I’ve got an old Aces value amp somewhere in my lockup, dates I suspect from the late 70’s. Used to use it for large venues (I was a DJ in the 80’s). Hooked into our PA system from the same era (HUGE base bins, separate mids and tweeters) the sound was immense. I never really knew much about the techie side of it as I had roadie who looked after all that, but I do know that if you turned the bass right up and everything else down, you almost couldn’t hear it, but fuck me you could feel it! I’ve long since lost/sold the speakers but always hung on to the amp as it’s a thing of beauty.
We once did a gig in a very posh marquee in the grounds of a very posh house, we got a bit carried away and eventually cause a wall in a nearby building to crack.
When I work on my Mac, I listen to mostly European jazz (John Surman, Jan Garbarek, Nils Petter Molvar, Jon Balke, Dino Saluzzi, Eberhardt Weber, Louis Sclavis, etc) and classical (Chopin, Grieg, Tchaikovsky, Khachaturian, Shostakovich, Lutoslawski, Penderecki, Bartok, etc), but sometimes I go for a more popular stuff (Nina Simone, Kate Bush, Magda Umer, Brian Eno, David Byrne, Leonard Cohen, Peter Green, Peter Gabriel, JJ Cale, Led Zeppelin, etc). On rarer occasions, I listen to so called “world music” (Radio Tarifa, Miguel Poveda, and other flamenco artists).
My music library is about two-and-a-half-months-long and all hi-res, or at least CD-quality. I keep my abbreviated library on two 256 GB thumb drives, so that I can take it to my car at any time. I never use computer built-in speakers. I have a dedicated DAC, good amp and good quality headphones and speakers—both desktop and floor-standing towers. Music has always been my passion, since before The Beatles started their career (I am an ancient person).
The power it put out was nuts. Back in the mid/late 80’s I toured with and supported The Tremeloes (clean-cut image but insane people who taught me how to party!) their tour operator was breaking up an old PA system and my system came from it. In total the entire rig was something 5, maybe 10kws. it was broken into complete systems outputting 1-2kw, that’s what I bought. The base bins were 4ft square and needed two people to carry. I had to buy a van to move just the PA!
Not much longer after that everything went small and Bose, which I always hated: They just looked and sounded wank.
Around the same time that dross Dire Straits released Money For Nothing, and everything became about nuances of sound and acoustic ranges (or some such bollox). Pure power stopped being important, which was sad. No one ever turned a Bose system up to 11!
I gave up that game not long afterwards and started running venues.
EDIT: I also supported Five Star, remember them? Their dad/manager had me by the neck against the wall once for using the same shower as his daughters. Not at the same time, they were on stage, just for using their showers. He was mental. Did a stint with The Real Thing. Huge drinkers too. Went on stage totally hammered most nights.
No, had valve amps till the nineties then built an awesome 300B valve amp. That lasted 20 odd years then blew up. After that a Sugden A21SE. That blew up Twice! I then discovered my speaker cables were rotting from the inside, killing my amps.
I still have the broken Sugden which I will get repaired soon.
Interesting - Sugden amps were always highly valued and praised in their day - out of interest which cables were you using that rotted from the inside ?
I also shuddered at the mention of the BeeGees, but then I thought back to the 60’s where they were actually quite o.k.!
I’m currently listening to ‘MUSE’
I usually listen to music on the radio while I work or maybe youtube albums. I built a website to help myself out. I am a bit nerdy like that I guess :) https://www.radionewsfeed.com/