What's the "Next Big Thing" in Audio?

What would it take to bring back the centrality of music in people's lives felt in the college dorm rooms of the Vietnam era, the jazz clubs of Kansas City in the 40s, Vienna in the days of Mozart and Beethoven?

 

Ah, if anyone knows the answer to that I'm sure there are several music industry people who would love to talk to them. Looking back, it was just the right confluence of cultural and world events at a given time. Who knows when or if that will ever happen again.

 

Actually, I believe that there is some great music being made and being made with video. Music videos used to suck. They were schmaltzy and poorly produced. Now there are great live performances being recorded from both an audio and video perspective. Even better is that grass roots music is impacting the music industry again. These people aren't owned by Sony. They are making music because they love music and there are some amazingly talented people out there!

 

So, there might be no next big thing. The modern human being only has a short attention span and reacts mainly to visual stimuli or loudness boosted audio. The period that everyone (industry and recording engineers) was working on creating realistic sound ended probably in the sixties? The quadrophonic effort in the early seventies was already a step too far. The CD was at first not really progress in terms of sound, but a huge success to get convenience to the masses.

Luckily the audiophile community is still alive, albeit that it is a niche market. However, it is still a flourishing market with countless, highly engineered products! That is the upside; the downside of being a niche market is the price you pay for production in small numbers.

 

It's already underway - active speakers with DSP built in. Son is raving about it, I like my SE EL84 with passive speakers.

On this subject: I've owned mono blocks with 4 * KT 88 doing lots of power into sme LS5/12A but they are 23.5 dB less sensitive than the Klipsch La Scala. Meaning that my little 4 watt with a La Scala goes louder than the LS5/12A - they would need 895 Watts to go as loud but they cannot handle that amount. Unfortunately the La Scala does not fit on my desk next to my computer.... Neither would I want two monoblcks with 4 * KT 88 next to my computer - too much heat coming of those babies. By the way: the Klipsch La Scala speaker has been the longest in production, says something for them.

Eventually people will realise that small boxes do not give the dynamic range that big drivers gives them, too much compression in a small driver. Less excursion gives often better dynamics. Perhaps that will be the next big thing if the current pandemic does not wipe all the manufacturers of (exotic) stereo equipment out of business (and everyone seems to have gone to ear buds or to home theatre with 5 or more speakers).

 

Good points, but on a broader commercial scale 90% of the market doesn't care about all that, and in fact don't even know what you're talking about.

 

Music studio sessions will be recorded with video and 5+ channels of audio like movies are now recorded.

Music will be streamed through your cable box and played back through your surround sound home theater system. More musicians will opt for recording in video and 5+ channels over the traditional 2 channels and no video method. The costs of movie style recording of music will go down with economies of scale.

Comcast/Fios will be the new music streaming service providers and the cable box will be the new music streaming device.

The modern audiophile will watch the artist perform the recording session on his TV and listen to the music in surround sound through 5+speakers. Each speaker will have its own discrete channel of music. Each speaker will be wireless, have class D amplification, have built in microphones and DSP for real time room correction. Watching the artist in the session plus the 5+ channel 3d surround will provide a spooky real experience. Obviously the audiophile can turn off the TV and just listen whenever he prefers.

 

I think 3D sound is where it goes next. I was chatting with a friend about this the other day. It just needs a big player such as Apple to bring out a technical standard along with matching headphones containing 4 or 5 directional drivers in each ear and people will start making music for it.

 

Destroying the last 50 years in entertainment technology - cable and satellite tv, high definition televisions, video streaming, bluray, the internet

 

Silence

 

For the next Big Thing in audio, I’d like yo nominate The Truth, and an end to foo and the gullible and paranoid contingent of the audiophile world. Unfortunately the marketeers and salesmen/women of the world have done their job all too well...

 

The unanticipated return of the 8-track...

 

Some of you may remember a short film that originally appeared on Funnyordie.com called "The Procedure" in which a future technology allows people to have their favorite song implanted in their brain for continuous playback during their waking hours. The results for the guy who chooses "Private Eyes" by Hall and Oates are tragic.

 

Gapless playback - Wikipedia

 

I laugh uncontrollably when i see clueless mules hauling monoblocks around in 2021... There are too many stupid dudes in the world of hifi man.

 

Think you're a lil too late for the game chief. I sit blissfully soaked in a 3D dome all day long in my atmos/dts x/auro soundfield while i work remotely making beaucoup bucks all day chief

 

The sincere music lover listens to his record and CD collection and most of them have a good playback system altogether.

Only records and CD's are worth having, all other formats nice for toying around but not for listening to the favorite music.

 

Digispeakers (I'll take the Ibis/Crusher/dual Pelican (21", flat to 10 Hz at max SPL) combo.

 

I do not feel a break thru is possible now. Just better products come forth at times.

 

Aside from missing the point of my post, which was to ask if there is a new form of audio technology on the horizon, you modified my original quote with your own comments - which are not what I originally said. Granted this is a discussion board and not a legal forum, but that's not a particularly cool thing to do.

 

PS Audio may have the next big thing. Paul is now signing musicians to record in PS Audio's own studios. His idea is to shepherd the music from the initial recording, right through to the speakers, with the purpose of insuring that the quality of the sound originally recorded is maintained through the entire audio chain! Of course, for the audiophile consumer to be able to take advantage of this, they would have to invest in the audio products that PS Audio designs towards that end!

It's quite a gamble, and it'll be interesting to see (hear?) what he comes up with.

 

I totally agree.

Before getting bigger I’d like to see it get better. By that I mean close to 100% reliability coupled with the availability of resolutions of choice (if that will even be necessary) in the future.

I do believe streaming will eventually become the prime method of experiencing the highest form of musical reproduction in domestic situations.

 

Thus my response in #68 for best SQ.

But keep debating which speaker cables/analog interconnects sound the best (or eliminate them for purest signal)...

 

Probably not a "big thing", and perhaps previously mentioned...but I am sure a good few have been down this path....you finally get that desired pair of loudspeakers...heavy beasts, and the manufacturer advises that "best placement" is near to a rear wall.....no problem. There new and exciting and all is well...until of course the "loudspeaker cable upgrade" factor comes into play.
Can you release the old cables and install the new ones without moving the speakers? If you do move them, did you measure that "sweet spot" before you disturbed them?
A rambling introduction into the query "Why don't high end speaker companies position the binding posts on the side of the cabinet rather than the rear"?

 

Cosmetics I presume.