A recording engineer's responsibility
ends at the audio media. It is the audiophile's job to present the recorded
material in such a way that the sounds perceived are most desireable to
themselves. The assumption of neutrality being ideal in this matter is
naive. It's an entertainment system, not a laboratory.


Back in the early sixties, recording engineers and producers of top 40
rock and
roll would enhance the recordings to make it sound better on the sort of
equipment
95% of the kids owned back then. Portable record players and radios using
hot chassis circuits (using tubes like the 50C5 and 4 inch speakers).
Or the kids
used the console TV/radio/record player in the living room.

Radio station program directors like Rick Sklar of Musicradio 77 WABC would,
with the engineers, tweak the sound processing of the music (compressors
and such)
to sound good on transistor portable radios, AA5 table radios and such.
What
most listeners used. He had examples of these radios in his officce and
would
listen to see if the station sounded good from them.

So recording engineers taylor the sound to fit the playback equipment they
expect most of their customers to use. Of course checking to be sure the
material will still sound reasonable on a good system as well.