Every word in the lyric matters

I have a test for a system, and it is not on any measurement sheet. Does it make me feel the music? Does it travel me into the song, where every word in the lyric matters?

I learned it the day the MA9500 arrived. First song Giorgio by Moroder, second What a Wonderful World by Friends n' Fellow, third Birds by Dominique Fils-Aimé. I hugged my dealer and broke in tears, not because of a soundstage but because the music surrounded me, and every image the artist wanted me to recreate was there.

Detail and soundstage matter, and I chase them like everyone else. But they are the means, not the test. I have heard flagship systems that tick every audiophile box and frost the brain within half an hour; they impress, and they take you nowhere.

The proof is simple. With my McIntosh system, the only thing I care about is the next song, and the next song, and the next song, for hours. When a system does that, everything technical has already done its job, and only the ecstasy remains, song after song.

If you are checking the soundstage after the third song, the system has failed my test. If you are reaching for the fourth, it has passed.