If you peruse the things that Frank Van Alstine said in the previous century, one of the gems you might find is his view that audio gear shouldn't re-interpret an artist's intent. Rather, it should function as a perfect copy machine. Others have referred to this philosophy as "straight wire with gain."
I believe Frank needed to emphasize this at the time largely because of the increasing fashionability of single-ended class A tube power amps -- which as a rule came with with low linearity and high output impedance. The occasionally pleasant effect this combination can create became a marketing lever for many manufacturers. "Warm. Rich." Buzzwords for a loose low end and signal masking. What they never said was, "Not as the artist intended." Nor, "Works great for some stuff, not so much on others."
Today, the range of amplifier-effectors is wider than it was then. And somewhat refreshingly, the language has gotten a bit more honest. I now read things like, "People don't want amplifiers that are clean," or, "People prefer amplifiers with [some kind of] harmonic distortion profile."
While the honestly is refreshing, I still can't endorse the view that an amplifier should do more than just amplify the signal. I spent a large part of my life making music, and I now attend live acoustic music performances at one of the country's legendary orchestral halls on a regular basis. I know the magic a practiced ensemble or solo performer can generate, and I have the utmost respect and admiration for the musicians who dedicate their lives to honing and shaping what they do to make this happen.
So, what matters most to me is that the gear you have in your home system communicates what the artists intended. In other words, audio for me is all about respect for the music and those who make it.
Don't get me wrong: I believe there is a place for effects. That place is recording and mastering studios. Use some ambiance-enhancing process to pull what you can out of a track that needs it? Go for it. Or use some dynamic processing or saturation to thicken a track that's too thin? Fine. This is all part of recording, mixing, and mastering artistry. The folks who are responsible for that music made active decisions to selectively use those processes to create their audio vision.
But I don't want an ambiance-enhancer or thump-warmer editorializing everything I listen to. This is especially the case since there's no free lunch. That ambiance-enhancement thing? It comes with a downside. They all do.
Yup. I still embrace the potentially unfashionable view that domestic audio gear should inject as little coloration as possible into the music. No magical distortion profiles. No compression masquerading as signal enhancement. No zingy resonances that add "interest".
We'll almost certainly never get to perfectly recreating artists' intentions in our homes. But we don't need to deliberately put up obstacles to getting there.
