing it Right" (the long intro allows for a lot of adjusting), XX "Angels", and Taylor Swift's "I knew you Were Trouble" (A Max Martin/Shellback dubstep bass drop refrain is perfect for tuning). RTJ's "Legend Has it" is also good.
For vocals I used to almost always use Mazzy Star's "Fade into you" but have recently added Cigarettes after Sex a lot - usually "Sunsetz" and the MTV unplugged's version of "Take on Me," probably in reverse order of how I listed them there.
And then lastly, an addition to Sweetcell's pretty good list would be Sturgill Simpson's "Sound and Fury" album because of the breadth of sounds.
EDIT: Shit, somehow I left off Pet Sounds. I usually use God Only Knows, but Sloop John B works too.
sweetcell wrote:
first criteria for selecting what to play is familiarity: do you know what the music is supposed to sound like? have you heard it a million times on other good sound systems?
forgot to add: personally, the first Shpongle album and RATM are my go-to's.
vansmack wrote:You forgot to log in to the Hutch account.sweetcell wrote:
here are a few "reference albums" that i've read are common among audio engineers when tuning a system:
That's a lot of time to spend in your car just to test your sound system…
A couple of quick hits just to make sure it's dialed in, then take your massive cross country roadtrip with Sweets list.
To test placement, balance, connectivity, I start with Oasis' "D'You know what I Mean" - there's a one minute intro with sounds all over the place before the mix of guitars drums and bass come in.
To test the bass/subwoofer levels I use Daft Punks "Doing it Right" (the long intro allows for a lot of adjusting), XX "Angels", and Taylor Swift's "I knew you Were Trouble" (A Max Martin/Shellback dubstep bass drop refrain is perfect for tuning). RTJ's "Legend Has it" is also good.
For vocals I used to almost always use Mazzy Star's "Fade into you" but have recently added Cigarettes after Sex a lot - usually "Sunsetz" and the MTV unplugged's version of "Take on Me," probably in reverse order of how I listed them there.
And then lastly, an addition to Sweetcell's pretty good list would be Sturgill Simpson's "Sound and Fury" album because of the breadth of sounds.
EDIT: Shit, somehow I left off Pet Sounds. I usually use God Only Knows, but Sloop John B works too.
sweetcell wrote:
forgot to add: personally, the first Shpongle album and RATM are my go-to's.
That reminded me a story a former student (who now has a job at the university) recently told me about how the students were always confused about how when I was assigned to monitor the protests, which were inevitably about me as a member of the administration, I would always sing along to the songs they were playing in the quad. "It was weird that we would play RATM and none of us knew the songs as well as you did. Who is this guy in a suit singing along to Rage?"
My friends call me smack. Vansmack.
vansmack wrote:when I was assigned to monitor the protests, which were inevitably about meok…now I want to know more about this story line…pics would be nice
Julian, wrote:
You forgot to log in to the Hutch account.
Steely Dan - Aja
My Peachtree iNova amp of nearly 11 years blew out over the weekend…due to a home improvement project. Fuck me.
Yada wrote:wha happend…were you getting the led out or did you drop something on it?
My Peachtree iNova amp of nearly 11 years blew out over the weekend…due to a home improvement project. Fuck me.
useless wrote:Yada wrote:wha happend…were you getting the led out or did you drop something on it?
My Peachtree iNova amp of nearly 11 years blew out over the weekend…due to a home improvement project. Fuck me.
So we had a small project taking place in our home that was creating a TON of dust… we left town for a week and I took apart/unplugged everything and packaged it away.
Hooked up everything Sunday and BOOM… right when I turned on the record player the speakers kind of crackled and and electrical burn smell came from the amp. Not sure if it's coincidental, bad timing, caused by dust, or I didn't thoroughly ensure everything was good to go before turning it back on.
I bought a cheap Sony amp for $150 last night at Best Buy and everything is working… so now I just need to decide if i want to
1. Trade in the old amp for a $200 credit for a new one
2. Attempt to get it fixed
3. Say fuck it and keep the cheap sony
Yada wrote:useless wrote:Yada wrote:wha happend…were you getting the led out or did you drop something on it?
My Peachtree iNova amp of nearly 11 years blew out over the weekend…due to a home improvement project. Fuck me.
So we had a small project taking place in our home that was creating a TON of dust… we left town for a week and I took apart/unplugged everything and packaged it away.
Hooked up everything Sunday and BOOM… right when I turned on the record player the speakers kind of crackled and and electrical burn smell came from the amp. Not sure if it's coincidental, bad timing, caused by dust, or I didn't thoroughly ensure everything was good to go before turning it back on.
I bought a cheap Sony amp for $150 last night at Best Buy and everything is working… so now I just need to decide if i want to
1. Trade in the old amp for a $200 credit for a new one
2. Attempt to get it fixed
3. Say fuck it and keep the cheap sony
I would try to get a repair quote. Might just be a bad capacitor.
BrettnotBritt wrote:
Might just be a bad capacitor.
Are you saying his capacitor is in flux?