Audio Road Tripping across the U.S.A.

Driving in a car too small to store much

Is a good way to make sure your audio road trip does not land you in the poor house. Is there such a thing anymore? Poorhouse? I mean, I've read about this quaint English institution that condemned poverty in the strongest possible terms, but what, and how different was 1996 and PRWORA? That's the acronym for welfare reform, in case you pondering. And that was passed under Bill Clinton, as was some hardcore anti person-of-color-caught-up-in-crime legislation. And that is supposed to be the more socially concerned side of the political spectrum? Oof. Well, what's the difference between neoliberal Democrat and neoliberal neocon Republican anyway? Eh?

Yes, at some point I really should start talking about traveling and checking out musical equipment. Hm. 

So, it was winter of 2018, and after quite a few years in the wilderness of good audio equipment (Harman Kardon Soundsticks are ok, but come on), I was in the mood again. This is so totally a retrospectively rationalized story. Come on, I did not even know the difference between 16/44.1 and 24/192 until July 2017. Still don't know what DSD is, or what is up with that. 

So it becomes a little clearer who might this post be for, I bought my Harman Kardon Soundsticks wholly with reward points on my Amazon credit card. That took time. I was a graduate student. Not much money in that gig. So you wait for the points to add up. The first time I saw those speakers (and thought they were the pinnacle of awesome audio equipment) was like 10 years before I bought them. And at the time I saw them, I used to make money, serious money. Don't know why I did not buy them when I could. Wait, I know, that was the time when I dabbled in my only audio splurge at the time - a pair of RNS speakers bought from the factory where they were made. Real Wood. RNS? Ram and Shyam, I was told by a now dearly departed friend. They are now in another friend's house, have been for many years. 

Anyway, so ya, I didn't have a lot of money, and let me nod already to NWAVguy for curing me a few months ago of some of the obsessions so-called audiophiles get into, and I was spending nights sunk reading about. I don't like that label, I prefer to think I am into good music on good equipment. 

It seems to me that audiophiles 

(I'm not meaning to paint a broad stroke here, just know that all realities and claims are socially contextual and historically constructed. Or is it historically contextual and socially constructed? To remain comprehensible, and for this place to serve as of some use to me—maybe to the 3 people who might stumble across it too; there, I've set my goal for readership—I am going to have to gloss. You can't keep qualifying every claim. At some point, people have to be generous readers, learn enough about who you are in totality and not do this kind of looking for the "that's the evidence that this person is an irredeemable racist," or some other pernicious "ist" thing that even the most well intentioned and progressive people in the United States do. Maybe that is just the nature of the public political culture here. The owner of the L.A. Clippers runs his properties like the classic racist slumlord, and no one bats an eyelid. I mean, money and success is it's own justification right? What finally gets him identified as racist is racist statements. Glad it happened, but, you know, he was and still probably is doing stuff that is morally questionable, and has nothing to do with him giving out racist friendship advice. For those who know nothing about this, look it up.  Like I'm saying in this extremely long parenthesis, I have to gloss and keep moving if I am going to get to my point), 

so, ya, audiophiles, in their love of sound as the artist intended, are left searching instead for silence. Lift your cables up off the floor, condition your current, don't let noise enter the signal chain. That is all very well, ok, cool. But let's listen to the music!