Rock? money down the drain?

Didn't miss the title . . . may have digressed alittle though. What I was getting at was; that certain people expressed thier views as if they like one type of music only. I'm saying there is good and bad in each catagory. Enjoy them all regardless of lables. What ever you like, a good system makes it sound better.

Flip - couldn't agree more. I enjoy going to the All-Music Guide website (www.allmusic.com) and traversing their extensive "genre" trees - it makes your head spin there are so many. I'm glad there isn't a test! I'd go one step further and say that not only is there good and bad in each category, but that certain situations bring out the best in an otherwise average song. A decent system is a must - a good system makes everything better.

Tell me Eldragon, how does jazz jerk around? This should be good. Are you one of those classical snobs that play classical piano and think reading classical manuscripts some 2, 3, 400 years old is superior to jazz music? Or have you even spent enough time listening to jazz to acquire an honest evaluation of certain players or the music in general?

I beg to differ. Jazz doesn't jerk. It DOES sooth the soul, and speaks volumes about the improvizational and technical ability of the individual creating it. Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, they all improvised...and probably would have loved jazz had it been available in their time.

Make your choices based upon your own preferences, but don't dis' JAZZ. You obviously don't understand JAZZ, for if you did you'd know it does not jerk around as you call it! Try reading or playing an Art Tatum transcription if you think all JAZZ does is jerk around...Some comments made by some of you people do nothing but profess your ignorance. Enjoy!

"Jazz? It isn't dead, but it sure smells funny" Who said that?

Some additional thoughts on my part based on a few experiments this week. Many high end systems that are owned by people that listen primarily to classical or Jazz cannot put out sufficient power in the 40- 80 Hz octave range to have that feeling of really rocking (at least 95 db spl). Some of this is that many, high end owners do not spend enough money in room treatment or DSP to smooth out the room response in this critical octave. I've measured the in room response of several well constructed high end systems and many audiophiles would be shocked if they saw how uneven their bass response really is. Many rock speakers get around this by overwhelming the room with fat bass until it is really the room walls resonating that is giving the listener desired megawhomp. I find this poor bass response unacceptable on classical music and it is for classical music that I built my system, but this poor in room bass response isn't apparent to many audiophiles. I played some rock for some friends over the weekend. My system uses both the Sigtech DSP and ASC room treatment to give me a very flat power response down to 25Hz. I played Metallica, Judas Priest, Eagles and Rage Against the Machine. Using the Z-Systems DSP I rolled off or notched frequencies in the 80 Hz and below bass. At average volumes of 98 db SPL it was suprisingly easy to lose the feeling of really rocking. Even bypassing the Sigtech but with more ASC room treatment than most audiophile use, much of the feeling of rocking was lost. My conclusions are that the visceral impact of rock (at least for Metal) depends on bass power, Whether that bass power is clean or dirty matters less than its absence. Many high end systems that focus on imaging or detail can't really produce that much more acoustic power at those frequencies than many mid fi systems. If this experiment is at all generalizable moving, from a mid-fi system to a high end system will not provide the visceral impact that is critical to rock. I might add is that these capabilities are even more critical to Mahler, Bruckner, Wagner, Strauss, Bartok and Stravinsky. If you are to have anything remotely approaching the concert hall experience these composers require a flat power response to 30Hz.