...and now a word from your anti-sponsor...


"...the whole artifice of recording. I see it like this: a voice into a microphone onto a tape, onto your CD, through your speakers is all as illusory and fake as any synthesizer—it doesn't put Thom in your front room—but one is perceived as 'real' the other, somehow 'unreal'... It was just freeing to discard the notion of acoustic sounds being truer." - Johnny Greenwood of Radiohead.

Personally, I couldn't agree more.
128x128ghosthouse
Ironically, the PA equipment likely wouldn't sound very good in a small space. They are two entirely different ways of experiencing music.
Agreed. Best not chasing what can't be caught. Best to enjoy what is on hand.

Home entertainment should be about entertainment, not trying to replicate the impossible.

I think Greenwood is right on comment.
....but the audiance can't really tell if half the sound is coming from a tape recording- so it must sound real.?
It's more likely that the sound quality at most live venues, from an audiophile perspective, is junk so rather it's from a live or recorded source the sound is about the same.
I think "real" is an off-putting word. When I was a kid, I enjoyed the best 60s bands on a 8 track and transistor radio. The bands were as real then as if I played them on my current system. I derived the same amount of listening pleasure. The songs were captured as a moment in time, and I felt affinity to the artist.

I have never desired a perfect replication of the artist, and cherish all the imperfections that are a constant of watching bands play live every night. Both the recorded work and a live performance are worlds apart.