Imagine two people standing in Skeleton Bay, Namibia where the Namib desert meets the Atlantic Ocean. The first is a tourist and surfer, the other a local Herero pastoralist taking a break from tending livestock.
Do you think they both see the same things? The longest sand-bottomed left hand wave in the world? The increasing frequency of severe droughts, floods, food insecurity, escalating temperatures, and rising sea levels?
My point being different people see different things even when looking at the same landscape and these differences are rooted in one’s perspective, interests, and purpose.
The Barn has two listening areas—the A-Side and the B-Side—and there are always two systems setup at the ready to play. I’ve had the pleasure, and good fortune, to have listened to hundreds of combinations of gear here, mixing and matching different amplifiers with different speakers using different digital and analog sources to feed them. But on any given day, there are two systems in play.
Imagine two people visiting the Barn. One is a retired electrician, the other a classical pianist. Do you think they both see the same thing? Do you think they both hear the same things?
Of course not.
Now let’s suppose one person prefers the system playing on the A-Side while the other prefers the B-Side. Is one right and the other wrong?
Of course not.
Having two systems to listen through has taught me many things but the most important is simply this—there are no right and wrong views when it comes to hifi, only different views informed by one’s perspective, interests, and purpose.
