Expensive rooms

The most expensive room treatment I have ever seen was at the home of reviewer Michael Fremer, though walking in you wouldn't recognize it as such. Mike's listening room contains thousand upon thousand of albums in floor to ceiling shelves with narrow aisles, from just behind the listening position, all the way back to the rear wall. And the sides of the room are lined with albums too, and they go into the hall and beyond. I have never seen so many albums in my life (amazingly he's memorized the location of every one of them). And filling a room with albums damps the environment without adding absorption or anything else. Expensive, yes, effective, certainly. His room sounds excellent. For mere mortals like us we can achieve good results by adding things to our listening rooms: couches, chairs, tables, etc. In fact, here's where having a stereo system in the living room probably has advantages over a dedicated music room. Take mine for example. It is sparsely furnished, containing only three chairs, equipment and loudspeakers. In home environments we tend to add furniture, and every piece we install helps break up sound from loudspeakers in beneficial ways. Sometimes arranging furniture can have a positive impact on the way your system performs. Just don't tell your wife or she'll have you doing in constantly.