So I found out how to get your digital music to sound better. Don't ever listen to analogue any more.
I've been deciding which streaming service to subscribe to (and rebuild my CD ripping server). They all have pluses and minuses. Pandora has by far the best curated music, but the sound quality is limited. Amazon HD has great quality at a great price, but the device selection is limited. Tidal has great sound and good device selection, but at $26/mo, it's not cheap.
After farting around all day trying to get my MacMini back up to speed, I hit the subscribe button on Tidal and connected it to my SMLS SU-9 to see what these MQA files are all about.
At first I was disappointed. I thought my Altec A5 crossovers were maybe getting tired. The mid/highs were grainy and a bit shouty. Bottom was not bouncy or punchy. It sounded, well, meh, even with Tidal Master material.
For a reference, I fired up my Techniques SL1200 for the first time in it feels like years, I'm embarrassed to say. I went through the old album section ritual. Funny how it hasn't changed in over 50 years. I found Jeff Beck Wired in my hands and plopped it on the platter. I switched the input selector on my preamp from 3 to 1, lowered the tonearm and BAM...the room came alive. It's clearly not the speakers, or preamp or amp. Good. Then I picked the same track(s) from Tidal and A/B'd the input sector back and forth for 3 tracks. It only took a few bars really. I couldn't believe my ears. All the lushness I loved so much was back. All the depth and dynamics and liquidity was there in spades.
So I'm thinking that we had it pretty good back in the 70s. Maybe we didn't know how good. When CDs came out we were seduced by the ease (and laziness) they afforded us. MP3 did it again. Did we really almost give up that much sound quality just to be able to flip through an iPod with ear buds and listen to 1000s of songs, crappy quality songs but music nonetheless.
Now I've been trying to play catch up and try to force my laziness (and frugalness) to coexist with my love for great audio. I have failed so far. I'm not spending $5000-$30,000 on a DAC to try and get almost as good SQ as a $400 turntable.
Maybe analogue music ruined me, and if I never heard a great vinyl recording on a great system, I would be OK with digital. But I have, and I'm not.