Audiophile or Music Lover?

Are you an Audiophile or Music Lover?

  • Audiophile

    Votes: 66 17.1%
  • Music Lover

    Votes: 321 82.9%

  • Total voters
    387
Vintage Audio Enthusiast, thank you... LOL.

For me it is all about "sound", not about flash and super high-end equipment. So I guess, I would be more a "music lover" than an "audiophile". I find all my equipment bargains, generally on Ebay... heee heee.
 
Music lover here... As far as gear is concerned... All I care about is making the music I love sound really good. Without music that moves me it's all for nothing.
 
I grew up hearing a lot of good music on a tinny AM transistor radio, suspect living room consoles and boom boxes. I still would rather hear that than 'meh' music on a top-notch system. I like good sound, but strive for compromise. High bit rate MP3s sound pretty good through Klipsch speakers! However, I do have my quality LPs/CDs if I want to do an audiophile throwdown windowshaking test of my equipment.
 
A literal translation of "audio" + "phile" is "sound lover." So if you love recorded sounds besides the purely musical, that might be a reason to apply that term. Translation can be so interesting: the snooty "cuisine" just means "kitchen."

On the other hand, audiophile might imply a serious devotion to high quality audio equipment, as much as to the quality of the music or other recordings.

I'm not wealthy enough to be more than a half-fast audiophile. I love a lot of kinds of music, but I like other kinds of recordings, too.
 
I grew up listening to AM on transistor radio too. I remember reading that Paul McCartney always played his bass lines an octive higher so they would sound better (or even make sound) on Transistor and car radios.

Not sure if that was true or not but there were songs that sounded better then others on AM.

A big part of why I got into vintage audio was I had a lot of MidFi that only sounded good with good recordings. Beatles, Stones, etc. were not enjoyable.

Now they are on my SS and Tube setups :yes:
 
Audiophile here !

I won't listen to any music that sounds like crap, I didn't pay a lot of money on equipment to have my ears sonically offended by a crappy recording.
 
Are you an Audiophile or a Music Lover?


I don't understand the question.

Specifically, I'm thrown by the word "or".

I think a more realistic question would be "Do you love gear and music, or just music?"
 
I think I already stated thought I had when I posted this. Some folks want the ultimate gear even if moderate quality doesn't sound good on it. Like my Thiels. They sound great with great recordings. Throw on some Beatles Mono and it's flat and boring.

Now everything sounds great with either my:

Sui 890DB - AR 3a's, 5's, KLH 23's, Dynaco A25's...
Eico HF-81 with my Klipsch Forte's

Both setups using Apple Lossless files streamed to Music Hall tube DAC.

I would love to have some of the mega dollar Audiophile setups available but not at the cost of making mid level recordings sound like crap - nor do I have the $'s to spend. I want to be able to enjoy old Beatles, Zombies, Derek and the Domnoes, along with Pat Metheny, Classical, etc.

If you don't like the question - no need to participate :D
 
I don't understand the question.

Specifically, I'm thrown by the word "or".

I think a more realistic question would be "Do you love gear and music, or just music?"

+1. I voted for music because I wouldn't own any gear if I didn't love music.
 
To me the HiFi is just a means to listen to the music we love. I enjoy listening to music even in my 2012 Ford Edge with factory stereo. As long as it is listenable, I listen to music. Same goes with the Smartphone and Earbuds, listen to 320kbps MP3's.
 
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This is sometimes the old egg, chicken thing, in that which fosters which first.

I'd have to go with the music. The love of music brings about the system that is the journey.

Then when a person experiences a good system (at a friend's house/in a store setting), they look forward to obtaining a system that does a good job of increasing the appreciation that was there to begin with. As time passes, they tend to want a better reproduction of the sound as close as they can get to a real life musical event.

If along they way out of design or not, a knowledge base occurs and this creates an interest in how the different gear works. Some like to go into detail on the electronic workings, for others it is simply obtaining better gear that they can afford or improvements take place bringing about a better result and they arrive at their destination.

For me it was the music that inspired the desire to appreciate better sound and head in the direction of becoming an audiophile along the way.

Q
 
^^^This. I used to be kind of an audiophile snob, dabbling only in the very high-end of equipment and listening to only better recorded music (audiophile-approved recordings). Now, In my wisdom and more senior years, I have come to appreciate more modest yet still good-sounding gear and just appreciate the music more.
 
It's hard to imagine an audiophile who isn't a music lover.

Sort of like a wine connoisseur who hates alcohol...... or a cigar aficionado who doesn't like tobacco.
 
Audiophile. My endless pursuit of quality takes me deeper into the music.
 
This is sometimes the old egg, chicken thing, in that which fosters which first.

I'd have to go with the music. The love of music brings about the system that is the journey.

Then when a person experiences a good system (at a friend's house/in a store setting), they look forward to obtaining a system that does a good job of increasing the appreciation that was there to begin with. As time passes, they tend to want a better reproduction of the sound as close as they can get to a real life musical event.

If along they way out of design or not, a knowledge base occurs and this creates an interest in how the different gear works. Some like to go into detail on the electronic workings, for others it is simply obtaining better gear that they can afford or improvements take place bringing about a better result and they arrive at their destination.

For me it was the music that inspired the desire to appreciate better sound and head in the direction of becoming an audiophile along the way.

Q
Wow, Quadman2... It's almost as if you can read minds. This is the exact journey I've taken over the past ~40 years or so en route to the hardcore listener that I am today.

My parents had a decent setup at my childhood home, but it took the sound of the system of a family friend who was a senior employee at a local music store during my teen years (thus obtaining steep discounts on thousands of albums and accompanying gear...) to push me over the edge into a passionate love affair with listening to prerecorded music. Every now and then his family would invite my parents to their home a couple a miles from ours and I'd proceed to zone out in front of his vinyl-only two-channel setup for as much time as possible during the visit. My memories are vague, but I clearly remember an upper echelon Technics turntable, preamp, amp, and separate multi-band EQ sending some of the best sounding tunes I've ever heard to two three-way floorstanders. Crystal clear vocals, taut midrange, and thunderous tight/not-sloppy bass would fill the upstairs portion of house he occupied while living with his mom (our host) while saving to get his own house. His collection of thousands of LPs (no 8-tracks, reel-to-reel, cassettes, or even CDs) inspired me to save up allowance money and eventually money from my first jobs to start my own budding collection, some of which I still own 30 or so years later. So, like yourself, for me it was definitely the music.
 
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