Can someone explain to me why boomerphiles love jazz so much?

I have to do a lot of international travel, but the long time at airports and on the plane gives me more time to listen to music uninterrupted so it works out lol. Speaking of office I just bought the iloud mtm’s and am going to set them up in mine. They are the perfect sleeper, as they look cheap and bad, but are actually good lol

2 Likes

Love the way you think!

I didn’t quite enjoy jazz back then, not until I experienced a really good live performance by chance. Since then I got addicted and went to jazz clubs as often as possible (a rarity around here sadly). On the audiophile side, even with decent gear it’s difficult to get the same experience as live venue, and so I’m cursed with upgradeitis.
I’m 40 and my taste is rather diverse – post-rock/post-metal, synthwave, death/black/prog metal, classical, a bit of classic rock, and lately really into things like Khruangbin.

Oh forgot to say the most important thing. Why it’s always exciting, it’s the improvs. It’s like being high and floating and being carried away by the stream of music and not really sure where we’re going.

That’s another reason too now that you mention it, that jazz sounds kinda bad on lesser systems, so they like to try and get it to sound the most realistic

Personally I enjoy jazz but not to the extent that I prefer it over other genres, but some good live jazz can be a great experience

After a couple years working in a cubicle farm early in my career I found myself drawn to sales and marketing. I work harder (not necessarily longer), and overall probably have more stress but the freedom from cubicles is worth it for me.

smmmmmmmoooooo000000000ottttttttthhhhhhh jazzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Edit: dangit he deleted the post

1 Like

I think other have captured it in that jazz and classical music showcase a system.

First, jazz and classical have instruments that have incredible timbre. On top of that, the mix isn’t crowded, particularly with smaller ensembles, so the music scales with the system. Contrast to something like Led Zepplin, which does not sound appreciably better with a great system compared to a good system.

Second, because the instruments are the focus, the production quality tends to be better. It’s why Steely Dan is considered an audiophile group - they put so much work into making the recording sound incredible. (Fleetwood Mac is similar.) When you play something with poor recording quality on a great system, it sounds worse because all the flaws are made evident.

Third, it became part of the culture of audiophilia. Regardless of what you actually listen to, you “show off” the system with the audiophile canon. That canon has a lot of jazz and 70s rock because the first people buying the systems in the 70s were listening to it. I hate “Hotel California” but damned if I don’t know what it sounds like on a wide variety of systems.

If it gives you any comfort, in 30 years they’ll all wonder what our fascination with Yosi Horikawa was. :slight_smile:

2 Likes

It depends on a system, because I have heard systems that just make most music sound great and it doesn’t really matter what quality they are (to an extent). I would say you mainly point to highly resolving systems which aim for more transparency

Also yes I am getting quite tired of Hotel California lol

1 Like

Theres many reasons, partially just a generational gap and also the simple fact that there’s a huge change in general attitude between people who listen to jazz, classical, instrumental and rock, heavy metal etc. I really noticed it with my brother where i dont hear any rock and only generally hear ballads, modern classical,instrumental, and pop. Of course there are people that love both but alot of the time its just polar opposites. For me metal and rock is just too violent to my ears lol. I like soft soothing music

To add to this with my very limited experience with highly resolving stuff. Even then I’m not sure such a system would make something with not great recording quality sound bad. Maybe that’s just me and I like stuff with a huge amount of detail.

Yeah it’s mostly preference when you step in the high end. You can chance accuracy or “musicality”. Both will lead to relative enjoyment

Took the words right out of my keyboard, at least with regard to jazz being the best showcase: small band, typically recorded up close with good separation, all natural instruments and sometimes voices (best chance to recognize when they sound real), and few enough of them that they don’t overcrowd eachother (unlike symphonic) and also diverse enough that you get to hear more of the fidelity being put to use (unlike with small-classical things like a string quartet or whatever).

I don’t listen to it much myself, but I get why it can be among the most eye-popping experiences when played on a transparent system. (I for one would go with more accessible World Music stuff, which often shares the same technical characteristics.)

World music is also another good example, but personally I find that generally more boring then jazz imo, but I do have some world music albums that I enjoy

Boomerphile is a term I just made, I thought that was perfect to explain these types of people. but you made a very good point about trying to find super clean sources, and extremely well recorded audio, I do understand the loudness wars and how that’s fucked music up, so I can understand that.

1 Like

I love this BTW, reminds me of old rap when it was good.

basically how a feel about it, I just hate jazz music, it just gets on my nerves after awhile.

don’t get into guns or cars, like I have, its never ending.

I can agree with the car statement, that can ruin you, but I more enjoy driving then actually working on cars or anything, I wouldn’t make a good mechanic lol

Guns are fun once in a while, but not really super interested like some people I know

yes, I’ve experienced that with Martin Logan electrostat’s they make compressed or poorly recorded music sound like dog shit because of how revealing they are.

just heard of him about a month ago, bubbles is an incredible song