Two years ago, after the release of the RAP 5 compilation, I commented on
most of the cuts--being a busybody, I guess. Anyway, one comment from
that time stuck with me. I was reminded again this week as I'm
auditioning a new pair of speakers. The old thread included:

From: (Mike Rivers)
Date: 21 Aug 2003 21:10:52 -0400
Local: Thurs, Aug 21 2003 9:10 pm
Subject: RAP5/3/12-13 Mike Kellat

In article
writes:
Track 12, at 0.22, for instance. Turn up the volume. (Makes me wonder
how loud Carey listens - several of the things you commented on I can
only hear at blazing levels...)

Well, there's listening for enjoyment and then there's listening for
criticism and quality control. Just like using a magnifying glass to
check for small cracks in solder joints, you need to use the
equivalent (turn up the volume) to find flaws in a recording. Me, I
listened ot the set in the car and everything sounds just fine, though
I did have to adjust the volume now and then. Geez, I could have been
killed while driving and fiddling with that knob.

--

It isn't how loud. It's how loud relative to "other stuff". In a quiet
environment with clean gear, you can hear enormous amounts of detail at
relatively subdued levels--and headphones can "show all" at even lower
levels, minus the left-right interaction of speakers.

This comes up because I had gotten slack recently. My newest computer
(already almost a year old) has a noisy fan that I haven't tended to. My
house is usually buzzing with some extraneous noise, be it refrigerator,
A/C, or television.

But I wanted to really audition these new speakers, so I turned
everything off and *really listened*. It's amazing what you can hear
when there are no distractions. Ears work.