“Ninety percent of success can be boiled down to consistently doing the obvious thing for an uncommonly long period of time without convincing yourself that you’re smarter than you are.” — Shane Parrish
Everybody knows that practice of any skill with the idea of challenging yourself will more than likely make you better at practically anything you choose to do. But where have you ever seen those concepts applied to bettering your own audio skills other than right here on this blog? (And Robert Brook‘s of course.)
Just how would you go about challenging yourself as an audiophile?
Falling in love with outcomes doesn’t move you forward.
Falling in love with the process does.
Shane Parish
It’s amazing how far you can get in this hobby if you’re obsessive enough and driven enough. (See links below for more on these two drivers of success.)
To achieve real success you must be willing to devote huge amounts of time, money and effort to the pursuit of better home audio.
You will really go far if you’re willing to let your ears, not your brain, inform your understanding and appreciation of the sound of the various pressings you play.
If we thought like most audiophiles — that money buys good sound and original pressings are usually the best — we would currently be very unlikely to have a business selling a million dollars or more worth of Hot Stampers every year.
(For those new to the idea, here are the short versions of what they are and how one goes about acquiring them.)
Since moving to Georgia in 2023, my Hot Stamper listening sessions have come to a stop. I still have clear memories of hearing some of the great albums we sell, and many of those recollections inform the commentary found on this blog.
Dear Tom,
So what I can’t get out of my mind, you have been doing this all these years, your own personal collection must be the creme de la creme. Cannot even imagine. But sure would love to hear!
Dear Chuck,
I’ve had an extensive record collection for all of my life, right up until about fifteen years ago. Starting at the tender young age of 10, I bought the 45 of She Loves You on Swan records, which I still own. Can’t play it, it’s broken, but I keep it anyway. When I was a kid, I used to take my two dollar weekly allowance and buy two 45s with it. Did that for years. Still have them, close to two hundred in old carrying cases. I look forward to playing them in my retirement.
I had hundreds of amazing sounding LPs in my collection, the best of the best from more than 20 years of doing shootouts. About fifteen years ago I asked myself what were all these great sounding records sitting on a shelf for? I never played them because I got to hear all my favorite records every day, and after playing records all day, the last thing I wanted to do at night or on a weekend was pull a record off the shelf and play it.
So I put all my personal records into shootouts, and sometimes they did well and sometimes they did not. (Those of you who go back and play your old records from years past will surely find some real surprises, both good and bad.)
Steve Westman graciously invited one of the most controversial members of the Audiophile Community — that would be me — to appear on his youtube channel for a half hour chat. When he couldn’t shut me up, it ended going for an hour.
I want to thank him for putting up with me while I spent the time mostly criticizing all the modern reissues he seems to favor.
Please read the comments and feel free to post your own if you have something you would like to say. I read them all.
Say whatever you like, I can take it!
Unlike the Tom Port of twenty years ago, and some rather famous reviewers still writing today, my skin has grown quite thick since I started causing trouble in the vinyl community with my crackpot ideas and uncontrolled greed. People seem to enjoy beating up on me and the snake oil they accuse me of selling, but more than a thousand years ago one of the great Stoic philosophers offered his advice on how to deal with the criticisms of one’s detractors. This is advice that I have tried to heed myself for lo these many years, not always successfully.
Below is an excerpt from an article in The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday.
The secret from Marcus Aurelius for when we get flak or insults or judgment from other people? He said we should look inside their soul.
“Get inside him,” Marcus wrote. “Look at what sort of person he is. You’ll find you don’t need to strain to impress him.”
His point was that too often we blindly “accept” what haters throw at us without stopping to actually examine who these haters actually are. You wouldn’t take driving advice from a bad driver, or be guilted about your finances from someone who knows nothing about money.
Nor should you listen to people telling you you’re not good at this or that, that you’re failing here or there, whether you should act in one way or another, if you don’t respect that person and their own choices.
If you want to stop caring what other people think, take a second and actually look at those people for a second. You’ll quickly find that there isn’t much to be harried on about, that you’re doing just fine.
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