Recently, I got new speakers and when I hooked them up, a/b tested against my old speakers, and heard tighter, punchier, deeper bass, more clarity and detail, I confidently told myself that the new thing is better, but over time I noticed that I was just not listening to music that much. Listening to my favorite albums or checking out a new one for the first time used to hold my attention, but now after a few songs, I would drift off down a YouTube rabbit hole and can’t get through an entire album. I put my old (apparently inferior) speakers back and I suddenly can’t get enough music.
I’m not going to go into over-analyzing those particular speakers, because I have had the same thing happen with headphones and amps as well. I think my takeaway here Is that in my time watching reviews and trying to judge what good sound is, I have inadvertently trained my self to look for certain characteristics of sound quality that aren’t actually what I enjoy the most… so how do you know what it is about sound quality actually keeps you listening as opposed to what checks the boxes you’ve created to distinguish “good” audio quality.
I sure as shit didn’t know what I liked when I started, but trying things and building a vocabulary based on experience have led me down a path where I now know what I like, and am very happy with my rig. Armed with this self knowledge, I am also confident I can continue to refine and improve things for myself and help other people find good sound.
First premise is that you can’t know if you like something if you have never heard it, so listening for and identifying common terms is a good step in becoming a more educated “audiophile”. Once you can start identifying aspects of sound in consistent and grounded terms, you can corroborate with others in person (dealers or buddies) or online and continue to build your base knowledge of what a term really means to you, and how you can describe it to others. Doing all of that gives you a much better chance of picking the right gear and building a satisfying system. Of course, once you start with your own gear, you’ll need to start listening to more varied gear (and components – capacitors are a world all on their own!), so watch and be prepared to fall down a rabbit hole here…
Here’s my initial list of “common terms” (and some adjectives associated with them) that I wrote down a couple of years ago. I try to use these more objective terms when describing sound rather than obtuse metaphors (like “blackground”, “sweet”) so that I keep my language relatable and grounded. That way I am constantly building a framework to help build up my understanding of my personal preferences, and help other people understand how to identify gear that matches their preferences. Maybe this list will help others… (please assume that this list is incomplete and that I could use your help fleshing it out)
- Frequency - low, mid, high
- Imaging - accurate, clear, blurred, fuzzy, 3D, 2D
- Soundstage dimension - width, depth, height
- Soundstage location - 5th row / near, 30th row / far, etc
- Spatial - dimensionality, layers, flat
- Tone - warm, cold, neutral
- Timbre - true, believable, natural, weight, presence, balanced
- Decay - fast, slow, dry, wet
- Liquidity - liquid, grain, etch, sharp edges
- Drive - slam, prat
- Speed / transients - slow, mushy, fast punchy
- Engaging - fatigue, analytical, musical, inviting
- Macro dynamics - open, wide, compressed, narrow
- Micro dynamics - detail, resolution, clarity, wash, indistinct
- Intangibles - plankton, magic dust
- Weight - fleshed out, substantial, thin, hollow
- Timing - fast, slow, coherent, blurred
- Clarity - transparent, veiled, grey, clean
If you can identify these terms in a piece of gear, or a system, or a specific vinyl pressing, you can become a force of good in the hobby and help people understand why we’re so crazy.
(also, go try the golden ears training if you can - also super helpful for learning how to identify aspects of sound - https://soundcloud.com/user-825223896/sets/golden-ears-volume-i)