April 2022

Doing What's Best For The Luxury Audio Community
A heart-to-heartfelt wish as there's much work to do!
Editorial By Steven R. Rochlin

  Since it has been quite some time since writing an article, I'd like to first thank all our readers for your patience in product delivery over the past year. Supply constraints combined with various factory closings globally over the past year have been a challenge for many of us. While many of us stayed home, we took much joy, and a careful listen, to our luxury audio systems. With many of you wanting to upgrade your gear, there were an abundance of companies I spoke with who were simply inundated with orders! As someone who gives close attention to the luxury goods market for decades, the health of the industry also rests on the used marketplace. Am sure many of you have seen the rise in asking prices for pre-loved gear. This, imho, reinforces the value of high-end audio products. No matter the cost, enjoying music is an excellent investment for your overall health and happiness.

Without a doubt, the past year has been eventful for us all. As compared to years past, have answered more emails, spoken with more manufacturers, distributors, and of course magazine editors. Let us not forget that within the past year, Enjoy the Music.com is grateful to be working side-by-side with many luxury audio shows. As of this writing, we now support all industry-operated shows within both the USA and Canada. At the same time, during the past year, we have expanded our site in nearly every direction. From adding magazine partners and posting 'virtual shows' by The HiFi Summit, to well over 100 informative 10 Question articles with leading audiophile manufacturers.

With so very much happening here at Enjoy the Music.com, I want to ask everyone reading this to appreciate the best use of my time. As many here know, I love mechanical timepieces. There is an abundance of reasons for that, yet the main one is that time is the most valuable thing we have. There is less of it with each passing day. With so much to do here in keeping the information fresh and this site updated, plus social media, RSS feeds, arranging gear for reviews, keeping track of said gear....

Steven's Not At This Show
Most know this, yet the decades of show reporting always brought a smile to my face. In 2000 was attending so many shows that it almost seemed like I was 'stalking' manufacturers. Sure I'd see the same gear at many of them, yet the Brazilian show had Brazilian manufacturers few in the USA ever heard of. As a specific example, when I traveled to China to report on their show, at that time no one heard of Line Magnetic and a few other brands. For those curious, I do not know the exact count, yet it must be 150+ shows I've attended to date over the past 25 years. That's a heck of a lot of traveling!

It's always fun meeting up with everyone at events. Many of you have joined me during lunch as we ate and drank and told jokes, and perhaps smoked a cigar together as well. We also discussed our family, the beach, and as quite a few are also enthusiasts of exquisite mechanical timepieces. Anyone who knows me realizes I can go on and on about these magnificent handmade creations that happen to also tell the time.

The ongoing growth of this site also comes at 'a price'. Unless someone out there can clone me, there simply are not enough hours in the day as it is right now(!). Bluntly said, Heather is doing her best to keep me on a steadfast path of a (relatively) balanced schedule of work and play. Way back when back in the 1990s, when many of us first met, I was in my 20s. Today, am now ~200%(!) older than that. As they say, "It's not the age, it's the mileage." And so with Enjoy the Music.com's continued growth trajectory, it comes down to where my time is best employed to benefit the greatest good for the luxury audio industry (for both our readers and manufacturers, ok and distributors.... and of course show promoters... and also...).

Thank You For Understanding
A most humble thanks for your kind understanding that, while Enjoy the Music.com is indeed sponsoring a show's party, and we have reporters there, there's much work for me to do right here. Picture this, if you will, imagine paying big bucks for six different parties for all your audio buddies and close friends... and you're not going to be there to enjoy it(!). During these industry parties we sponsor, please enjoy the sweetmeats, delicious drinks, and meet up with fellow exhibitors and members of the press. This is your brief moment to take a break between exhibit room setup and the Big Show over the weekend. We take care of the costs, so please enjoy the party on us.

Truly wish I could be there to enjoy it too, yet have to be here to get things done. As I sat here during the recent Montreal show, it felt kinda weird as this site was paying for so many parties for all our friends that I won't be attending. Once again it comes down to where my time is best employed to benefit the greatest good of the luxury audio industry.

Check us out on Facebook :)

Check us out on Instacart, I mean Instagram :)

Please allow me to also take a moment to humble thank the many independently-owned magazines who entrust this site to spread the good word to the world about each issue / their website. As of this writing, there are 11 active publications we work with, plus we're keeping the vintage faith with two out of print publications too. Once again being of service to the industry, as it should be. You see, during the past year, I've been going back to the very first words and original intention of what this site was to (hopefully) become.

And once again it comes down to where my time is best employed to benefit the greatest good of the luxury audio industry. Our readers are the #1 priority, as during those very early days of the web there were virtually no manufacturers, zero print publications... yet many music lovers had questions about high-end audio. That's precisely why this site was launched in the first place. To be of service to the music and music-loving internet users.

This desire remains true to this day:

#1 To be of service to the music, and to enjoy it.

#2 To expand the reach of our love of music, as shared through luxury audio gear.

Ok, it's a bit more than that, yet hopefully, the efforts and actions Enjoy the Music.com have shown the audiophile community we mean what we say. Words are great and all that, yet what is this website doing? And so please understand that personally attending shows is simply not possible given the tasks at hand. For shows, rest assured we'll have writers there. Sometimes more than we ever have so there will be more event coverage. That's a big win-win for everyone in my book! Also, have you noticed over the last year or so the 'editing' has gotten a teeny tiny bit better. Just a bit, though this site will never be 100% perfect Oxford English. I'm down with that, and it's cool, dude. What matters is... (see #1 above).

Except For The Florida Audio Expo
Yes, my Muse / wife Heather and I are / will be attending the sunny Florida Audio Expo in Tampa. While this site sponsors the Thursday night exhibitor / press party, there's also a very special private party on Friday night for our partners and supporters. A few years back we took everyone to Mayors (owned by Watches Of Switzerland) mechanical timepiece and jewelry store. Did you know if any of them got a Rolex during that event, for example, it probably doubled in value today(!). During the 2022 Florida Audio Expo Heather and I felt it was time for some fun, so we took everyone go-karting!

Oh my gosh, it was a blast and many gave Heather compliments for her bartending abilities (she's a generous pourer with 18 years aged Macallan and Johnny Walker Blue). Food, drinks, and driving. Wait, I do not condone drinking and driving, yet we did bus everyone there and back so, ummm, is it ok to lightly drink and go-kart driving? The answer seems to point to yes! Everyone left the private party with a big smile on their face.

As for what very special event, only open to our partners and supporters, will Enjoy the Music.com have in 2023? If you're a luxury audio magazine owner or manufacturer/distributor and want to benefit from our decades of hard-earned accomplishments, or for many years continue to love what we do and want to support our efforts, please e-mail me. If you're a reader and want to throw us a few bucks as a show of thanks, we have a Contribute page (goes towards helping get writers to shows, expanding our content, etc).

There's (Always) Still More Work To Do
No matter the situation, it seems there's always more work to do. Quite a few of us live this, either daily or from time to time. For me, considering the editing, coding, social media, updating many printing publications, industry news... and yes there's more to come! In some circumstances am handing off ideas to our partner magazines who can flesh them out (they have both the time and skillset). And sure we're promoting them (in general), so we all benefit. Once again, it comes down to where my time is best employed to benefit the greatest good of the luxury audio industry.

As for shows, they know I'm equal to all of them as best as possible. The more shows the better, and the wider the reach the better.  See #2 waaay up above within this article.

Apologies if this article sounds a bit personal rather than something only about high-end audio and who recently passed away. As for the latter, we'll be seeing an acceleration in those in the coming years as the Old Guard gives way to the web-savvy Crypto Kids. The snail-pace progress by record labels is not helping matters, sure, as a now-deceased original owner of a popular publication was too early in assuming what should have been the future of music decades ago. The smart magazine owner knew the direction, and as I said that's (one of) the reasons he sold his magazine long ago.

Alas, he was simply overly confident in the music business to do it in a timely fashion. For it is just as bad for business in being too early as it is to be too late. Perhaps more so for early adopters, as first-to-market generally involves higher initial costs. As an example, the professional-grade NewTek TriCaster 460 live streaming studio with Canon XA-25 cameras Enjoy the Music.com did for years, the cost to do it today has been reduced quite a bit to achieve (almost) the same results.

Personally...
Since it has been quite a few months since writing, I felt everyone should be aware that my love of music flourishes and, in fact, has grown if we're judging by the size of (no not head, or my ego, though YES if you said) my percussion / drum kit. There is simply no way I could ever thank my Muse / wife Heather for the many things she does here. Not just for myself, for you kind readers and the industry as well. We're all here, working very hard, and doing what is best for the luxury audio community.

A New Feature
Since Enjoy the Music.com desires to do the greatest good for the greatest number of people within the luxury audio industry, this month we've started featuring editorials from our partner publications. Each magazine editor has many years of experience, and their editorial usually covers current news, ideas, and their opinion. Many times, it also lets you know what's within their latest issue. Am sure you'll enjoy reading them. Please subscribe to their respective publication, as each magazine puts in great effort to bring you news, show reports, reviews, and much more. We want you to be well-informed and support those who share their passion for music with you.

We Want To Hear From You
We want you to join us! We want to hear from you and so join the conversation on Enjoy the Music.com's  Facebook and Instagram social media pages. We update them regularly.

A most humble thanks for reading this editorial, and for your kind understanding, as there are only so many hours in the day. In a sense, as proof, many know I love writing April 1 (fools) reviews as they're incredibly fun to write! Alas, this year there simply wasn't time.

Am a tad bit busy... sewing the seed of love :)

As always, in the end what really matters is that you...

Enjoy the Music,

Steven R. Rochlin