Prrrrrrttttt!!!!!
I am sorely, SORELY tempted to lock this thread simply because:
a. Skunk, I'm sorry to say, but most of your replies are designed for flamebaiting. You love the putting in the last word.
b. Let's go back to my "word-of-the-day" which is obfuscate, specifically the 2nd definition which states, ' to make obscure or unclear: to obfuscate a problem with extraneous information'. Skunk, you're obfuscating the issues by mixing up 2 different scenarios, live and recording. FM has no basis when an amp is loud, almost the same with an ampsim if the monitoring used is just as loud. FM is only important to listeners when listening at lower volumes so most guitarists can discard FM as part of their 'listening' equation. For recording engineers, we use nearfields which should negate FM except when we monitor at low volumes, which is also moot since engineers shouldn't move any monitor EQ if their goal is to mix properly when their monitors are already properly calibrated.
c. Flexibility in recording is achieved by getting both the mic amp and the DI'd signal for possible re-amping later. Even in other countries (or rather, especially), engineers usually like to have the option to reamp a guitar track because what was recorded sometimes doesn't fit the song in general. Does this mean that the raging amp that the guitarist recorded to was crap gear? Probably not, but it does mean that the emphasis isn't with the gear, but WITH THE SONG and how the other instruments complement each other. Amps may inspire the musician, but merely looking at the song just from the viewpoint of an amp or ampsim is extremely myopic.
c. There's a perception that digital sounds worse. Well, it does, to a degree and somehow, this can be proven, that's why there is this trend towards higher sampling rates as well as higher bitrates. Higher bitrates afford you more headroom but the emphasis in bitrate is not in the last upper 6 dB, but in the last 8 bits where the fade to nothingness defines how smooth the converters sound. Higher samplerates, OTOH, push up into supersonics the anti-aliasing brickwall filters which some blame for taking away the 'organic-ness' of sound. The prevailing theory is that upper harmonics, the ones that we don't hear, are lost because of the brickwall filters and raising the sample rate brings back some of those perceived harmonics, perceived because we sense it more than actually hear it.
Short anecdote: I remember Gerard Salonga's post (with Angee) about their description regarding an analog mix as "bumabalot". I can only think that it's possible that jitter was part of the equation there since jitter has been known to reduce soundstaging. Hopefully, better clocks can address this but GC4 has one of the best listening suites and gear that I've seen. If Angee was able to tell the difference between the 2 recordings, then I guess the fault lay in the original recordings themselves.
d. Lastly, it's one thing to have an animated conversation, but personal attacks aren't going to win you anything, especially in the friends department. Your bias is getting the best of you, and your ego isn't going to win you much support either. No man is an island, Dodj, but if you want to be one, hey, I'm not stopping you.
I will keep this thread open for now in hopes that the issue will clarify itself... hopefully.