LGF and GreenStiles, thanks for getting back to me about my hi-fi and the Mission speakers.
Up until recently, I was using a pair of JPW Gold Monitors -- tiny British bookshelf speakers which had a surprising amount of bass and really projected music into the room. However, I found that I wasn't listening to the hi-fi much, mainly because the treble was really intrusive. Vocalists pronouncing "ssss" and drummers hitting cymbals really sounded too harsh and shrill for my ears.
I sold the JPWs (for buttons :roll: ) and connected up the DM4s, which had been sitting in the house doing nothing for several years. But I still found that certain situations don't sound so good; those high frequencies (again!) and crescendos where lots of instruments are playing at the same time.
I've isolated the tracks where the treble frequencies make uncomfortable listening, and as LGF suggested, it seems to have more to do with the actual recording than it does with my hi-fi. For example, pronunciation of the letter "S" on
Lloyd Cole's "Perfect Skin" seems to be harsh no matter what equipment you've got. And it's the same story for the snare drum at the beginning of
"Perfect" by The The. So on that count, maybe it's the recordings rather than my equipment.
But I've still got the problem of crescendos. When a just a few instruments are playing down-tempo, like
"Older" by George Michael, my modest setup sounds absolutely fantastic. But when lots of instruments play together, it just gets a bit confused and messy.
Hence my looking around for different speakers. The Missions aren't too expensive, so they might be worth a little gamble. I might be pleasantly surprised!
[Edit: LGF suspected that my CD player might be the problem, and I can find out if that's the case by plugging my Sennheiser headphones into the amp. If certain tracks still sound messy, I can't blame the speakers!
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