Science Shows There is Only One Real Way to Listen to Music

http://m.mic.com/articles/104250/what-the-internet-has-done-to-your-love-of-music

Interesting and decently written article and listening. I pretty much find myself agreeing. I use Spotify for background music and Vinyl and HiRez for in depth listening but I definitely give the edge to vinyl for sound quality and sheer amount of music available. MP3 sucks.

 

The Loudness Wars have turned music into aural wallpaper - something that can be always around you but something that listeners can't pay attention to.

I wonder how many of those who think highly compressed music sounds ok actually sit down and listen to music (without doing anything else)?

 

I haven't read the article yet but I find mysel conflicted over the current state of music in our culture (at least in the U.S.). I can't back this up with facts but the digital age has made music so accessible and it seems as though tons of young people are listening to music with headphones or at their desks while they work, it's probably more accessible than at any point in our history so far. I think that's great in principle.

However, so much recent music sounds like like hot garbage hot garbage (aka loudness wars). So while music is almost ubiquitous today, I don't think it CAN be appreciated based on the way it's recorded and distributed to the masses, at least not relative to the past 4-6 decades.

This is not to say all music today is recorded for $hit but for the audience I am speaking of, younger kids, it really is. The music itself may not be terrible though I have to say I don't really get it, but that's beside my point.

FWIW, I'm 35 so it's not like I don't consider myself on the fringes of the millennial generation.

 

For the last two weeks I've had Pfarmers' new album streaming on my phone and on my computer. I must have listened to the album twenty times through, so much so that I've had "The Ol' River Gang" and "El Dorado" in my head when I wake up in the morning. And when I listen to the album now, I know what song comes after the one I'm hearing.

It's streaming...and yet it's an album to me. There is no one "real" way to listen to music, it's whatever works for you.

 

Poppy Crum?
hmmm....
"crummy pop"
does this person write for The Onion?
and Bob Ludwig's comment?
wow! Isn't that the pot calling the kettle black?!!

 

In a round about way that is sort of the point of the article.

 

OK, I'm gonna chalk this up to my poor reading skills, but after reading that article, I'm left with: "WHAT is the only one real way to listen to music that science shows?" It wasn't spelled out clearly enough for me to grasp.

 

And Sammy Hagar had determined there is only one way to rock...

 

The original version of the article stated Vinyl ( do to its lack of dynamic compression and fidelity) was the best way to listen to music based on a bunch of test Dolby Labs did but they then changed it to all high resolution formats and non compressed formats. I linked to it off of Facebook and some how got the adended version.

 

Ah, thanks for the clarification. It was sorta seeming like they were saying repetetive listening as opposed to spot sampling was the way to go, but they also contradicted that.

 

maybe I'm misunderstanding but are you saying that vinyl wins in terms of availability? maybe we have different definitions of the word...

 

Biff Rose, The thorn in Mrs Rose's side. I loved Biff but he just disappeared. Loved Buzz the Fuzz.

 

Some interesting thoughts and comments about the article here: http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...-way-to-listen-to-music.394269/#post-11394949

and here: http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...-way-to-listen-to-music.394269/#post-11396191

 

Here we go with that "science" stuff again. lol

I listen to nothing less than redbook and mostly highrez material, whether is it is in the background when I am reading or just listening, which is something that most people don't do any more. Who do you know that does what we audiophiles do and sit in a chair and just listen to music anymore? Trying to just hear every nuance of the performer playing and/or singing? Just us.

The difference is not science, but the decline of the human condition. Society today cannot be "alone" for one second, they must be connected to someone or have someone need to be connected to them. Alone, contemplating what an artist has to say is important to us(audiophiles) and we are not insecure to have to be with or around someone to be fulfilled or feel completed. That is the scary part of society today to me. The idea of just being alone makes people nervous. If you really need someone else to constantly validate your existence, the you have a much bigger problem.

 

People don't listen to albums today because... Loudness Wars.

That thesis is something like this forum's creed. While I agree it may be a contributing factor, the "elephant in the room" is the demographics the record companies are now chasing and that demographic's remarkably short attention span.

 

So I guess if we don't listed to vinyl records over and over then we don't really appreciate listening to music? I'm unsure of what the point of that article was.

Better than 90% of my listening this past year has been streaming Pandora stations I've created. I have hundred of records still but it's probably been close to a year since I played one. I grew up with vinyl (I bought Biff's "Thorn in Mrs' Rose's Side" back in 1968 and still have it). I prefer digital now. Oh well, maybe I'm one of those science deniers I keep reading about...

 

Steve Jobs never listening to mp3 and only vinyl is an example of how the older generation sold out the younger one. First we were fed cassette tapes and ghetto blasters, then cds, then downloads. All the while, people who knew better were still buying the vinyl and allowing us to buy the crappy version. Is it any wonder that the music has ultimately suffered in the way it has?

 

So vinyl is the only real way to listen to music? Ok. Looks like I haven't really listened to music during the last 20 years and pretty much never to any classical music.

Bummer.

 

Ghetto Blasters...one of the best "names" of audio equipment ever.

- Buck

 

I'm still not sure of the point of the article. I suspect that there will always be people whose attention span for music is limited. Being a classical music lover, I'm on the other end of that scale. The degree that access to music via the internet has both broadened availability and reduced apparent value doubtless has changed things. But the article suffers from subject drift, so by the end one is left scratching one's head.

 

What does this say about those of us who were first introduced to listening to music via AM transistor radios? So much phoolery in audio.

 

So you're saying the author's attention span was, um, limited?

 

I don't see much science in the article.

Tim

 

In any case, all true music snobs will tell you that the only real way to listen to music is to read the sheet music.

 

Even though I don't stream or listen to much that has been compressed any further than Apple Lossless, the sheer volume of my collection tends to inhibit forming the in depth connection with music that I formed during my younger years. Some sociologists scratch that up to a factor of age, and that may be true, but those first dozen albums are indelibly a part of me in a way that numbers 10,001-10,012 will never be.