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Romy the Cat
Boston, MA
Posts 10,131
Joined on 05-27-2004
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Post #:
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9
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Post ID:
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24612
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Reply to:
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24604
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The DPoLS ceremony in a Boston apartment.
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This was the most astonishing and bewildering moment of my
entire audio life. It was in 2000. That time I lived in cozy downtown Boston
apartment that I absolutely loved. The apartment sounded fabulously with pretty
much any playback you put in. Also, to live in there very much reflected my
very urban life style during the years. I loved to live in city, I loved at 3AM
on the morning be able to make 300 feet trip to a store to buy cigars, I loved
be able to meet on the streets the type women who can afford a plastic surgery,
I loved to live in near epicenter of civilization. My views and my feeling
about all of it very much changed now but that how I felt then and my Back Bay’s
apartment very much reflected it.
In 2000 I made a transition from box speakers to horns. I
think I got Avantgard Duo in February-March of 2000 and when with a month I got
rid of Duo and bought Trio. During 2000 I was at full throttle experimented
with improving of Trio sound. At that time, I discovered the Fane Studio 8M and
I was looking for a solution to replace the Trio’s subs. I did not start to mingle the MF drivers then
and a large collection of MF and FM drivers came later on. At that time, I had
three Lamm M1.1 amplifiers and I was in prosses to buying Lamm ML2 to drive my
Trio.
A few words of tangents I need to say about the Trio. With
all understandable problems of the Avantgard Trio I am very grateful for them
as the lead me to the horns loading topology and helped me to learn what I
know. That time I was doing a lot of traveling, including visiting different
Avantgard Trio installations around world, observing and learning what other
people do. I have seen a lot of potentials with Trio but never anything
remarkable with exception of one installation. I do not remember who it was, it
was some kind of beginner dealer in NY and I do not remember how I get familiar
with him. He was not a big dealer and was selling Avantgard Trio for a few
months and then went back to dark. He was not so experienced with Avantgard and
when I spoke with him about the details of Avantgard setting up he was
absolutely clueless in my estimation. Still, when I visited him I was very
surprised that the Trio in his room, and in his installation, did sound very nice.
When I was visited him, I was scratching my head and did not get why it was so
nice and why it was free from many Avantgard problem that I was very intimately
familiar. Anyhow, it was very well performing Avantgard Trio.
Anyhow, returning back to my apartment and to my slightly
modified Trio. I had my own Midbass drivers, my own speaker-level crossovers
and 4 subs were set in midbass/subbass configuration. I was working on better
drivers integration as I was trying to get an aggressive nearfield and was
moving the Trios a lot in my room. One day
making another change with
crossover and moving Trios a fraction of inch to another location I felt that
something suddenly went different. I was standing at my left speaker and
unexpectedly I felt was like an orchestra’s musicians were practicing and all
installments did something different and suddenly they all went in tune with a
single note.
When I put my ass to my listening spot I literally got
disoriented. The sound was like I never heard
before. Not because it was better, but it was very different. Anything,
literally anything we in audio know about sound was not there. There were not frequencies,
no dynamic, no colors, no resolutions, no details, no harmonics, no transients,
no imaging, there was absolutely nothing what we call auditable in what I
experienced. The audio reviewers love to write in those situations that “there
was no audio but only music” but they are idiots and that do not know what they
are writing. It had absolutely nothing to do with music and it had only to do
with the interaction protocol between sound and my brain and, boy, it was WAY
different! Sound presentation was not created in space in front of me but
somehow was unfolding in my brain. The effect was similar to headphones… but
with no sound. I felt that there were some harmonic events unfolding in my mind
and I felt PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY for those events. It was even in a way
further then playing instruments myself, it was not the feeling that I crated
sound but rather the felling of abstract but VERY tangible responsibility for
each note.
I stopped the CD player spent a good half hour to think what
is going on with me. The idea of mini-stroke did popup in my head. I know that
I was healthy, do not use any legal or recreational drugs, pretty much do not
drink and do not have any psychiatric deviations. Still, the experience was a
bit alarming. I played more and the experience very much repeated itself. I
took different CDs and recognized that this process of the “bizarre musical psychological intrenching”
did not change with music. I even took the music that I would not normally
listen with my playback, the Deep Purple’s “Purpendicular” album, and the
presentation of the playback did not change.
It is important to note that the feeling I was getting there did not
directly related to live music. I did experience something similar probably 3-4
times in my life during live concerts but it was due to incredible quality of
musical events. Here, in front of the damn playback, I was getting incredibly
personal with music regardless of the quality of the musicianship itself. That
was new, VERY new.
I was smart enough then and I did do not touch ANYTHING in
my playback and I decided to take my mind out of it. I went to a nice local
restaurant, ordered a very nice 3 meals supper and asked a waiter to serve me
slowly. However, I was keep thinking
about what was going on. The though that I have that amassing music machine in
my home physically was forcing me to go home.
I took next day, Thursday, off. I spent the rest of the evening and the
next day with playback listening and experimenting, trying to figure out what
is going on. I did not experiment with playback but rather with my perception
and with my mind. I clearly understood
that I have no idea what made the things “to work” in my playback and if I touch
anything I might fuck everything up. For instance, I discovered that moving my
listening position away from listening spot did not change the “involvement”
with sound in the way how it typically change sonic imaging. In fact, I was
able to stand next to one of the speakers(!) and the “prosses” still was going
on. That very much hurt my hypothesis regarding the “prosses” and phase
aliment, at least the “big phases” (a big subject!).
The “ceremony” lasted to two days. In Saturday I went somewhere
for a whole day, I think it was shooting a wedding… I returned home and did
something with playback that make the whole “involvement” much less. Then I was
trying to fix it… and lost it. Lost it forever. I never had the similar sound
presentation neither with my playback not with any other playbacks. If you read
my site then you read about DPoLS and do
think that completely accidently my playback found itself during those 3 days
in perfect DPoLS setting, when “small phases” get aligned. Over my audio
life I very frequently think about these 3 days, about audio and about us. I
wish I had a simple recipe how you can put the playback in DPoLS mode. OK, who the hell care about
you!? I wish to have some kind of recipe for MYSELF but I do not have it. Well,
it is what it is… Still, if we are taking about something magnificent in audio then
I never think I will be able to top my 2000’s DPoLS event.
Rgs, Romy The Cat
"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
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