What Mucks said.
I found the author's attitude towards other people and the way he was dismissive of what he perceives as 'widely held beliefs' mildly offensive to be quite honest, strikes me as a bit of a 'know-it-all'.
It matters not one jot quoting facts and figures nor does it matter learning how the human audio receptory system functions or how digital sampling works, when it comes to listening to music for enjoyment your ears will tell you which is pleasant and which isn't pleasant.
And that's without taking into consideration the quality and method of the original recording and the anomalies that can creep in on the music's path from recording studio/live venue to the product purchased by the listener.
The majority of music I listen to now is either from Vinyl or FLAC files and I can say there is a huge variation in quality across my music library. That's not to say that what many would consider to be a poor recording is unenjoyable, often the ropiest quality recording will be enjoyed by the listener, it's the music that counts after all, and let's not lose sight of that.
The author mentions Steve Jobs and Neil Young as wanting to supply better quality music files to the public than the ubiquitous and inimitable mp3 by supplying files at a higher bit rate. An admirable idea in my book but the author criticises them by claiming the bitrate they wanted to offer was not only no improvement but was actually inferior to mp3.
That may or may not be, we only have the author's word for that, but messrs Jobs & Young's intentions were good.
As has been mentioned before on this forum Steve Jobs' preferred listening media was vinyl. And so is Neil Young's. I will not say vinyl is a superior way of listening to music to digital but it often is, as I said, it all depends on the recording.
I wouldn't mind betting the article's author is an advocate of 'the more money you pay the better it will sound' when it comes to buying hi fi. I will state boldly that this is a nonsense and will be even bolder by saying I've proved it and have listened to other people's hi fi systems that didn't cost a fortune to support my assertion.
All this has put me in the mind to listen to Led Zep's Physical Graffitti right now on vinyl. This double album does not rank with the best recordings ever made but it is still one of my all time faves.
First and foremost, it's all about the music
