ZplyonZ Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 I had a thought when passing a musical instrument store yesterday (to take scp's gripe in another direction)... All I could see looking in were cheap electronic synths, DJ mix boards and PA speakers, making me muse on how rare it is for a young person to have any exposure to the way acoustic instruments actually sound. Where is a typical High School student hearing music? In his/her car, playing video games or while tooling around the net on his computer. In all of these cases the music is almost exclusively highly synthisized, bass heavy "rock". Or television backgrounds, to pick an even easier target. Ever listen to the music played in a one hour block on say, the Spike channel? For the most part just watered down skater dreck, distorto guitar effects and synth drums. If that's all they know of music, why in the world should a kid care or even acknowledge the existance of sustain on a piano note, or the articulation of the slap on an acoustic bass, so lovingly reproduced on our ancient-technology boxes? Maybe I'm just getting old, I never thought I would be the one to say "These kids today... their music is just noise!" I love to rock out, but mostly to what I consider well-recorded and engineered stuff (Radiohead, Jayhawks and Wilco are on the deck now). I think even that level of audio quality will be for a shrinking market going forward... There can be no "critical faculty" when the game has moved on. Grumpily, Chris L Austin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deang Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 Man, you guys are oooold. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Duke Spinner Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 Hi, TBrennan ..TB ..?? TooBad ..?? ... toobad i got Valencias, 'n 19's ... ........ well ...the Valencia's really Rock ! lotta bass output, huge impact outta that horn they were commonly found in clubs in the 70's the 19's .. are a little, say, smoother, refined ,restrained, i guess .... they have more bass extension, but a smaller port with less output the crossover is more sophisticated, the horn driver doesn't quite give the "pop" of the snare drum head that the Valencia has with the 808 driver the Valencia's are more closely related to a pro-sound application, the 19's more Hi-Fi .... BeezA ... ahh ...i have a '69 FireBird Scrambler ... and a Victor GP British bikes are for people that like bikes, i mean .. like to work on thier bike .... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scp53 Posted January 9, 2005 Author Share Posted January 9, 2005 should i just enjoy audio and not "convert" people? there are some that are fixed and will not change. i guess it may be wasted effort. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WMcD Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 I tend to agree with what Chris says; a little bit. OTOH, it sounds a bit like what adults said about the Beatles. One critic said the trouble with electric guitars is that there was too much distortion and the owners didn't have the sense to know it. The implication being there were dim witted teenagers pursuit of bad music in the 1960s and they never amount to anything. - - - - - I must say that some adults get so annoyed at teens and their music that they can't see anything else. Probably one of the more, very unintended, insulting things about young adults came from the typewritter of Gordon Baxter. He wrote the Bax Seat column in Flying. A very good fellow if his writings are any indication. He had discovered some young people doing missionary work using light planes in the jungle. He J U S T G U S H E D. The final sentence was, "I just had to give you readers a snap shot of these clean cut young people." The implication being that if a young person doesn't have a short haircut and carry a bible, they are flawed. Conformance to his theology and his hair style was the litmus test. It was annoying as heck. Nowadays the graduate schools are full of people listening to who knows what with metal rings piercing who knows where. They are going to cure cancer and go to Mars. I have no doubt that the MD who treats us in old age will be one of the tatooed, pierced, headbangers which are looked upon with suspicion. Maybe the Kreb's cycle does make more sense with an I-Pod and bad synths. The generation gap is, in recent years, echoed. It really is a shame. I renew my comments re Erik. Good mentors make a big difference. They are the ones who realize the reversal of position which goes on. My rant, Gil Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tpg Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 Watched Boston Legal and feel much better having laughed. To sum it up, I understand both sides... I can be on either side depending on the circumstances. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBrennan Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 TPG---Hope you feel better now. As to guitars; it's what you play, not what you play it on. My best friend still plays out and uses a Peavey guitar which is certainly uncool. But he's good. He keeps his Gretsch White Falcon, 69 Les Paul (bought new and people then were telling him not to buy a "crappy" new one) and old SG safe at home. He considers the Peavey a capable tool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nicholtl Posted January 10, 2005 Share Posted January 10, 2005 Scp, I totally feel your pain, man. Whenever I'm in Best Buy or Good Guys, all I ever see, besides the old couple marvelling at the Bose Lifestyle systems, are young high schoolers standing around the car audio section, bopping their heads to the boomy and horrible (but loud) sounding MTX subs or what have you. I don't think audio is going down the drain, per se, it's just that the market for loud but crappy (to audiophile standards) sounding speakers is expanding. Not to worry though, because the small, elitist niche known as the audiophile niche, is still ever prevalent, kicking, screaming, and we're here to stay. And so are the companies that cater to us. So there's no real need to fret. Just know that there are those unfortunate souls who like quantity, not quality. And then there are those of us who appreciate the finer things in life. Like Klipsch. And other fine audio components. Actually, come to think of it, it may be US that are the unfortunate souls. After all, your average teeny-bopper high school jock isn't going to spend and arm and a leg endlessly upgrading his system to achieve acoustical nirvana, right? Relax. Don't worry. Be happy. Life is good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted January 10, 2005 Share Posted January 10, 2005 I think the biggest problem with being frustrated with "people that don't know anything" is that it is too easy to come across as a pompus arrogant prick (well that's what I've been told anyway). I have been there many times and all it does is turn off the listener which doesn't help you or the idiot person. It's been touched on a few times, but the most important factor is that these "idiots" have never heard better quality (I'm just using the term for simplicity...they're really not idiots). Also, they're usually not even after the same kind of quality that "audiophiles" are trying to achieve. My brother knew this one popular rich kid at school and got to telling him about how we had some really nice speakers at home. One day this rich kid ("idiot") came over in his camaro with the typical boom machine. He brought some of his music over and it sounded really quite awful on my "high end system." He took me to his car and I must say that it sounded so much better. I brought some of my favorite music into his car and I felt that it sounded like utter crap (yet it was so realistic on my home system). Am I justified in claiming that my system is superior in all ways to his system when his music sounded better to him on his equipment? Isn't the whole purpose of this hobby to maximize one's level of enjoyment? The path to audio nirvana begins with the recordings we already listen to. Another kid came to my house one day and I asked him to listen to a CD and close his eyes. He was actually extremely amazed at how realistic it sounded and that he expected to see the singer when he opened his eyes. However, he informed me that he would rather have the overexagerated bass because he could feel it better and that got him more involved with the music. For the record, I have a relatively flat response down to 25Hz with a small peak from 30-45Hz (hardly a bass shy system). Anyways, I could go on and on with all sorts of stories but the end result comes down to the individual listener and their expectations of a sound system. Realism is not always the main priority for every listener. However, I firmly believe that a "realistic system" is entirely capable of satisfying any of the other expectations through the use of EQ or better recordings. Nevertheless, it truly is annoying that most people don't care about the realism because that means there's no incentive for the record industry to produce realstic albums. Thus it is very difficult for audiophiles to find music they enjoy (unless of course you're an old fart that digs jazz or classical) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBrennan Posted January 10, 2005 Share Posted January 10, 2005 I have four kids, all grown now. All grew up hearing a good hi-fi in the house, all listen to music and NONE of them has any interest in hi-fi. They can listen to and enjoy music to satisfaction using a radio, boombox or cheap stereo. So much for the argument that people would want better gear if only they heard it. Some people connect directly to the music regardless of the sound. Sometimes I think it's we hi-fi fans who are screwed-up, not those who enjoy music without hi-fi. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
richinlr Posted January 10, 2005 Share Posted January 10, 2005 ---------------- On 1/10/2005 3:20:15 AM TBrennan wrote: I have four kids, all grown now. All grew up hearing a good hi-fi in the house, all listen to music and NONE of them has any interest in hi-fi. They can listen to and enjoy music to satisfaction using a radio, boombox or cheap stereo. So much for the argument that people would want better gear if only they heard it. Some people connect directly to the music regardless of the sound. Sometimes I think it's we hi-fi fans who are screwed-up, not those who enjoy music without hi-fi. ---------------- One of the things I noted a very long time ago was that many musicians had very abysmal systems and had no desire to upgrade them or get anything better. I was often told that there was no need for any better because, as musicians, their minds filled in the blanks and corrected anomalies. Interestingly enough, I believe we have all experienced this same thing with familiar music played on a boom box. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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