Building The “Perfect” iTunes Beast, Cont’d.: Is The World Supposed To Be Flat?

noah | August 29, 2007 3:32 am
flat.png

Little did I know yesterday, when I dashed off a quick post about the allegedly “perfect” iTunes graphic-equalizer setting, that I’d be setting off a comments-box firestorm; quite a few people not only bristled at the suggestion that a one-size-fits-all setting could be implemented for music (especially given the lossy nature of MP3s, crummy speakers you’re listening to said lossy files through, etc.), but a lot of people were offended by the idea of tweaking the EQ settings at all. Bad-album-art tipster extraordinare Lucas Jensen, who makes and records music, hit me backchannel with an explanation for that rationale that, in these terms, pretty much makes sense:

“The perfect setting equals no setting, just good quality rips and good speakers. People work HARD to get stuff sounding the way that they want it to–we don’t just mix any way we want. I think bass and treble knobs are plenty. Put it this way: If you don’t like the colors in a movie, you don’t adjust the tint in your TV. You just don’t like the color. It’s not totally analogous, but it’s the choice of the director–or the musical artist–however misguided, to make that sound the way it is. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Admittedly not all speakers are made the same, so compensations can be made. But a perfect setting–theoretically–is a flat one.”

Earlier: Building The Perfect iTunes Beast: Can It Be Done?

Tags: