We live in a funny world, which isn’t funny at all most of the time, and one of the funniest notions in hifi is that the value of listening to music is best determined by a measured approach devoid of emotion.
I take a different tack where an important indication of my positive response to a piece of review gear—within a system—has to do with an emotional response to the music in play.
Is this a controversial approach? Shouldn’t I focus on objective measures, measures that are provable, repeatable, and universal?
The answer(s) depend on the reason(s) we listen to music.
I listen to music for many reasons but a very important determining factor relating to the value of hifi lies in my level of engagement—with music. The ideal outcome occurs when nothing else intrudes on the experience and this complete connection with music happens over long periods of time—hours, days, months—with whatever I choose to play no matter the quality of the recording.
This kind of engagement necessarily involves both intellect and emotion, to boil an amazingly complex and wonderful experience down to two words. The mind and the body, if you will, a minefield of a (false) dichotomy if ever there was one if we look at the related debates throughout history that pit the mind on one end of a seesaw and the body on the other. And I call this a false dichotomy because you cannot separate one from the other, the mind from the body, without killing the host. But this seesaw analogy is instructive nonetheless because the balance between intellect and emotion, or the objective and subjective, is the basis of many a hifi disagreement and things get more tense the more extreme the imbalance between one end and the other.
I suppose it could be posited that a perfect balance is ideal, and I’m not so sure I would argue that point, but it’s been my experience that this balance can change day-to-day, or even moment-to-moment, depending on inside (me) and outside variables. If I’m deep into digging some Parliament and someone hits my big toe with a hammer, my focus will shift away from the music which is why I always stress the importance of listening over time—days, weeks, and months.
But barring any jarring events, inside or outside, my goal when listening to music on the hifi is complete immersion in that experience which by necessity involves all of me (why not take all of me) and any attempt to detach intellect from emotion to better assess some ‘objective’ value relating to that experience is counter-productive, like being hit on the toe with a hammer. To put it another way it breaks the spell, tilting that ideal balance out of whack.
Without mincing words, I’m saying that when it comes to deciding what hifi to buy, listening to music over time through it is the best way to determine value and we need to bring our complete self to the experience.