Music Quality

[Vyn]

Inspired by Z's new phone thread, here's a question:

What's the quality of the music you're sticking in your ears?

I guess you'd have to define "quality". There are objective scales to use, but there are also subjective scales and purposes. In other words, does the music you're listening to at any given time give you whatever it is you're looking for from it? A good feeling, commiseration, anger outlet, contemplation, etc. With that in mind, I propose the following hierarchy of music quality, objectively:

1. Live performance. This is the highest quality.

2. Master tape. Not being mixed down or otherwise altered, it may not accurately reflect the live performance due to sound levels, microphone placement, etc. But the sound waves would have high fidelity to the source.

3. Vinyl. The grooves on a record are the actual sound waves in continuous form.

4. Digital. CD, mp3, whatever. Anything that is an electronic representation of sound waves in discreet form.

The quality of the gear used, the skill of the person turning the knobs, the quality of a pressing plant setup, etc. will of course split those four categories into sub-categories of quality. But I think those are the big ones.

So, we have live performance and then everything else, e.g. recordings of some sort. If the quality of the recording is top-notch, along with production and such, then the playback gear is going to make it or break it. A high quality recording puked out by shit gear is going to sound as bad as a shit recording on the same gear.

But would shit gear emitting puke be quality enough subjectively? If it serves your purpose, then it could subjectively be considered quality.

I don't know how many of you ever rocked out to a transistor radio playing AM music, but at the time it sounded great. Looking back it was shit puke. So perhaps the quality of "quality" in this context also depends upon circumstance and varies therein.

What do you think?

[Typhon]

This may sound odd to some, but I do not care for live performance.  Not that is does not sound good, but I prefer to hear songs played perfectly each and every time, as in a studio recording, when I listen to my music at home or in the car.  So skip #1, for me. 

Nobody is going to own the master tape, so skip #2. 

Vyn is correct when he says vinyl is the actual sound waves in continuous form.  But vinyl slowly deteriorates due to friction with each and every play.  Therefore, the quality slowly deteriorates.  Skip #3. 

That is why I stick with digital from CDs.  Uncompressed digital. 

[Charger]

Well yes nothing beats seeing the band live. That's the ultimate format ofcourse.


I listen to 90% of my music on cds with my computer through a Sony Amp.

5% in the car. I burn my own cds there...usually band collections. Straight from my own cds ofcourse.

And the remaining 5% from my phone during runs. Those are mp3s in order to save space on the memory card. Plus using bluetooth headphones while on the treadmill you can't really tell so much about the quality anyways.


I collect vinyl but I have no way of playing them so they are just collectibles. And that's the way I like it. Keeping them in pristine condition they'll be worth more some day when I'm long gone.


Oh I had a transistor radio back when I was a kid!


Naturally compression is a problem with music nowadays in general. The loudness wars of the early 2000s still leave a mark...and sadly it is still done today too. Ruin Rubin ofcourse being the poster boy for this shit.

[Typhon]

I listen to 90% of my music on cds with my computer through a Sony Amp.

Same here, but with a Nakamichi.

5% in the car. I burn my own cds there...usually band collections. Straight from my own cds ofcourse.

Same again, but more mixed bands to imitate a radio station.

[Charger]

5% in the car. I burn my own cds there...usually band collections. Straight from my own cds ofcourse.

Same again, but more mixed bands to imitate a radio station.

I got few of those too. I also have a few collections featuring only women fronted metal bands.

[Zzzptm]

This may sound odd to some, but I do not care for live performance.  Not that is does not sound good, but I prefer to hear songs played perfectly each and every time, as in a studio recording, when I listen to my music at home or in the car.  So skip #1, for me. 

Very much in the spirit of Glenn Gould, the great interpreter of Bach's work. He hated the applause and the often non-optimal conditions of the performance venue. In the studio, there's much better quality control, especially with edits.

But, ah! There's Neil Young, who absolutely refuses to do edits because he knows that every time the master tape is played, it loses fidelity. He'll rehearse and rehearse and then do some takes and it's a matter of memory which one to go with for the record.

Typhon is correct in that the best sound quality, over time, will be the CD, if carefully maintained and uncompressed.

But for me, limitations of travel steer me towards full digital. The songs I use for my radio show, also digital, so I can have a full library on hand at all times. No CD player in my PC, again, pushes me towards digital.

[Typhon]

No CD player in my PC, again, pushes me towards digital.

  You don't have a disc drive?

[Charger]

No CD player in my PC, again, pushes me towards digital.

  You don't have a disc drive?

I'm assuming he only has a laptop. Most laptops nowadays don't have a disc drive anymore...

[Typhon]

No CD player in my PC, again, pushes me towards digital.

  You don't have a disc drive?

I'm assuming he only has a laptop. Most laptops nowadays don't have a disc drive anymore...

You are correct, but you can get an external drive for less than $50.  Personally, I would not have a computer without one.

[Charger]

No CD player in my PC, again, pushes me towards digital.

  You don't have a disc drive?

I'm assuming he only has a laptop. Most laptops nowadays don't have a disc drive anymore...

You are correct, but you can get an external drive for less than $50.  Personally, I would not have a computer without one.

Agreed. I am a desktop guy myself though.

[Thelemech]

I have about 1600 to 1700 CDs with about half of them ripped to my desktop PC and my laptop.

I have a very high end stereo but the place I live in has very thin walls so I have been using a Sony bookshelf stereo that sound pretty damn good for it's size.

I use to own quite a few vinyl records but I ended up selling them and my turntable as well.

For me CDs are the perfect medium with very good resolution especially considering it is a technology from the late 70s to early 80s.

[Zzzptm]

No optical drives except on my server tower. It's all digital at my house. We have a DVD/Blu-Ray player because we still have a lot of movies on DVD and those are harder to rip and store. But when I was basically just ripping CDs and never listening to the CD itself, I decided it was time to just do digital.