A GUIDE FOR THE DEDICATED ANALOG AUDIOPHILE
Here is Robert’s latest posting.
You say your stereo is having trouble playing challenging recordings like The Firebird with Dorati?
You can’t get the strings in the loudest passages to sound the way you think they should? Too screechy are they? Or too smeary? Or too thin? Or too hard? Or even congested and almost distorted in the climaxes?
It’s amazing how many different ways there are for strings on an orchestral recording to sound wrong. If getting The Firebird’s strings to sound right is a goal you wish to achieve, you, my friend, have your work cut out for you.
Because nothing in audio is harder than reproducing the massed strings on the biggest, boldest orchestral recordings.
We have some good test discs for that specific purpose, but it will take a real commitment from you to bring about the success you seek.
Audio Is Hard
This is a drum we have been banging on for as long as I can remember, to the constant irritation of every less-than-serious audiophile who comes in contact with us — which all well and good. We haven’t catered to that crowd since we gave up on Heavy Vinyl in 2007.
We’re trying to reach a much smaller subgroup of more serious enthusiasts with our approach to audio and records. See here, here and here, and there are great many more discussions to be found on our audio advice page.
If you want to achieve any real success in audio, you need to do a lot of work and spend a fair amount of money. Not a fortune, maybe not even six figures, but trying to do audio on the cheap is a fool’s errand. It can’t be done.
Why is it any of our business how your system sounds? If it’s good enough for you, why isn’t it good enough for us?
A true Hi-Fidelity rig is in fact what makes our business possible.
Without top quality sound, our records can’t possibly be worth the admittedly high prices we charge for them.
We want to help you take audio to the next level for two reasons: one, because that’s where our records really come to life, and two, that’s where the shortcomings of the modern Heavy Vinyl reissue are too glaringly obvious to ignore.
I found a way to get there. Like me, Robert Brook found a way.
We believe that the more time you spend following the advice on our two blogs explaining how we got to where we are now, the clearer the path forward will be. We hope you can learn from our experience. It will cost you nothing and might just save you a great deal of money.
Further Reading
- Hot Stampers and audio progress go hand in hand
- More advice on equipment, tweaks, electricity, room treatments, etc.
- Advanced record cleaning is critical to finding your own Hot Stamper pressings
Robert’s Approach to Audio and Records
Robert has methodically and carefully — one might even say scientifically — approached the various problems he’s encountered in this hobby by doing the following:
- Improving his equipment,
- Teaching himself how to do a better job of dialing in his turntable setup, and
- Learning how to do controlled shootouts for his favorite albums.
More on Robert’s system here. You may notice that it has a lot in common with the one we use. This is not an accident.
And it is also no accident that these two systems just happen to be very good at showing their owners the manifold shortcomings of the modern remastered LP, as well as the benefits to be gained by doing shootouts in order to find dramatically better sounding pressings to play.