Anyone else prefer listening to their system more than a concert?

@ghdprentice  It’s unreal when they do that. I used attend a small club where local jazz bands played with no cover. Retired dudes, part-time music teachers. Live instruments. Massive dynamic range. Simply wonderful. Then the owner, with the best will in the world, installed those atrocious speakers with piezo horn tweeters. On stands. The sound was utterly destroyed. The color and soul eradicated. Loud, brittle, monochromium garbage. They do the same in our town when bands play on the village green in summer. I hate unnecessary amplified music with a passion. 

Small clubs or cafes of maybe less than 200 seats can be great and let the musicians really shine as well as a good symphony hall. Other than that, my home system sounds better than most live music I’ve recently heard & can play sufficiently loud in my big room while sounding really good to enjoy great rock or blues which are my preferred genres. 
 

Unfortunately, most larger rock venues today sound terrible w/ the now preferred digitally amplified & sound processed line arrays. They lose most of the nuanced beautiful tone & detail of the great sounding Marshall stacks or Fenders, percussion & vocals especially when there is more than 2 or 3 instruments / vocals playing at once. They generally sound hard, harsh & annoying & not very enjoyable. I recently have seen the great Tedeschi Trucks Band & the fun Leonid & Friends ( great all Russian Chicago tribute band) & the sound quality was awful! What a shame! 

I still enjoy going to see certain artists live that I like and are playing in the right venue. I long gave up going to arena and stadium concerts for various reasons: 1) competing with scalpers and ticket bots to get decent seats, 2) ridiculous ticket prices 3) sound quality of the venue. Recent concerts have been in more intimate venues like Tipitina's or smaller theater venues like the Civic in New Orleans. Last best "loud" concert I saw was New Order's last tour. It was a phenomenal show where I had great seats and the sound system was properly dialed in. 

All that being said, it's just much harder to justify going to a live show in the middle of the week considering I have kids still in school and work the next day. Where I live now in Lafayette, LA, I  go to Festival International and Festival Acadien et Creoles, which means I get to hear several great acts during the daytime hours, and expose my kids to music they don't hear on streaming or radio. My youngest loves dancing to Cajun, Zydeco, Swamp pop when we go to the festivals. I love hearing of new international artists that don't have wide exposure as well. It's a win-win situation, and the festivals are free and family-friendly events!

Otherwise, at my ripe old age of 53, I prefer the comfort of sitting in my chair with headphones on and listening to whatever I want while sipping a beverage of choice and not having to convince my wife to go with me to see a band she most likely has no interest in seeing live. 

Depending on who it is (and how much the tickets cost), I'll go to a concert. But I live in a sawdust and horse manure-smelling city that only books fake country music, so the chances of going to a great music concert here aren't very good. I'd consider traveling, but only for an act that I truly admire. I'd also have to wear ear protection since my ears ring a little all the time.

The last live music event I attended was for a bar band in Jenks, Oklahoma, and they pushed the volume level up to 105 dB, so that was painful. Plus, they played a lot of 70s rock that I don't care for, so it definitely wasn't worth the free admission.

All in all, I get the most pleasure out of listening in my music room. Based on my personal experience in music, my system reproduces the music realistically, and it didn't cost too much (about $10-$12k total spent over several years). I can also keep the volume level at a comfortable 40-55 dB, so I'm extremely happy.

My goal is for it to sound like a concert in my room. Either the musicians are in the room with me or I’m in the room with them. It can happen with a great performance, a great recording, and a good system. Always looking for the impact of a live performance. 
 

But we miss out on the immediacy of a live performance. Particularly with jazz, You’ll never hear that solo again. My rig sounds great and I can spend hours stuck in front of it. But the presence and emotion of live musicians playing… Hard to beat.