There is no such thing as "the" listener. Listeners vary. I have many home-made and field recordings that I listen to over and over - and any number of studio recordings that I have listened to once and will never listen to again. For me, the content is far more important than 'production values'. Apparently, that is not the case for everybody. Fair enough. Despite some of the opinions expressed on this thread, there is no one 'right' answer ...