Attn audiophiles

[unbibium]

On my friends list, I have at least one audiophile, several musicians, and a handful of people who can understand all kinds of sciencey things.

Would any of you agree that MP3 is ruining the sound of music, as this WSJ article makes a case for?

Comments

[kirkjerk.livejournal.com]

I was once-upon a time a musician, but am nearly the opposite of an audiophile. As long as the fidelity isn't distractingly bad, like external speakers trying to run off of headphone power, I'm generally content, and more interested in the core ideas of the music.

[surferelf.livejournal.com]

Me too. I'm a former musician that doesn't even own a decent set of speakers. Unless the sound is so bad that it gets in the way of enjoying the song, I don't notice it. I listened to the clips in the sidebar, and couldn't honestly say that I would be able to tell them apart in a blind test.

People don't fall in love with music because of the quality of the recordings. The music I loved was on old, scratched LPs played on a shabby stereo that my Dad got from a frat house. Later, there were the 3rd or 4th generation dubbed cassettes of coolness I couldn't hear on the radio, and probably couldn't buy in a record store even if I had any money. Those got played in a walkman or crappy plastic boom boxes with 3" or 4" cones.

The guys interviewed for the article are highly trained ears. They make their living off of them, so I don't doubt that what they're saying is true. However, I think it is safe to say that the reason why people aren't enjoying listening to pop music has almost nothing to do with the way they mix the music, and has more to do with the fact that what they're mixing are crappy songs.

[pentomino.livejournal.com]

It's possible that you're right, though Leo Laporte mentioned a study about how the brain handles compressed or low-fidelity music, which concluded that it has to work harder to fill in the blanks, and that has certain effects. I'll have to look it up.