Spintricity - Meet Brian BoehlerMeet Brian Boehler Continued(2)

you still don\'t know the who, what, and why about me. For those of you curious about the details please feel free to read on. For the rest of you, move on, skip the remaining paragraphs and get to the great articles contained in Spintricity.

My name is Brian Boehler and I\'m a member in good standing of the audiophile experience we call the High-End. I\'m really not sure what that means, but I\'m pretty sure that I\'m there. I\'ve always enjoyed the equipment aspect of our hobby, not for the sake of the equipment but as a vehicle to transport me to the music that I love. Generally, the better the equipment, the more involved I am in the music. While I appreciate the cost-no object aspect of our hobby, I\'m not able to indulge in this arena. I tend to enjoy the best of a given technology for a given price range that can be justified. My ultimate interest is the finest musical reproduction that can be afforded thus ultimately defining my view of “High-End Audio”.

The more mundane facts are that I\'m an Aerospace Engineering Senior Manager involved in the high technology manufacturing arena for 30 years. I oversee Quality Engineers and Inspectors who build satellites, launch vehicles, and articles that I can\'t talk about. I have been in the audio arena, for the same 30 year period, working in audio retail part-time for about 10 years. I\'ve been involved at ten CES shows and five RMAF events with all aspects of setting-up, tearing down, running the rooms, and helping with event planning and execution. I have been a member of the Colorado Audio Society since the early 80\'s and I\'ve kept close ties with many people in the industry mostly because I respect them and enjoy their company.

For the more curious, I wanted to share my feelings of the “High-End Industry”. I have always appreciated the industry, the manufacturers, celebrities, and veterans of our cottage industry. While I always enjoyed working in the industry, I never could see it being my ultimate calling in life. However, one downside was seeing people that I really respect getting into the mechanics of the business and loosing their love of music. As a salesman, I wasn\'t willing to sell my soul to move another piece of gear by stretching the truth, pushing the item because of a spif, or coercing a person to buy it because it was a certain brand with status and appeal. I was about the music, the love of the overall discovery process and letting the music sell the equipment for me, that became my passion – letting the equipment become a pathway to the overall music experience. I chose early in my career search to always treat the “High-End Industry” as a hobby versus my vocation. I have never regretted my decision and believe it was the best approach for me as a person. Please, don\'t take away from this that all dealers are on the take, many are great people with a mission to educate, share, and hopefully sell some great equipment that enables you to undertake a musical journey that will last the rest of your life. However, I chose to enjoy it from a sideline/hobby perspective due to my negative experiences.

While I am an engineer by trade, I really don\'t get jazzed by the technology surrounding the gear. Whether vinyl versus digital or solid state versus tube, I really don\'t care. My concentration is on the musical experience and I\'ve not discovered any technology that gets it right in all circumstances. I\'m finding more enjoyment in exploring the acoustic, psychological, and environmental aspects of the equipment. I don\'t care about double blind objective reviewing any more than I care about the subjective evaluation process. My main goal is to just listen and see how the music affects me, my attitude, and how I change as a result of the experience. Life is too short to argue, convince others that your approach is best, or defend a particular technology. Sorry, not interested!

I am looking forward to sharing and exploring thoughts and ideas about our industry. My articles will cover multiple topics including the musical experience, on-line versus the traditional magazine, the audiophile life and evolution of our listening habits and experiences as we mature, high-end retail from a fence sitting perspective, and high-end equipment manufacturing issues. I\'ll throw in how my friends, audiophile buddies, children, wife, and life experiences have affected my choices and approach to the High-End experience. Hopefully, we will share some ideas that may inspire you to explore and experience equipment and music in a new and potentially more meaningful way.

Good Listening & Journey!
Brian Boehler