Astute observations and perspective from a seasoned ear.
I differentiate between detail and dynamics. Detail refers to the full reproduction/presentation of all sounds/notes, including the most subtle ones. Dynamics refers to volume contrast and speed/transients, the expression of system energy.
And then on a macro and micro level. Macro-dynamics differs from macro-detail. However, micro-dynamics and micro-detail are a bit harder to differentiate.
Perhaps some of this is a matter of vocabulary/communication versus that which we are experiencing/sensing, similar to tasting notes.
I’m not disputing that you heard these bends, but wonder whether they were intentional. When playing a guitar one must depress and bend the strings down to make any sound. What you hear may follow from merely releasing the strings (as quiet and super short), as the strings make a little unintended noise when unbending.
In this vein, I thought that Vance Joy’s Riptide ukulele intro was intentionally dynamic until I saw him play. The volume goes up and down as his large arm and hand passes over the (small) sound hole of the ukulele. On top of this, his video/performance model is much larger than the tiny instrument used for recording.
Detail and Dynamics are two different properties of the sound as I think about what each is.
Detail is to me: how much fine grained sounds do I hear? Is it a property of the recording or the transducer or something in between. Example: The piano is used in the Prokofiev 5th symphony, I have a dozen different recording providing different degrees of resolution for the piano, its not used as a concerted instrument but almost used as bass support. No two recordings reveal themselves as sounding the same, its a recording issue not transducer issue to my way of hearing it.
Dynamics just the difference in loudness level between the softest and loudest sounds and all gradations in between the two extremes.
However, dynamics convey many details from the master source. Dynamics is the ‘3rd dimension’ of details. I say this in moving from the HD-600 to the Elex and to the Clear. The HD-600s more or less paint a flat picture of the soundstage, while the Elex splits everything apart by greatly exaggerating dynamic differences. The Clear balances this out through sensitivity and nuance – air can then become air, room noise can then become room noise.
In the digital era we have players, TVs and whatnot with stepped output levels. My TV ranges from 0 to 60 I think, while Apple devices seem to have 20 or 30 steps (I never counted). The HD-600s have about 10 meaningful steps at any volume setting, the Elex have about 15 super exaggerated steps, while the Clear have maybe 30 steps. To my ears.
Interesting topic. I just posted thoughts about “detail retrieval” in another thread. An edited version of that post is below…IMO it pertains here.
"Most audio terms are rather subjective, but in my experience, “detail retrieval” (concerns the) resolution of musical detail.
A good example is in well-recorded traditional acoustic jazz (for example, Miles Davis’ KIND OF BLUE). A headphone with higher resolution will let through all manner of subtle, low amplitude sonic cues (sound of fingers on bass string; sound of air blown through trumpet; the most delicate cymbals & brushwork revealed; and subtle reflections or other sonic cues inside the studio itself). A headphone with less resolution will give you the musical notes & general music flow, but omit some of those details.
I have an HD650 extensively modded by Jupiter Audio Research (JAR650), and IMO this is overall a relatively high resolution headphone, particular in the midrange. By comparison, another open-back headphone I enjoy a lot, the Philips Fidelio X2, has noticeably less resolution. They’re both terrific headphones, but resolution is one of the differences between them.
As a result, I can imagine the JAR650 being used for studio monitoring–but not the X2s."
For me I always like to use the “window” analogy. If you have a smeared or opaque window that isn’t very clear, you can still see the details of the images through it to a certain extent. But a perfectly clear window lets you see the details better than if the window were smeared or opaque/translucent. So in many ways I consider detail retrieval to be image clarity. I think this can come from a number of places experientially, but this is something that I find lets us “peer into the music” better, to borrow a phrase from Tyll.
The other consideration is that some headphones have an easier time of handling that kind of image clarity during busy sections than others. So for example, the high end Audeze LCD planars do a remarkably good job at image clarity during complex layerings and busy passages (try listening to some heavy metal tracks on the LCD-XC for example). It’s really impressive how these headphones are able to keep the image clarity intact, where on many other headphones they have that kind of image clarity for less busy passages, and then things blur together a bit during the complex layerings.
There’s a sense in which this may also all be related to ‘speed’ of the diaphragm - its ability to react to excursive and restorative force, but as many conversations with industry insiders and manufacturers have indicated, if it can produce up to 20khz, then technically it’s moving fast enough. So maybe it’s not precisely the speed of the excursive and restorative force, but more so its behavior related to it. But at the end of the day, it’s still unclear where this kind of ‘detail’ and image clarity comes from, at least from what I’ve been able to identify.
Part of it is also the mechanical distortion of the diaphragm. Beryllium drivers are very stiff and aren’t as sensitive to mechanical distortion, for example. I think this also contributes a lot to image clarity.
My best example of is the day I put on my first set of hd650 moving from random drug store bought Phillip’s ear buds. It was amazing the amount of music I was missing. And my headphone hobby took hold. Now that I have a few decent mid grade cans eliegia, LCD.-X, HD650, ELEX, it has become more nuanced while I save for.next jump into Zmf, and other highly recommended cans and possible amp and dac upgrades. Multibit jotunheim, and thx 789
Why I think dynamics contribute to perceived detail, is because good dynamics (macro & micro) add a sense of realism to the sound. It brings you closer to how things sound in real life, although it doesn’t necessarily affect the perceived “resolution” of the content.
To me, one of the central mysteries of headphone audio is how one HP will be highly detailed & resolving, and another will not be–when they both have just a single driver to reproduce all frequencies.
In 2-channel audio with the extreme diversity of speaker materials and design, manufacturers can use multiple drivers & crossovers to fractionate & allocate frequencies to drivers expressly designed to reproduce them. Moreover, different drivers can be made of wildly different materials & reproduce audio using divergent design principals (ie, ribbon vs EMIT vs horn vs dome tweeters). As if that weren’t enough, different drivers can be housed in their own tuned sub-enclosures.
Thus, I marvel at what headphones accomplish with a single driver–and how different they all sound. Honestly, I can’t figure it out…
Indeed, the deeper I dive into this hobby the more I realize how little we actually know. We can’t really hope to answer all the questions we have, but we can at least try to understand how everyone perceives different things and improve how we communicate our experiences. That’s primarily the point of this discussion, imo.
I couldn’t get past how bright XC was, even with a clear window everything in the top end has so much emphasis I struggled to peer thru the windows and see the “whole” picture
Well they are intentional in the sense of that’s how HE played his instrument, he may not have been purposefully bending, I also play both Classical Nylon String guitar and bass. Both electric and acoustic, so I’m familiar with how one can play the instrument
There’s also the question of what tension was he playing and how as his action set? Some fret boards are just noisier than others, either way those little bends are part of his sound or how he played his instrument. Listening to covers of his music even with a detailed system, other guitarists don’t quite play like he does… even when playing the same music
