In the noise-whittling games, progression needn't be linear. Success needn't always mean more of the same. Instead it seems to be a function of different qualities needing different critical masses of obstruction removal before they pop up. Their weightiness and sequence should be unique to each system. As an archaeologist removing fine soil layers never knows what will reveal, peeling away layers of out-of-band noise can unveil a multitude of things. What I first noticed after CS had bedded in was more textural differentiation in the bass. This wasn't really about clearer fundamentals. Those merely describe pitch so whether a tone occurs at 38Hz or 41Hz. This was about the overtone structure above those fundamentals. That Jacob's ladder of differently spaced rungs of harmonics describes texture. And texture isn't static. It can modulate with sound pressure. To create emphasis in a plucked bass line for example, an upright's operator will apply varying amounts of force even alter vibrato speed. These manipulations affect which harmonics dominate.
Colouring between textural lines of soft and sharp, hollow and rotund, raspy and ringy, sinewy and strident is another form of musical expression that differs from intonation, timing, embellishments and phrasing. It's about tone modulations revealing different timbre aspects of one and the same instrument or voice. With CS hanging off Corelli Corundum hanging off my Vibex Granada/Alhambra, the 'modulation bandwidth' of bass sounds increased. This wasn't merely about discerning various bass contributors in parallel but following what each was up to individually. The extra data simply presented itself. I wasn't looking for it with zero advance notion on what GS might be doing. I simply noticed that bass intelligibility had risen as though visibility through many meters of water had improved to better make out the rocks, sand and shellfish at the very bottom. The second observation occurred during a gorgeous vocal duet where the stronger man's voice had always stood out more than the wispier woman's. It had me silently wish that the recording engineer had given her track a slight boost. Obviously GS didn't suddenly manipulate the recording console. Just so, following the female singer embedded in rich slightly overpowering orchestration was suddenly easier. Ah, there you are, girl! The lady separated out cleaner. I can't tell you the mechanism, only the upshot of superior separation.
It's precisely such discoveries which animate much audiophile pursuit. It's about walking down familiar musical promenades and obscure little side alleys to discover things we haven't noticed before. Familiarity against which to pay close attention is key. Someone unfamiliar with our system and music will be none the wiser. They interface with the totality of the experience without a comparative inner reference. So these two things are important. We must be as intimate with our hifi as we are with our significant other. Now one glance suffices to pick up on their mood which could be a closed book to anyone else. Our intimacy expresses itself as close attention and caring. We notice subtleties which a bystander won't just because they neither care enough nor have developed our intimacy. That said, the contributions of GS presented themselves in very relaxed noticing. In fact, making an effort tends to tense up and shut down by degrees. Or as Richard Vandersteen once famously said, "just pour yourself a glass of wine and listen. You'll quickly know whether you enjoy the sound or not." A glass of wine is simple code for relaxing. We might enjoy an actual glass; or know how to relax without impaired clarity. But it's really that simple. The more we relax, the deeper we sink into our experience. That inevitably makes it richer and more rewarding. And there's a very practical flipside. Less residual noise lowers our barrier of entrance. It makes deeper noticing easier even when we can't give ourselves over completely because parts of our attention are still busy elsewhere.
The third GS effect I noticed spoke to this lingo of relaxation. I don't mean it in the sense of deflated musical tension as though my tunes suddenly sat there listless and de-energized. I've heard that effect before but this wasn't that. If that had been in the music itself, this was in the listener. I can't explain it better than GS making the act of listening more relaxed. How an inanimate object would do so is an excellent question. I just can't answer it. I'll cop out with the late Charlie Hansen's irrational but efficacious which is how he described his Ayre burn-in CD. My takeaway? The presence of GS was surprisingly significant because sensing its sonic influence wasn't hard.
The notion of an observer influencing an experiment by the mere act of observance is familiar to modern quantum science. Many audiophiles simply forget about oncoming traffic whereby the experiment also influences the observer. We can't have one without the other. Appreciating this feedback loop only needs awareness of our inner state. We don't solely focus on what the hardware does but also on how it affects us. That in turn influences our perception of the hardware and so forth. Many showgoers know this. Over the course of a few days, they're exposed to hundreds of exhibits. Some feel instantly inviting. One doesn't want to leave. Others auto eject us. A big in-between section is neither fish nor fowl. Some is down to decoration, lighting, the presenter's personality, attendant crowds, SPL and music played. Then come sonic intangibles. Their presence asserts itself in moments. Something in our body recognizes it as soon as we hear the sound. We relax as though into an affectionate hug. Whatever that is and however diverse showgoers might explain it, the Castello Solo did for me now. To make that a bit more concrete, let's go anti and explain what it wasn't. Aside from extreme SPL, the possibly most universally hated show sound is brightness from a treble that's forward, steely, strident, glassy, piercing or any other form of massive attack. This affront is followed by overdone lumpy boomy bass which distracts no matter what else goes on. We might call both forms of excess an amplitude issue of too much HF or LF. These are very basic errors not at all relevant today. Less offensive than either could be boring sound that fails to communicate. It might feel lethargic, woolly, muffled, indistinct. Whilst not actively driving us out like a bouncer, such exhibits still make us leave. This again wasn't applicable today. In fact, today's improvements were to a sound which I already thought truly excellent. If you gave me a magic genie bottle to alter this sound in any way—I just must make specific demands and can't issue a generic "make it better"—I wouldn't have been able to ask for even one wish much less three. What GS improved I only saw as possible in the process, not via an already identified absence or lack I wanted addressed beforehand. It's that ignorance on what's still possible which places such changes beyond obvious basics. The soundstage doesn't widen, bass doesn't deepen, treble doesn't rise, midrange doesn't enrich, images don't enlarge, things don't go magically louder. So GS doesn't play the surface. We must enter its action on a deeper level like the inner game of tennis. That's back to subtler noticing and what drives it: caring to do so in the first place. Feel free to call it an obsession. It just might be.
