Forums - Recommended music update

Randy in Caintuck Seasoned Member Tube be ... or not tube be ... it's a no-brainer. Posts: 975	Recommended music update 04/29/18 at 20:22:46 I finally had time to make some additions to the recommended music section of my website ..... Page two is a collection of the German Stockfisch label CDs. All of these CDs sound great played through the Betsy baffles ..... as well as through any high quality loudspeaker. The link can be found here. Happy listening, Randy
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Casey

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #1 - 12/01/19 at 02:00:32

Randy - thanks for the great list of music - lots I don't know and need to check out.

I have your Lii15s still just breaking in but figuring out something today - that being that these speakers when matched with a Decware UFO amp don't suffer bad music.

I have been listening the last couple of nights to records (actually streaming through roon lumin u1 and exogal dac) from a top 10 jazz of the 50s list I have downloaded and then followed by a chaser of Leonard Cohen's new posthumous release. Amazing sounding - listening between 930 and 1030 at night.

I first got serious about music in mid 70s. Was in London England when the Pistols, the Clash, the Jam and Buzzcocks hit. Was like my Who or Led Zep. Saw the Ramones 4 times, Patti Smith, Television and the Clash twice - loved loud in your face music. My guitar still try to figure out picking for South Central Rain or About A Girl as much as Blue Eyes are Crying in the Rain.

So long way of getting to today I was a bit fixated on Brittany Howard who a lot of people are touting as best album of 2019. Her solo album, or Thunderbitch or of course Alabama Shakes all great stuff but sounds terrible on the baffles and Decware amp. Unlistenable to be honest.

Need to think about this - have canuck Colter Wall playing now - sounds like he is in the room, can almost smell the beer...

Need to check out your recommendations.

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Randy in Caintuck

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #2 - 12/01/19 at 02:45:34

Hi Casey,

I hear what you are saying .....
There have been several discussions (and various opinions) on the forum concerning the quality of recordings played on high resolution audio systems.

Some of us lament the fact that we are at the mercy of the recording engineers. I own more CDs than I care to think about that were originally discovered when riding in my automobile, purchased and then made me sick to my stomach when played on my home system ...

My solution for this is to play them when riding in my automobile .....

I was in the IT industry for 25 years before retiring and the IT phrase of GIGO (garbage in - garbage out) certainly applies to audio recordings in my opinion. I'm not sure what some recording engineers are thinking of when mastering their music, because some of it is just horrible.
I know that it doesn't have to be that way because I have spent the past 20 years searching out good sounding recordings (mostly digital) and have more good music in my library than I could listen to in a year of 24 hour sessions.

On the other hand, there are quite a few forum members who have an opposite opinion and state that they have tailored their audio systems to sound good (or at least acceptable) with nearly every recording in their library .....

I will just have to take their word for that .....

It certainly seems like a paradox when some recordings sound like the performer is in the room with me and have amazing detail, air and three dimensionality while others are flat, dry and lifeless or thin and "hot" and make my ears bleed. If an audio system is "accurate", how can both types of recordings sound good on that system ? ...

One thing that seems to be a constant with the systems that are claimed to make everything sound good is the inclusion of a Decware ZROCK. Steve has developed a very interesting device and according to some owners who I respect, it performs as claimed and makes "thin" and "bass shy" recordings sound much better.

I have no experience with it in my home system, but if I owned a large number of recordings that were important to me and sounded horrendous, a ZROCK would probably be on my "short list" .....

Something to think about .....

Best wishes,
Randy

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Steve Deckert

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #3 - 12/01/19 at 05:10:17

Great recordings find Randy... it's always been that way. He makes the universe work for him when it comes to his music. The list is excellent, always the best sound quality which is also my premise when listening to recorded music on a high resolution audio system.

It is a never-ending frustration of mine that so much music that I would like is recorded in such a way that it's impossibly distractingly bad to the point of not being able to listen to it. Always makes me a little bit mad. Plus there's a mortifying aspect to it when you are the engineer of the audio equipment and are listening to it perfectly reproduce a super bad sounding stereo knowing that anyone who might pass by and hear it will be more than certain your gear sucks...

For the readers who might be wondering... with respect to dealing with unpredictable recording quality I have made the observation over the years that it is primarily a frequency balance and dynamic balance issue relative to the playback volume. If you have a way to adjust both, you can make most of that crap sound like something respectable. Dynamic balance is adjusted by "riding the gain" as we so often talk about in these forums and Frequency balance is adjusted by either Tri-amping, Bi-amping, or using a ZROCK2 form of equalization. When Tri-amping you have 3 volume controls, and when bi-amping you have two so you are always able to adjust the bass and the highs separately.

Randy I am listening to the stockfish recordings, your favorite CD, and found that the ZROCK2 improved it in the following ways, eradicated any traces of mid-bass bloat, extended the low end, improved the treble as well as the midrange. It's not subtle. I've been listening to the speakers all night without it, and being aware of a slight mid-bass peak from all the surrounding speakers in the room, not all of which had shorted voice coils because I ran out of jumpers, and during this post I hooked the ZROCK2 back up.. fixed everything! This is pretty interesting because in over simplified terms my complaint was a touch too much bass and the ZROCK2 fixed it despite not doing anything about all the sympathetic speakers in the room. Somehow it made whatever was aggravating the other speakers in the room go away, while boosting the midrange and treble with a fuller and flatter bass.

Actually the change is very similar to comparing this CD to the record on my vinyl rig. In fairness the unit I am listening to has the anniversary mods including the tube regulation mod, which I should just rename the liquidity mod. Tonights ZROCK2 is not even fully burned-in yet.

I can see why this is your favorite Stockfish CD. Until your list, I wasn't even aware they made CD's, but what is really cool, is that QoBuz has these and they are optionally in 24/44.1Hz. The 24 bit is easy to hear. So when you take a the recording from 16 to 24 bit, and then add a ZROCK2, it does actually start to sound like the LP! That's exciting because the music is so good!

Have a great weekend!

Steve

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Steve Deckert

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #4 - 12/01/19 at 05:24:58

So I just imagined one of my listening pals being here to witness what the ZROCK2 just did... which was primarily to fix the hint of mid-bass drone. I heard myself telling him "Yea, it's not the speakers..." "It's an energy block somewhere over here..." By releasing it through careful ZROCKupuncture we were able to restore the Chi or Prana of the system to it's normal state of bliss!"

It's funny because if it were the speakers you would not be able to make it go away with anything short of a notch filter, and instead we made it go away with a nearly 16 dB gain shelf that is gone at less than 1kHz and somehow it increases the midrange and highs even though on paper a ROCK2 EQ curve reduces them relative to the lower bass.

I only bring up this esoteric stuff because it's been said Randy's an alien.

BTW, Randy, you might want to add Spirit of Gambo - The Galaxy Recordings - to your Stockfish list. I think you'll like the
textures.

Steve

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Randy in Caintuck

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #5 - 12/01/19 at 06:04:53

Steve posted .....

Quote:

BTW, Randy, you might want to add Spirit of Gambo - The Galaxy Recordings - to your Stockfish list. I think you'll like the textures.

Hi Steve,

One of the first recordings that I purchased on the Stockfisch label was entitled "Bowers & Wilkins Presents: Very Audiophile New Recordings" and it included two tracks from Spirit of Gambo" .....

They are both excellent ..... and I need to purchase the Galaxy Recordings and add it to my recommended music page(s).

Sadly, I have been rather busy and have been wanting to add several additional pages to the recommended music section of my website.
Hopefully, that will happen in the near future .....

So much good music ..... so little time .....

Best wishes,
Randy

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Randy in Caintuck

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #6 - 12/01/19 at 07:45:03

Update .....

I decided to go to the Elusive Disc website to purchase a copy of The Spirit of Gambo - The Galaxy Recordings on CD.

It showed as a back ordered item - out of stock.
So ..... I checked the Stockfisch website in Germany.
It showed there as "out of print".

However, they have it as a 24bit/44.1kHz .flac download .....

It's a big file ..... thank goodness for my high speed internet feed.

Steve ..... you are absolutely right. The texture is excellent.
I love harpsichord and this is some of the best I have ever heard .....

Thanks for the heads up,
Randy

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Lon

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #7 - 12/01/19 at 14:16:50

Steve Deckert wrote on 12/01/19 at 05:10:17:

For the readers who might be wondering... with respect to dealing with unpredictable recording quality I have made the observation over the years that it is primarily a frequency balance and dynamic balance issue relative to the playback volume. If you have a way to adjust both, you can make most of that crap sound like something respectable.

Yes, making "crap sound like something respectable" has been my audiophile journey. I'm in this for music. Not great recordings, not even great reproduction of recordings, but to experience the music. By gain riding I've gotten really close to having the recordings I want to hear, thousands of jazz recordings well to not so well recorded, sound "respectable" in the past, able to get past the sonic limitations and experience the music without obsessing about sonic drawbacks. And then with the ZROCK2 it's easier to get there, and also possible to get closer to the music without the sonic sensibility dominating.

I don't listen to music as loud as some here and don't crave the "hit" of a concert experience etc. and I find the HR-1 with the modded Monoblocks and the ZTPRE, ZBIT and ZROCK2 don't make everything sound fantastic, but make almost everything I have sound listenable, and involving and allow me both the study and the escape I seek from music and my system. Thanks to all involved, this is among the things I most appreciate in life.

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Steve Deckert

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #8 - 12/02/19 at 02:10:23

Yes, the music is more important than the recording and you have to have a way to make it sound good enough to stick with it. I was in the wood shop today and noticed a Hi-Res 24 bit release of Prince on QoBuz. I have recordings of him that are audiophile quality and then some. I clicked on it, and away we went. Out in the wood shop there is no adjustments to the sound, it is whatever it is. This was a release that had me running for the pause button in less than 2 minutes because it sounded so ridiculously bad compared to what I know it could be sounding like... Of course it could have been any number of things that caused it to sound bad, after all it is a computer and it is connected to the internet. That said, we always like to shoot the messenger and I found myself grumbling about why the hell do you make a hi-res version of a crappie recording? To what end does it serve? For all I know next time I try to listen to it, it will sound fine. It's the universe we live in : )

Steve

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Casey Verified Member Posts: 16	Re: Recommended music update Reply #9 - 12/08/19 at 00:34:44 Hi Randy - not sure if you saw this article but had never heard of Stockfisch til looking at your music list http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/catching-up-with-stockfisch-records/ listening to Sara K and Chris Jones live record tonight (tidal and roon) - nice acoustic guitar and sometimes bluesy or folky sounding tunes
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Randy in Caintuck

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Re: Recommended music update
Reply #10 - 12/10/19 at 15:40:07

Hi Casey,

Nope .... I had not seen that article.

Thanks for sharing .....

Elusive Disc carries the Stockfisch products, but they don't always have everything in stock.

I check the Stockfisch website on a pretty regular basis and recently noticed that there are some new recordings that are not currently in my music library.

Time to empty the wallet .....

Best wishes,
Randy

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Randy in Caintuck

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Posts: 975

Re: Recommended music update
Reply #11 - 12/17/19 at 23:29:07

A couple of days ago, I took a break from eating sawdust and spent a few hours in my listening seat .....

Among the music I enjoyed were several albums from one of many artists who passed away at a much too early age ..... Dave Carter.

It seemed proper to devote page 3 of my recommended music to Dave and his partner Tracy Grammer along with some other artists who carried the torch after Dave's untimely death

Check out page three which can be found here.

The links to pages two and three are at the bottom of the first page.

Great songs ... great harmonies ... great talent ... enjoy !!!

I have plans for several additional pages as time allows .... but this music is special to me and I am happy to share it with visitors to my website.

Happy listening,
Randy

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Randy in Caintuck Seasoned Member Tube be ... or not tube be ... it's a no-brainer. Posts: 975	Re: Recommended music update Reply #12 - 12/20/19 at 15:30:36 Since I was on a roll ... I added a page 4 to the Recommended Music ... The link can be found here and the bottom of the page has links to each individual page. Enjoy !!! Randy
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