Sound Pressure: Listening to Loudspeakers
Sometimes speakers talk to me. Usually when they do, they ask me to move them, or to move myself—the listening position—to suit them.
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Jim Austin
Goldmund Telos 2800 monoblock power amplifier
Frederich Nietzsche distinguished between two approaches to culture: The Apollonian, which is characterized by order and rationality, and Dionysian, which is about chaos, intoxication, and vitality. Apollo was the god of Music, Art, Light, and Knowledge, and to Nietzsche, the Apollonian impulse was the main source of beauty.
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Hidden Music, Fake Musicians
Lately in this space I've focused on all things (rather, some things) analog. This month I return to digital, specifically to streaming. I love listening to records, but I also listen to a lot of streamed music. I'm a Qobuz devotee, since Qobuz is the most approachable streaming service and the friendliest to audiophiles.
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Is This the Ultimate Old-School Analog Move?
This month, I am writing about what could be the ultimate analog topic circa 2025: A prominent vinyl-only record club is going totally offline. Is it a marketing gimmick? Sure it is, but read on.
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The Skating Force Phenomenon
At the beginning of last month's As We See It, I wrote that I've lately been focused on "analog things." I proceeded to write about refurbishing and modding my old McIntosh tuner. That's "analog thing" #1. So, what other analog things have I been focused on? Here's #2...
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From Simaudio's Moon: A new product, a new series
Simaudio has introduced a streaming network streamer/integrated amplifier, the Moon 371, the first product in a new, more affordable series called Compass. Why Compass? The name evokes the name of the higher-end North series, introduced in 2023. "Compass guides you North," a Simaudio rep said at a press event in Boucherville, across the river from Montreal.
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CH Precision C10 D/A processor
It takes audacity for a company that already builds one of the finest DACs on the planet, which is already expensive, to set out to build one that's so much better that it warrants an extra digit in the model number and a much higher price tag. But then CH Precision has never lacked audacity.
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Analog Matters & the Modafferi Mod
After owning a McIntosh MR78 tuner for many years—I bought it on eBay sometime early in this millennium; it was fully functional and in superficially excellent condition—I finally did what I'd long intended to do: I sent it in to Audio Classics for inspection, refurbishment, and the famed Modafferi mod.
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"Premiumization"
I remember, though not well, when I acquired my first "10-speed" bike. My parents bought it for me at Sears. It cost about $100. It had a white frame with red and blue accents. It replaced one of those super-fun high-handlebar, banana-seat bikes some folks reminisce about . . . That would have been around 1978. Taking inflation into account, that bike would cost about $400 today.
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Audiophiles Behaving Badly
By my estimation, this year's High End hi-fi show—the last in Munich
before the world's largest audio show moves to Vienna—was a major success, perhaps the first I've attended since the pandemic that managed to completely escape that shadow. Every day but Sunday it was very busy—sometimes too busy; on the busiest days, the hallways at the MOC convention center reminded me of NYC's Fifth Avenue on Black Friday, an experience I've had once and hope to never have again. Most important: I heard a lot of really good sound.
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