Quote Originally Posted by JoeE SP9
Although I don't really play anymore, I have kept several of my old "axes". They include a Fender Precision, a Chocolate Brown Gibson EB-3 and an Ampeg Baby Bass. Music is playing in my head most of the time. If all I had was that old plastic table radio I would listen to it and get much pleasure from it. I'd rather listen to a "good" system but as long as it's not overly distorted it's still music to my ears.

For me, being able to hear the bass parts on recordings the way I knew they should sound was a major impetus toward acquiring a "good" system. Getting the bass right was/is hard. The midrange and treble while not having the greatest or sometimes any fidelity (on BPC etc.) has always been clear enough for me to hear the lines. When the bass sounds right I know my or any system is on the right track.

Living in the inner city gives lots of exposure to some of the worst sounding gear anyone's ever been assaulted by. I'm speaking of those rolling distortion boxes sometimes called car stereo's. Bass sounding like it's coming from underwater is so offensive to me I sometimes wish I could shoot cars with a "zap" gun and kill just the stereo.

Last week while sitting on my porch steps I heard what I thought was a standard "crappy" car stereo coming down my block. It turned out to be a young teen riding a bicycle with a large basket on the front holding two 12 volt car batteries powering a car stereo with an amp and equalizer. He had tied two bookshelf sized speakers (12" 3 ways) to the rear rack and was entertaining himself and most of the block. It actually sounded better than a lot of car stereo's. You guy's in the "burbs" just don't know what you're missing!
LOL!!!! Thanks for the laugh Joe, what a visual with the bike. I am from Toronto which has no shortage of characters like your bike rider, I do miss it.

What you've wrote here is the first thing I've read without feeling like running into oncoming traffic. You hit the nail right on the head for me. So well put. That's exactly it for me, I am a bass player and I want to be as close to that bass groove as possible. This means I want it as audible as possible, which we both know with older or crumby recordings, only a decent system will do.

I think aside from the bass, I want seperation so that I can choose to focus on whichever instrument is hitting me the most in a given song. I suppose that I forget, most people have no ability to discern instruments in a song. If I use my wife as a typical example, she hears the vocals and anything else that the engineer puts into the mix with added prominence. So I suppose this is why the singers and guitarists have the most panties hanging on their gig cases at the end of a tour.

I want to say that to all you music lovers willing to listen on any device, great!! I'm not trying to judge or say you don't love music but I think Joe cornered my feelings. As a musician, I need to be as close to the intended result of the recording as possible. If not, I basically get frustrated with what I'm hearing and can't be bothered to listen.