6 Ways to Enhance Your Music-Listening Experience

If you love music, then you’re most likely willing to invest time and money to improve your listening experience. A good first step here is to invest in great headphones. Philippines’ tech retailers have a lot of good selections that can give that impactful, concert-level quality of sound.

 

Besides getting top-notch headphones, here are other ways you can enhance the way you listen to your favorite songs and musical pieces:

Get Good Speakers

When you want to enjoy your music in private or while on the go, headphones are your best companion. On the other hand, if you want a more immersive experience when listening at home, it’s best if you have a stellar speaker system. With the right setup, you can fill your home with dynamic audio and elevate the way you listen to music.

Some of the things you need to consider when getting speakers include the components, the size of the units, and proper positioning. The components of a home speaker system usually include the loudspeakers themselves, subwoofers, amplifiers, and tweeters. Depending on the size of the room, you might need more than two loudspeakers and subwoofers.

Getting the correct size of speakers is also important. If you get ones that are too big, you might get noise instead of music. Finally, positioning is crucial. If you want to get that surround-sound audio quality, it’s best to place the speakers in the corners of the room. This way, the sound waves will converge towards the center.

Go Lossless

If you use a smartphone or a digital to play music, each track’s format is likely .mp3. This is ideal for compressing the file so that you can save as many songs as possible. However, in the process of making the file smaller, much of the detail is lost. Thus, while a .mp3 music file sounds pretty decent, it doesn’t have the nuance of studio recordings.

To experience ultimate sound quality, you need to veer away from the .mp3 format and find FLAC music instead. FLAC stands for “free lossless audio codec,” which is similar to the format used by artists when they’re recording their songs. If you have an Apple device, the file format you’re looking for is ALAC (the first A stands for Apple).

Do note that FLAC and ALAC files are bigger than standard mp3’s. One FLAC file is about 5MB per minute on average, so a 3-minute song can be 15MB or more. Thus, be prepared to expand your storage or have limited songs in your database.

The built-in speakers and digital preamp of your smartphone or tablet may also not be able to “translate” all the details of the song. Thus, you’re going to need the previously mentioned studio-quality headphones or speaker system to appreciate the music better. You can still play FLAC or ALAC songs without these audio accessories but you’ll likely miss out on the changes.

Equalize

Even if you have top-tier headphones and speakers, you can still improve your listening experience by learning how to equalize. This is the process of adjusting the frequencies of sound until you get the “blend” you want.

Some headphones or speakers may have been built to focus on providing better bass output, for example, but the songs you listen to have more treble. Through the help of an equalizer, you can mix the frequencies and fine-tune your music to your preferences anytime. What’s even better is that there are many quality equalizer apps that you can download for free!

Organize Your Music

Everyone has different music tastes and that’s perfectly fine! However, no matter how eclectic your musical preferences are, it’s best to organize your library so it’s easier for you to find the tracks you want. You can categorize songs per artist, genre, or even by mood, for example. Remember that there’s no single right way of arranging your music; the most important thing is to have a system!

Make Time to Truly Listen

Most of the time, when we listen to music, it’s a background activity. You may be doing some chores, for example, or perhaps exercising. In short, you aren’t able to really focus on the music and really appreciate every single note. As such, if you want to elevate your music-listening experience, prioritize it. Sit back and relax, literally! Let the music flow and really listen.

Go Analog

One of the best things about listening to music through digital formats is convenience. However, there’s something truly unique about playing music the traditional way—that is, using a vinyl record and a gramophone.

This isn’t absolutely necessary, of course, but you have to admit that it’s a different sensorial experience. From sliding the record out of its sleeve to placing down the needle, this method of listening to music is truly incomparable.

Happy listening!