@yaluaka I am very focused on the sound; if its right then the music is processed by the limbic portions of the brain which increases body movement and emotional response. Increased engagement.
I run a recording studio as well as manufacture amps and preamps. When the system is accurate it is also musical and engaging. IOW 'accurate' and 'musical' are not two different things. They are the same thing.
If you think otherwise it is because you've only encountered equipment that was claimed to be 'accurate' but was not (and was amusical; far too much of that out there) similarly the 'musical' equipment you've heard apparently was not as musical as is possible because it could not also be true to the music (accurate) at the same time.
Now I get that you can use R2R tape to warm up a digital recording (because it adds a 3rd harmonic) or run it through a single-ended tube circuit to add a 2nd harmonic; I understand how distortion affects our perception of musical (keeping in mind that understanding that is important for the design side of my work).
What I'm saying here is the distortion signature of any amp is paramount to how it sounds- the distortion signature is its sonic signature. So obviously the distortion signature must be as benign as possible (lower ordered harmonics dominant as seen in an SET or our class D or our OTLs) but also as low as possible so the equipment can reproduce low level detail properly.

