The Best Sounding Systems can Play Loudly with Low Distortion

@helomech 

"IME this typically happens for one of four reasons: the speakers are non-linear in response, the amp is too low in power to really control the woofers, the speakers are poorly placed in the room creating significant bass nulls, and/or they have poor distortion performance to begin with. The bass null problem is especially common."

Rationalize it any way you want.

Rationalize it any way you want

It’s only a rationalization in the sense it’s a hypothesis based on experience far exceeding that of most here, probably yourself included. I’ve assembled more systems in just the last 15 years than most audiophiles ever would over multiple lifetimes. By all means though, remain willfully ignorant if that’s your thing, it’s a popular character trait these days after all. 

"an effect known as listening fatigue, wherein the ear’s sensitivity to the onslaught decreases and the listener tries to compensate by continually increasing the volume"

I have owned certain components throughout the years with which, regardless of the listening level, I seemed compelled to "chase the volume control."  After giving it some thought, I suspect these were components that were not capable of strong dynamic swings throughout the frequency range and so lacked the ability to sound "exciting" causing me to turn up the volume in order to establish an emotional connection with whatever music was playing.  Thankfully, I no longer have that issue with my current gear, which sounds good regardless of how loud it is playing. 

Common sense that best systems do that.  

The cleaner the system, the less loud it sounds as the speakers don't go into compression.

https://youtu.be/P1R2dKRDFUk