"Natural" Sound

[Argonaut]

IMO, what we do in life we do it privately...without fanfare.
What we do publicly we do intelligently...talk about the content, not the poster (never/ever about the poster)...and we use wisdom and good positive humor.

That's just my opinion...because I have read Keith's posts and I saw smart stuff in them...and that, is what counts the post (most)...smart content. :b

That's a good 'natural' allocation. ...In my book of life.

On occasion I quite agree with your summation of the very last few posts made in this thread by this individual, however they are IMO 'Always' eventually tempered and IMO erased by a ceaseless regimen of snide comment upon beliefs and experiences that other members may hold, together with an, at best, barely disguised damning with faint praise, to out an out derision, of products that do not form part of his portfolio, and present as a potential competitor to his business practices.

May I suggest that you project a modicum of your perspicacity ito reviewing the antecedence, on record, for this individual, and be assured that I am not entirely alone in my considerations.

This is the last response within this thread that I intent to make to you on the matter, of my own code and conduct in this regard, My apologies to the OP for any de-railment of his thread which was not my intent.

 

[NorthStar]

I'm very active...here...and over there too. I balance my life with the people who are part of it...in the most natural human way possible.
No one knows the absolute holy grail of the universe...we just all try the best shot @ it that we can afford.

* I would love to listen to some music @ David's place, and @ Mike's place too. ...The music recordings...

 

[853guy]

There's an infamous feline with a well known and documented system in Al's neighborhood which I've heard on several occasions and in different settings. On one level the system can't be faulted sonically because its all there, correct tone, timbre, dynamics, scale, presence, etc., very impressive but I can't call it "Natural". The system has all the right qualities but its also has a character that it imposes on the listener, which stops you from getting past the machine. The realistic sounds are very important to get right and essential but emotions are a natural part of the human experience and our subconscious will detect when something is off; "unNatural" if you want. The machine nature is different from ours and will act as invisible emotional barrier if not managed or hidden, hence less or more "Natural". Anyway this is my working theory.

Ah, Romy… How is that fine young man these days? Perhaps again that’s a factor of “trying too hard”. I’ve not heard his system, but greater complexity is not always the answer to a simple question, and as you suggest sometimes achieves many small incremental “gains” that while “impressive”, can nonetheless be ultimately subtractive from the overall gestalt.

I'm going to put an unadulterated plug for myself here; you're partially correct 853guy in your assessment regarding some vintage components but that's only part of it, setup is the other half of the equation. You can change, make or break a system through setup as much as through the components, if not more. When I visited Steve the only thing we worked on aside from setting up his table was his setup and that's how his sound changed from what it was towards "Natural" transforming his listening experience and not changing the system. He continues to improve his sound by himself; more "Natural", by tweaking the setup more than we had time for.

And here’s the flipside. Vintage components aren’t a silver bullet anymore than CNC’d ultra-high tolerance SOTA modern stuff. Obviously. But we are dealing with a human endeavour, and the human element is often curiously left out of the “equation”. It's possibly why there’s a reason we award Michelin stars to restaurants and the work of their chefs, and not the culinary ingredients that constitute the menu.

Agreed! Its the difference between ejaculation and orgasm!

Well, I’m glad one of us had the cojones to say it.

 

[Argonaut]

No one knows the absolute holy grail of the universe...we just all try the best shot @ it that we can afford.

* I would love to listen to some music @ David's place, and @ Mike's place too. ...The music recordings...

A most erudite mantra NorthStar.

 

[zztop7]

Mark Twain

Agreed! Its the difference between ejaculation and orgasm!

david

Hello ddk,
You could quote Mark Twain:
“The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.”
zz.

 

[microstrip]

There's an infamous feline with a well known and documented system in Al's neighborhood which I've heard on several occasions and in different settings. On one level the system can't be faulted sonically because its all there, correct tone, timbre, dynamics, scale, presence, etc., very impressive but I can't call it "Natural". The system has all the right qualities but its also has a character that it imposes on the listener, which stops you from getting past the machine. The realistic sounds are very important to get right and essential but emotions are a natural part of the human experience and our subconscious will detect when something is off; "unNatural" if you want. The machine nature is different from ours and will act as invisible emotional barrier if not managed or hidden, hence less or more "Natural". Anyway this is my working theory.
(...)

david

This is the key part of sounding "natural" - an absence of "hifi" sound. I have found that very often mixing brands gets a very nice tonal balance but blocks the "natural" sound of a system. Power supply cables and system have a good part on it - some power cables that enhance detail and sharpness do not help in sounding natural.

We should accept that for many people sounding "natural" is not an high priority - they have other preferences.

 

[steve williams]

Rodney’s screenshot of his room is an attempt at objective quantification, not at subjective qualification

I appreciated the objective quantification that was made 'however' it did not answer Rodney's question as to whether looking at his room measurements it sounds 'natural' and that is precisely the dichotomy that this thread has produced. The room analysis is based on measurements which are good but to me it did not answer Rodney's question

I'm with you 853guy because it involves our senses. Looking at Rodney's graph I can only agree with the interpretation but I cannot say whether it sounds natural until I hear it. So in reality one can speculate all they want but this is when listening becomes paramount which IMO it always is

 

[amirm]

They’re not “pretend terms".

They’re subjective qualifiers. What they’re not is objective quantifiers.

I wish you were being subjective. Throughout this thread I have encouraged using subjective terminology like you really enjoyed the sound. That is subjective. No measurement can eek out that sentence.

No, what you are trying to do is actually being objective and technical. A term like "harmonic structure" is term that utilizes technical terms, "harmonic" and "structure." We are desperately trying to add objective support to our listening observation as to make them be more correct. So we have created these terms without ever understanding what they mean.

It is not like you had a system with on/off switch for Harmonic Structure where you could instantly learn what it means for it to be there versus not. We have built up a vocabulary of these technical terms that we routinely throw out there as to length the review and show authority in us as a reviewer. But they have no real meaning.

They do have a colloquial meeting among subjectivists though. They mean something sounded good. That is it. So why not just say that?

I can put together a system that according to one person, one has microdynamics and the other does not, and run 10 audiophiles through without them ever agreeing on that pre-assessment.

Now compare this situation where I build the same two systems except that I boost the bass at 50 to 70 Hz by 5 dB in one of them. I assure you that a lot of people would say the bass was boomy or too high. This is a subjective term. Yet it is properly descriptive to actually have a meaning.

You want to be subjective, be subjective. Don't attempt to use objective terminology without any real meaning. In some sense, I would take the use of natural way, way ahead of these terms. At least that word is not trying to be overly technical like "microdynamics."

Be yourselves. Don't try to use objective terms which have nothing to do with objective evaluation of audio. I mean even subjectivists must get tired of reading for the thousands time that some system had great microdynamics, blacker background, etc. What do you get out of the same accolades over and over again? Is there such a desperate need to look like the other camp by using these technical sounding terms???

Let's remember that as objectivists we too highly value subjective opinions. This is why we conduct blind listening tests. But in no time do we ask listeners to tell us if there is "harmonic structure" there or not. If we are designing a loudspeaker, we want to know what to fix. Saying the harmonic structure was not there will lead to fix what exactly??? Tell me that you think the mid-range is depressed/low or that the sound seems bright and I can do something about that. Those are subjective terms that a graph may not tell me. And hence have lots of value to me. I don't know what the heck to do about lack of PRAT....

 

[Al M.]

I appreciated the objective quantification that was made 'however' it did not answer Rodney's question as to whether looking at his room measurements it sounds 'natural' and that is precisely the dichotomy that this thread has produced. The room analysis is based on measurements which are good but to me it did not answer Rodney's question

I'm with you 853guy because it involves our senses. Looking at Rodney's graph I can only agree with the interpretation but I cannot say whether it sounds natural until I hear it. So in reality one can speculate all they want but this is when listening becomes paramount which IMO it always is

True, but getting rid of the room artifacts, revealed by objective measurements, appears to be a requirement before being able to achieve 'natural' sound.

***

Amir, great analysis and interesting read!

 

[Ron Party]

I wish you were being subjective. Throughout this thread I have encouraged using subjective terminology like you really enjoyed the sound. That is subjective. No measurement can eek out that sentence.

No, what you are trying to do is actually being objective and technical. A term like "harmonic structure" is term that utilizes technical terms, "harmonic" and "structure." We are desperately trying to add objective support to our listening observation as to make them be more correct. So we have created these terms without ever understanding what they mean.

It is not like you had a system with on/off switch for Harmonic Structure where you could instantly learn what it means for it to be there versus not. We have built up a vocabulary of these technical terms that we routinely throw out there as to length the review and show authority in us as a reviewer. But they have no real meaning.

They do have a colloquial meeting among subjectivists though. They mean something sounded good. That is it. So why not just say that?

I can put together a system that according to one person, one has microdynamics and the other does not, and run 10 audiophiles through without them ever agreeing on that pre-assessment.

Now compare this situation where I build the same two systems except that I boost the bass at 50 to 70 Hz by 5 dB in one of them. I assure you that a lot of people would say the bass was boomy or too high. This is a subjective term. Yet it is properly descriptive to actually have a meaning.

You want to be subjective, be subjective. Don't attempt to use objective terminology without any real meaning. In some sense, I would take the use of natural way, way ahead of these terms. At least that word is not trying to be overly technical like "microdynamics."

Be yourselves. Don't try to use objective terms which have nothing to do with objective evaluation of audio. I mean even subjectivists must get tired of reading for the thousands time that some system had great microdynamics, blacker background, etc. What do you get out of the same accolades over and over again? Is there such a desperate need to look like the other camp by using these technical sounding terms???

Let's remember that as objectivists we too highly value subjective opinions. This is why we conduct blind listening tests. But in no time do we ask listeners to tell us if there is "harmonic structure" there or not. If we are designing a loudspeaker, we want to know what to fix. Saying the harmonic structure was not there will lead to fix what exactly??? Tell me that you think the mid-range is depressed/low or that the sound seems bright and I can do something about that. Those are subjective terms that a graph may not tell me. And hence have lots of value to me. I don't know what the heck to do about lack of PRAT....

+1

Or as I asked, why isn't that good enough?

 

[steve williams]

IMO reading this thread it is now all a matter of semantics. I understand that measurements are meaningful but do all rooms that measure good sound good. Both sides seem to be saying the same from the other side of the fence.

 

[Bill Hart]

IMO reading this thread it is now all a matter of semantics. I understand that measurements are meaningful but do all rooms that measure good sound good. Both sides seem to be saying the same from the other side of the fence.

That's essentially the same question I asked in the first paragraph of my post #304 here. Though I'm not in the habit of quoting myself, I cut and paste it here for convenience:

"Does this mean that once time and frequency response anomalies with respect to a given system in a given room have been addressed, that's the end of the inquiry? That any set of components that meet those measurements will sound the same? That's where I'd get stuck- and I'm not cheerleading for one school over another. I've heard music reproduced over industrial gear that sounded lifelike and via uber 'boutique' gear that sounded too 'hi-fi' for me."



Bill Hart

 

[steve williams]

That's essentially the same question I asked in the first paragraph of my post #304 here. Though I'm not in the habit of quoting myself, I cut and paste it here for convenience:

"Does this mean that once time and frequency response anomalies with respect to a given system in a given room have been addressed, that's the end of the inquiry? That any set of components that meet those measurements will sound the same? That's where I'd get stuck- and I'm not cheerleading for one school over another. I've heard music reproduced over industrial gear that sounded lifelike and via uber 'boutique' gear that sounded too 'hi-fi' for me."



Bill Hart

Precisely my point Bill and people got bent out of shape when I said something might sound too HiFi. As I sit here reading the interpretation of these graphs this is all analytical. I said countless pages ago that when I listened to David's system everything else stood still. There were no bass humps, or roll offs or anything that my mind was being directed to . All I did was sit and enjoy the music. For me at that time I understood the meaning of natural that "ends at the tip of my nose" (just so that I can be forum correct here in my post)

It's all about listening and for me there is a difference as Bill says that something sounds too HiFi. I have read countless posts here where people say the same so my description of natural is as I stated above. Pick your flavor

 

[Diapason]

There are different ways something can sound "good" to me, but apparently I'm now not allowed to use different subjective words for different subjective responses. Lads, this is nuts.

We don't have to pick teams here, the measurements are important, hugely so, but we are also capable of discussing subjective impressions beyond "I like it". I have no idea why we continue to build all these false dichotomies. Amir et al are saying lots of true and important things, that's obvious, but is it really useful to tell it's what subjective words we can use? All we can now say is "this sounds good" or "this sounds bad"? There won't be much conversation left if we follow this line of reasoning.

 

[bonzo75]

There are different ways something can sound "good" to me, but apparently I'm now not allowed to use different subjective words for different subjective responses. Lads, this is nuts.

We don't have to pick teams here, the measurements are important, hugely so, but we are also capable of discussing subjective impressions beyond "I like it". I have no idea why we continue to build all these false dichotomies. Amir et al are saying lots of true and important things, that's obvious, but is it really useful to tell it's what subjective words we can use? All we can now say is "this sounds good" or "this sounds bad"? There won't be much conversation left if we follow this line of reasoning.

Your post is funny. I like it

 

[amirm]

There are different ways something can sound "good" to me, but apparently I'm now not allowed to use different subjective words for different subjective responses. Lads, this is nuts.

If we have defended our case to the point where this is the walk-away position then we have done wrong. You guys are of course welcome to use whatever terms you like. Ron, not me, asked the question of such words as "natural" can be hyperbole and lacking specificity. So we have discussed that. Nothing should be construed as to what you are allowed or not allowed to say. My apologies if we have gone this much sideways.

 

[Diapason]

Amir, I don't think you need to apologise necessarily, and I'm certainly not walking away or anything of the sort (!) but this is one of those threads where I'm really left shrugging my shoulders about how little audiophiles will argue over!

 

[ddk]

True, but getting rid of the room artifacts, revealed by objective measurements, appears to be a requirement before being able to achieve 'natural' sound.

***

Amir, great analysis and interesting read!

IME digital EQ is the furthest thing from "Natural" as argued by us here. Eq'ing a system has nothing to do with the room, you're only messing around with the system's frequency response and at best it's a bandaid not a cure.

david

 

[microstrip]

Precisely my point Bill and people got bent out of shape when I said something might sound too HiFi. As I sit here reading the interpretation of these graphs this is all analytical. I said countless pages ago that when I listened to David's system everything else stood still. There were no bass humps, or roll offs or anything that my mind was being directed to . All I did was sit and enjoy the music. For me at that time I understood the meaning of natural that "ends at the tip of my nose" (just so that I can be forum correct here in my post)

It's all about listening and for me there is a difference as Bill says that something sounds too HiFi. I have read countless posts here where people say the same so my description of natural is as I stated above. Pick your flavor

Steve,

IMHO there is convergence enough in the posts of those we defend the use of the concept of "natural" and in the many audiophile texts I have read to show it has a specific meaning for the audiophile community, that is not translated by forum measuring techniques.

The concept of "naturalness", applied to sound, is interesting enough to attract scholars research. This quote comes from the F. Toole book "Sound Reproduction"

When Klippel analyzed the factors that contributed to the perception of
“naturalness,” one of the general measures of quality, he found the following:

¦ 30% was related to inappropriate discoloration (sound quality).
¦ 20% was related to inappropriate brightness (which is explained as a
70% excess of treble and 30% lack of low frequencies).
¦ 50% was associated with the “feeling of space.”
For the second general measure of quality, “pleasantness,” the factor weighting
was the following:
¦ 30% was related to inappropriate discoloration (sound quality).
¦ 70% was associated with the “feeling of space.”

Thus, sensations of sound quality and spaciousness dominated both “natural-
ness” and “pleasantness” in ratings of these loudspeakers and, of these, “feeling
of space” held a slight lead.


Siegfried Linkwitz also uses the concept of naturalness in his site:

In acoustically small rooms the naturalness of low frequency reproduction may differ between dipolar and monopolar radiating woofers. The coupling of the two types of sources to the modal structure of the room is investigated using steady-state frequency response, cumulative spectral decay, energy-time curve, modulation transfer function and tone burst response. When sets of shaped tone bursts are used for measurement and listening, both frequency and time domain attributes are brought to light which point to the perceived differences.
(...)
Even at reduced level the spectral balance of the reverberant field is important for naturalness of sound reproduction

 

[amirm]

IME digital EQ is the furthest thing from "Natural" as argued by us here. Eq'ing a system has nothing to do with the room, you're only messing around with the system's frequency response and at best it's a bandaid not a cure.

david

You are not messing with it. It is the room that already messed with it. Correcting low frequency response with acoustic material alone is darn near impossible and even if you got there, you risk creating a very dead/dull room. EQ when applied to minimum phase response of the system completely reverses this distortion. It is not at all messing with it.

This has been tested formally of course. From AES paper by Sean Olive:

"Room correction, when done properly, can
provide significant improvements in the sound
quality of loudspeakers in rooms. Three of the
five room corrections produced significantly
higher preference ratings than the uncorrected
loudspeaker/subwoofer.

[...]

Listener comments and spectral balance ratings
indicate the more preferred room corrections
sound more neutral, less colored, with more
ideal spectral balances."

Unless you tell me all of a sudden we don't value what we hear and those terms that describe it, what you are saying simply is not correct. If you have an ordinary room and have no EQ, I guarantee your bass is colored and can be improved.