Dire Straits Brothers In Arms
Link is to the full album; Wikipedia entry
Link is to the full album; Wikipedia entry
Could not be less important:
Back in the late 80s, when I was working as an aerospace engineer for Booz Allen Hamilton, the office's eccentric PhD invited me over to listen to music. (A later invitation is part of Day 7 Concluded in Losing My Religions.) He had the best, most precise stereo setup I've ever seen. (I cared about things like that then.)
After some preliminaries, he centered me right in the speakers' sweet spot and played Ride Across the River, telling me to close my eyes and pay close attention. He didn't say anything else - didn't tell me to listen for anything in particular - just to pay close attention.
In the quiet part at the end, I opened my eyes and turned to him, disbelieving. He smiled and nodded. I started pointing and he kept smiling and nodding. The cicadas were up high and the crickets down low. Vertical imaging! (I can hardly hear them at all today due to my tinnitus.)
Back in the late 80s, when I was working as an aerospace engineer for Booz Allen Hamilton, the office's eccentric PhD invited me over to listen to music. (A later invitation is part of Day 7 Concluded in Losing My Religions.) He had the best, most precise stereo setup I've ever seen. (I cared about things like that then.)
After some preliminaries, he centered me right in the speakers' sweet spot and played Ride Across the River, telling me to close my eyes and pay close attention. He didn't say anything else - didn't tell me to listen for anything in particular - just to pay close attention.
In the quiet part at the end, I opened my eyes and turned to him, disbelieving. He smiled and nodded. I started pointing and he kept smiling and nodding. The cicadas were up high and the crickets down low. Vertical imaging! (I can hardly hear them at all today due to my tinnitus.)
The next day at work, he debated this with an engineer who built his own speakers and claimed it was impossible to have vertical imaging. I could only tell him what I heard.
Horizontal imaging is possible with a good stereo recording and speakers placed the right way. You can also hear this with headphones -- the different instruments can have placement in space. But sounds seeming to come from high and low on a two-speaker setup ... well, lots of discussion about that online today, but this was long ago.
Again, not important. But the album is quite amazing. And the videos for Money for Nothing and Brothers in Arms were cutting-edge for the time.
And I'll say it again - Brothers in Arms in The West Wing is the best use of music in any TV show, IMO.
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