Your mom is an audiophile
I just had another pointless disagreement with my boss. It's becoming a much more common occurance. I'm beginning to see that he's the kind of guy who refuses to lose an argument regardless of whether or not he's on the losing end. And the funny thing is that it always comes down to me and my facts vs. him and "someone in the business" that he knows. Seriously, I can't tell you how many times I've confronted him with actual facts that can be verified by trustworthy sources and he'll just tell me, "Well, I know this guy who manages a Best Buy and he told me...."
So today's pointless argument was about what it means to be an audiophile. Webster's dictionary (oh, this is starting out like every bad speech in a public speaking class) defines an audiophile as, "A person who is enthusiastic about high-fidelity sound reproduction." The argument was about whether or not someone who owned just a butt-load (aka metric ton) of albums, like me and oh so many of my best friends, is an audiophile. I say no. Not unless they spend $2000 to own one of these. And even if you did buy a $2000 tube power amp, you would still need the tube phono preamp and a very nice (and expensive) set of speakers. Once you spend enough on your sound system that you could have bought a mid-range used car, you're an audiophile. My vinyl setup cost me about $200 total. I've spent more on records than I have on the equipment I use to play my records. I'm not an audiophile. I'm a record collector. Big frick difference. Anyway, I was just wondering if any of y'all in the sound of my voice consider yourself an audiophile and if so, what would make/makes you an audiophile. My argument is that if you care about the technology by which you play your music as much if not more than the music itself, you're an audiophile. If you just own a butt-load of records, you're a collector (and there's a better chance that you and I would get along than if you were an audiphile). But that's just my $.02 on that topic.
In other news, I finally took the Bryan Ferry plunge. It's taken a long time and a lot of hand wringing to decide if I was ready for it. Not that I didn't consider myself worthy of Bryan Ferry. It's more because of the fact that I like glam. No, scratch that. I love glam. I wish glam were still alive and well. And I absolutely love the glam years of Roxy Music. The one reason I don't own "Avalon" despite the fact that everyone tells me it's one of Roxy Music's best albums is because it's post-glam (and post-Eno). My mind just isn't ready to accept Roxy Music as a non-glam band. Anyway, today I bought not one, but two of Bryan Ferry's solo albums. Bryan Ferry went all crooner in his solo albums (which is no surprise because he was showing himself a crooner toward the end of Roxy's glam era. And he has a nice voice, so there ya go). I don't know what possessed me to do it, but I waltzed right into my local vinyl spot and put the cash on the hogshead for a double deuce of Bryan Ferry. And I have a feeling that I'm really going to like it. Filth, I like Morrissey even though I acknowledge the fact that the real musical genius behind The Smiths was Johnny Marr. Actually, Bryan Ferry and Morrissey are very similar in their solo stuff in more ways than one. Anyway, here are the two Bryan Ferry's I picked up:
I love this one because he's sporting a pencil thin French style (or what Nadia would call Chester the Molester style) moustache. Classic.
And this is the other album I picked up, Boys and Girls, which is supposed to be the pinnacle of Bryan Ferry's solo career. I admit I'm still a little nervous about these, but now that I own them, I'm legally obligated to listen to them.
So today's pointless argument was about what it means to be an audiophile. Webster's dictionary (oh, this is starting out like every bad speech in a public speaking class) defines an audiophile as, "A person who is enthusiastic about high-fidelity sound reproduction." The argument was about whether or not someone who owned just a butt-load (aka metric ton) of albums, like me and oh so many of my best friends, is an audiophile. I say no. Not unless they spend $2000 to own one of these. And even if you did buy a $2000 tube power amp, you would still need the tube phono preamp and a very nice (and expensive) set of speakers. Once you spend enough on your sound system that you could have bought a mid-range used car, you're an audiophile. My vinyl setup cost me about $200 total. I've spent more on records than I have on the equipment I use to play my records. I'm not an audiophile. I'm a record collector. Big frick difference. Anyway, I was just wondering if any of y'all in the sound of my voice consider yourself an audiophile and if so, what would make/makes you an audiophile. My argument is that if you care about the technology by which you play your music as much if not more than the music itself, you're an audiophile. If you just own a butt-load of records, you're a collector (and there's a better chance that you and I would get along than if you were an audiphile). But that's just my $.02 on that topic.
In other news, I finally took the Bryan Ferry plunge. It's taken a long time and a lot of hand wringing to decide if I was ready for it. Not that I didn't consider myself worthy of Bryan Ferry. It's more because of the fact that I like glam. No, scratch that. I love glam. I wish glam were still alive and well. And I absolutely love the glam years of Roxy Music. The one reason I don't own "Avalon" despite the fact that everyone tells me it's one of Roxy Music's best albums is because it's post-glam (and post-Eno). My mind just isn't ready to accept Roxy Music as a non-glam band. Anyway, today I bought not one, but two of Bryan Ferry's solo albums. Bryan Ferry went all crooner in his solo albums (which is no surprise because he was showing himself a crooner toward the end of Roxy's glam era. And he has a nice voice, so there ya go). I don't know what possessed me to do it, but I waltzed right into my local vinyl spot and put the cash on the hogshead for a double deuce of Bryan Ferry. And I have a feeling that I'm really going to like it. Filth, I like Morrissey even though I acknowledge the fact that the real musical genius behind The Smiths was Johnny Marr. Actually, Bryan Ferry and Morrissey are very similar in their solo stuff in more ways than one. Anyway, here are the two Bryan Ferry's I picked up:
I love this one because he's sporting a pencil thin French style (or what Nadia would call Chester the Molester style) moustache. Classic.
And this is the other album I picked up, Boys and Girls, which is supposed to be the pinnacle of Bryan Ferry's solo career. I admit I'm still a little nervous about these, but now that I own them, I'm legally obligated to listen to them.