As We See It

As I write this, I am recuperating from four days of frenzy at the 1986 Winter CES in Las Vegas, Nevada. I am also pondering why I was so unexcited by most of what I saw and heard of the high-end exhibits; high-end audio may have reached a developmental plateau of sorts.

"You listen to these modern records, they're atrocious, they have sound all over them. There's no definition of nothing, no vocal, no nothing, just like—static."—Bob Dylan, interviewed by Jonathan Lethem. Rolling Stone, September 7, 2006

The single most enduring controversyhttp://www.stereophile.com/asweseeit/406awsi">controversy; in audio is: What method or methods should we use to evaluate the performance of audio equipment?

"The trouble with some reviewers..."

My eyes were inexorably drawn to a surprising headline this morning: "New Studies Say Universe Younger than Objects In It." A study by Indiana University's Michael Pierce has just been published establishing a new value for "Hubble's Constant" (the ratio of velocity to distance for distant, receding galaxies) which suggests that the universe may be as young as 7 billion years old; at the same time, researchers at Harvard are saying that the universe is somewhere between 9 and 14 billion years old. Quite a discrepancy! (A billion here, a billion there—pretty soon you're talking real age.)

High-end audio is not a rational construct. It is a sensory experience that leads to emotional engagement. In slightly different words: High-end audio is not about a concept, but about the experience of having our emotions engaged. The difference between reading about a high-end audio system and hearing great recordings played on one is almost as big as the difference between reading a love poem and falling in love.

I couldn't believe it. Something was off.