I have to say that I am also a little bit confused by this discussion. As I gain experience in the hobby, I find myself actually being drawn toward simplicity: simplicity in set up, and simplicity in communicating and thinking about what I am hearing. Often, the less communication and thinking the better.
I have been to audio shows, dealers, and even in one case, someone's home, where the host begins the listening session with a speech, describing what the system is all about, the changes that have recently been made, and what we are about to hear. He sets the stage. He then plays a specific demo track of music that reinforces that for which he has prepared us.
To some extent, I used to play music that my system portrayed well, rarely playing music that challenged the system. That was more with my former limited range speakers. I would play small ensembles, rarely larger scale music, and almost never rock or pop. With my new speakers, I can play larger scale music convincingly. With more recent set up changes, a broader range of recordings sound good. And in combination with those changes, a new preamp, cables, and particularly cartridges, I noticed much more information captured in my LPs.
All of this has improved the degree to which I enjoy my music, and it has changed the way I present the music to my visitors. I no longer play my choices but ask others what they want to hear. It is completely up to them, assuming I have the music they request. I and we listen now more to the performances and the music rather than to the system. Sometimes I simply listen to the energy in the room. There is much less dissecting of the sound going on. There is less need to understand the sound, and there is more comfort and relaxation while enjoying the experience.
I do think that we need to agree on the meanings of terms so that we can convey ideas during discussions. It makes it easier. We seem to have surprising difficulty coming to terms with "pinpoint" , "hifi", "natural", and now "listening window". I was always confused about "glare", "grain", "tight bass", "articulation" and others. These have been used so often, I assumed this was how everyone thinks of sound. I even used these terms trying to burrow down toward a better understanding of the issues in my own system. But non audiophiles never use such terms, or they don't with me when we go to concerts or listen to audio.
AJ van den Hul described to me an issue he was hearing in some of his cartridges. He called it an unwelcome "accent" above 20K Hz. I knew immediately what he meant, not because I necessarily heard it, but because the term was easy to understand. He also rights about live music, never using these glossary terms. I think we try very hard to complicate and confuse matters in some of these discussions. We know what live unamplified music sounds like. Why not just discuss our systems in those terms? I think it would help if we find some way to simply our communication to convey things in easy to understand ways to others. Image how a non audiophile thinks about music, say in "layman's" terms. The glossary of hifi terms is great but where has it gotten us all these years later? It got me moving away from the essence of the music, the real reason I am in this hobby. This is where I was in college enjoying my Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, and Diva sound track. I am slowly going back there.
When I hear a new piece of gear in my system or am asked by a friend to comment about a new component or set up, I no longer think about "glare" or "tight bass", I think about whether or not it sounds right to me. This is the fundamental idea behind the term "natural". It assumes we know what an instrument or voice actually sounds like, well, within a range of variable acoustics and conditions, not an "absolute sound". Jeff Day's "Listening Window" is not something I ever thought of before, but it seems simple enough and I understand what he is talking about because I have experienced the same thing in my own listening room and that of Al M's over the last year or so. I read it in Tang's many posts.
The system, the vocabulary, and the discussions, have become simpler for me, and thus much easier to understand and enjoy. Perhaps it is fatigue or age setting in.
