My last post reviewing the Tone Poet reissue of Dexter Gordon’s One Flight Up will hopefully be my last Tone Poet article. I’m done folks. Stick a fork in me already.

But as I expected, I wouldn’t be seeing the last of the comments I’ve gotten on what I’ve written on this subject. Alas, that was too much to hope for. And the latest of these comments calls me out for implying that my views are objective when, to this gentleman’s mind, they are clearly subjective:

“To say anything other than the difference (between the T.P. and the RVG) is subjective is misleading the audience.”

When I got done throwing up my hands in frustration for yet another failure to clearly communicate my view on these reissues, I gave this comment some more thought. This wasn’t the first person to tell me that the notion of how “good” the sound of these records might be was subjective. You like this sound and I like that sound, so it’s just a matter of personal preference which one you like right?

Those with this viewpoint seem to feel that any criticisms made that do not acknowledge the subjective nature of those criticisms are to be dismissed as unfair. And by extension, if the opinions of those that do think Tone Poets are great records and prefer them to other versions are not presented as valid, then my own opinions are to be viewed with skepticism.

In a way, I agree with this. My views should be viewed with skepticism. After all, I have only a handful of readers who have ever heard my stereo play a record. Therefore how does anyone reading this know what a Tone Poet or an RVG or any record sounds like on my system? Clearly they don’t.

But this also raises the question of how we as individuals decide who is an authority on a subject and who isn’t. What are the qualifications necessary for a critic to be taken seriously? And can any critic offer criticisms that are purely objective?

Let’s take the restaurant critic. How much credibility do we give their reviews? If she doesn’t like a restaurant, do we go and read several more of her reviews to see if we can glean whether her opinions can be trusted? Or do we accept her views are objective enough to base our choices on, and then eat at the places she recommends while avoiding the places she doesn’t.

I’d say most of us, given the demands we have on our time and attention, default to the latter. “So and so said that place sucked, let’s go here instead.” Reviews offer us a way to inform our choices more quickly and with a lot less work on our part.

But if we stopped to think about it for even a moment or two, we would of course realize that a restaurant reviewer cannot write a purely objective review. Their personal preferences and biases will always influence their criticisms.

Does this mean we should dismiss what she says about a restaurant because we know she’s not being totally objective? Absolutely not. Neither would we want her to forgo laying out all of the reasons for why she liked or did not like a place and say instead, “we will all have our own opinions, based on our preferences for the food we like and the places we like to eat it. Therefore just go and find out for yourself. Some of you may like it, some of you may not.”

We have critics for a reason. We all want to know the opinions of those with knowledge and experience in areas that exceed our own. None of us is an expert in every field, so we seek expert advice on things which we lack either the time or the inclination to learn about ourselves. Clearly, there is a place for criticism in our lives, and analog audio is no exception.

In the audiophile world, we tend to decide the merits of a reviewer’s criticisms based on the quality of the system they use to conduct the review. If one reviewer has a system that we deem superior to that of another, we might give the views of that reviewer more weight, especially if that reviewer has a more expensive system. “It cost as much as my house, must be amazing! He must really know what he’s talking about.” Seems sensible enough.

But I’ve heard systems costing many times more than my own that were clearly inferior to mine in their ability to reveal what’s on a record. I also know several other audiophiles who’ve heard very expensive systems that didn’t impress them. Perhaps there’s reason to question the notion of price equaling quality in audio, particularly analog audio.

So what’s a budding analog audiophile to do? Who should we listen to? Is there anyone out there writing about and reviewing records and gear who’s doing so objectively? Or are all of us critics just stating our entirely subjective opinions, based on our personal preferences?

I’d like to pause here a moment and mention something important that I’m hoping we can all agree on. A record can sound very different depending on the system that’s playing it. As I’m sure is true for many of you, I own A LOT of records. Too many frankly. And I regularly pull out a record I haven’t played in a while, often one I used to think sounded amazing, only to discover it’s a dud.

I’ve also had the opposite experience. I play a record that I had left for dead years ago and learn that it’s actually a pretty damn good sounding record. Who knew?

Did my preferences change? Not really. But my stereo did. In fact my system has been changing constantly over the past 5 years or so, and every time it changes, my records sound different, in some cases dramatically so.

I think this notion of personal preference determining which records we like the sound of and which we don’t has a lot more to do with the differences in our stereos and a lot less to do with our personal preferences. I’ve had several friends come over to play and evaluate their records on my system, and invariably we agree on the strengths and weaknesses of these records when they do.

Does that mean my system sounds better than theirs? Maybe. More importantly it means my system is better at showing the differences between different records, because that’s exactly what I’ve built it for.

I have now spent the better part of the last decade finding the faults in my system and fixing them. This has not always been easy. Audiophile systems and the equipment they’re built from invariably have flaws in the way they reproduce music. As I’ve written about before, every system requires some degree of compromise, and in some systems and equipment there’s a lot of it.

When my system had more compromises, I had a very hard time hearing the differences between different records. My system was hiding those differences from me. I did many shootouts where I struggled to find clear differences between records. Great records didn’t sound that great and mediocre records seemed to punch above their weight, although at the time, I didn’t really know this.

But over time I began to realize just how much my system had been hiding. Differences between records that had formerly been vague and elusive became shockingly clear. Even as recently as a few days ago, after some new adjustments to my Triplanar tonearm, I was finally hearing records that I’d been struggling with for years.

You might say at this point that my system is more truthful than the vast majority of audio systems, which makes it not only a good system for evaluating records but also a good one for testing gear. Any small change I make can make a very big change in the sound.

I sometimes need to spend a little time with a particular wire or phono preamp to get into the weeds of what it’s doing and not doing, but I really only need a few minutes to know if it helps the sound of my system or not, and sometimes just a few seconds.

And if it doesn’t help the sound of my system, making it better at bringing out the best in the very best sounding records, then I can’t recommend that piece of equipment. It might do some good things, but if it doesn’t bring me closer to the performance on the record then it’s not the way forward.

A wise man once told me:

“In audio, strive for neutrality and you can find truth in music.”

Why is it that I’m saying my system is more “truthful”? Because it’s about as neutral sounding a system as you’re likely to find. And when you listen to records on a very neutral system, you find yourself using words like “right” or “wrong,” “better” or “worse,” and “good” or “bad” without thinking. These words roll freely off the tongue because they seem the obvious choices, despite their failings as useful descriptors.

But rest assured, I will always include more useful, helpful words in my reviews. You aren’t here listening to my system with me, how could I do otherwise? And make no mistake, I will always strive for neutrality in my reviews, as I have in my system. Or at least I will strive for it to the extent that it’s possible when espousing criticism.

I will always provide examples for why I’m saying what I’m saying. I will always endeavor to give you context for my opinions. And I will, in every case, make an effort to do my homework.

One thing I will never do is tell you that how good, or great, or fantastic a record sounds is just a matter of subjective, personal preference. Because not only does that approach have no place in criticism, it’s antithetical to the primary goal of this website, which is to help other analog audiophiles build their systems and train their ears to find, clean and play the best sounding records they can find, and to have those records come to life in the way only a great record can.

The Broken Record is a guide for the budding analog audiophile. That means it’s pointing the way toward the above goal. If you think your ear is already fully trained AND your stereo is doing everything right, this may not be the site for you.

Although, just playing the odds, you may be better off assuming you’ve still got room to grow in this hobby. I certainly did and I still do. The records I’m steering you towards here are the records that will help get you where you want to go in analog audio, and the records I’m recommending you stay away from are the ones that will hold you back.

You may like some of the records that fall in the latter category right now, like the Tone Poets, but that doesn’t mean you will always like them. If you follow my lead, I guarantee you will find some much better records that will thrill you in ways you never thought was possible.