Rocky Mountain Audio Fest - Day2

[MiTT]

Av123

Special for Joey, here is a look at some of the AV123 stuff. The Strata Mini shown here retails for $1595.00 and sounded very good playing Sarah McLaughlin. The electronics were all by Onix, which I got the impression is a sister company. They are right over in Broomfield, a neighboring community just west of me.

 

[MiTT]

More AV123

These smaller AV123 speakers looked interesting, although they were only on static display. At $219 to $279 a PAIR though I'd sure like to give them a listen...

 

[MiTT]

Belles Audio

Belles was running these beautiful $12K Class A monsters in their room, along with their $3K Phono stage and companion $3.5K Linestage.

 

[MiTT]

Spiral Groove TT

The Belles room was also featuring this Spiral Groove SG-2 turntable with their own arm.

 

[MiTT]

Blue Circle

The Blue Circle room was making very nice music utilizing a Stello transport feeding their own DAC and the FtTH hybrid integrated amp. The speakers were by Selah Audio.

I caught Gilbert Yeung in the hallway and we talked for a bit. Old timers here will recall that Gilbert used to frequent the old forum quite a bit. He's got an outrageous pair of shocking PINK CLS's and a set of Statements that he uses for voicing the Blue Circle equipment. He say's he's just too busy these days to participate in the forum. So busy in fact that he's got 14 month leadtimes on his equipment, it's become so popular. He still hand builds each unit himself.

 

[MiTT]

Butler Audio

OK, so here was a VERY special room, and a testament to the importance of good electronics in the system. In my report on the first day of the show I mentioned that I didn't really care all that much for the Escalante Fremont loudspeakers ($19K), despite their bring driven by the Pass electronics fed from an Esoteric X-01 SACD player. This room featured an MSB CD player feeding directly into the Butler Class A Monad 300B 100W monoblocks, driving the same Escalante speakers - and I loved it! The Monads are based upon Butler's patented "Blue Thermonic Tube Technology" and they are something truely special. $18,950.00 a pair in silver or black. Also on display was their 2 channel TDB 2250 at $3295.00 and their 5 channel amp (didn't catch the price), but they only had the Monad's playing.

 

[MiTT]

Monads!

The Monads were truely beautiful too, again, the picture doesn't do it justice. My buddy Joe and I hung out in this room for almost an hour, that's how good they sounded. We listened to John Lee Hooker, Jane Monheit and eventually Eva Cassidy doing "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". The music was mesmerizing, literally bringing goosbumps at times and even a tear upon listening to Ms. Cassidy's brilliant phrasing and delivery. This system "communicated" with the listener. A wonderfull, musical experience!

 

[MiTT]

Classe & B&W

One of local shop Listen Up's rooms was dedicated to an all Classe and B&W system based around the 802D speakers. Very nice sound on some solo acoustic bootlegs of Paul McCartney doing "Mother Nature's Son" that was making the rounds at the show. Supposedly it's from a Capital master tape that was running durring rehersals for the White Album. There was John Lennon cut too, but damned if I can remember now what it was. Both sounded great on this system. Total cost $35K as shown.

 

[Joey_V]

Thanks Tim for getting a pic of the Minis. How good did they sound? How was the imaging especially vocal image and how do they compare to ML?

Joey

 

[MiTT]

Thanks Tim for getting a pic of the Minis. How good did they sound? How was the imaging especially vocal image and how do they compare to ML?

Joey

Joey, they were nice, especially considering their price. It was hard to tell how good they might be under more ideal conditions. They were abale to localize fairly well, but didn't have the pinpoint imaging of a Martin Logan. Muiscal timbres were also not on par with what we are used to. If I were to pick a speaker in this relative price range I would still opt for the ACI Saphires I mentioned from the first day of the show. They had the ability to deliver the musical goods with a great deal of punch and at the same time just disappear. The music was just "there".

 

[MiTT]

DC Gold?

These speakers from DC Gold were a bit puzzling. They sounded OK, but not up to their $6200.00 asking price, and what the hell was up with the etched glass that continually changed colors. These things just screamed low class bordello when I looked at them. What was wild was that they had some seriously good electronics in the system - a nice VPI Scout analog rig, the well regarded Blue Note CD player and the state of the art ASR Emitter Version Blue integrated amp that Harry Pearson gushes about. All that couldn't help me get past the cheezy Las Vegas trashy appearance.

 

[MiTT]

Blue Note

The Blue Note CD player - if only in a better system...

 

[MiTT]

ASR Emitter

Ditto for the ASR Emitter Version Blue - some would say the best amplifier in the world...

 

[Beat_Dominator]

I got my magazine out. Pathos Endorphin is ~$8,500 in the U.K. I don't know what importers will charge....

*edit* http://www.pathosacoustics.com/endorphineng.html

 

[MiTT]

Emerald Physics

So another new speaker that had a non-conventional appearance (though soooo much better than those Gawd Awful DC Gold pieces of trash) were these 4 piece box-less designs from Emerald Physics. These things took up a lot of real estate, but were not overly imposing because they just don't have an enclosure. The sound was nothing short of spectacular too. These things had a soundstage that seemed a good 15 feet deep with truely holographic imaging. Johnny Cash doing "My Own Personal Jesus" was like the man in black was IN THE ROOM. Very impressive!

 

[MiTT]

More Emerald

A better shot of just one of the Emerald Physics channels without the sun right in the lens. Tweeter and midrange in the front, with the subwoofer behind.

 

[MiTT]

Emotive Audio

The Emotive Audio room featured their Vita Monoblocks, Epifinia linestage and Circa phonostage all driving these Symposium Panorama speakers in prototype form. These were full ribbon deisigns that sounded like their namesake, but seemed somewhat limited in dynamics. They would break up noiticibly on high dynamic swings. Could be promising atfter some further work on both the sound and the aesthetics. Projected to cost $55K.

 

[MiTT]

Are you Experienced?

Experience Music from Memphis, TN was showing their custom designed horns and one of the wildest single ended tube amps I'd seen...

 

[MiTT]

More Experience

The bottom section of the amp (yep, that's the amp) is the power supply and rectifiers, the middle section is the amplification stage, and the upper section is the output stage. All controlled and biased from the drop down door section at the very bottom. Very funky, very specific niche market, made by a guy who was passionate about making the very best amplifiers he could. The sound was very good single ended tubes with horns type sound - very intimate and connected to the core without caring a tinkers damn about imaging and soundstage. All custom and hand built for around $40K.

 

[MiTT]

Gershman Acoustics

The Gershman Acoustics Black Swans ($34K) were playing the Reference Records "Tutti" disk with authority. This is big trowser legs a flappin' type music and these baby's delivered. Powered by the Red Rock Audio amps that were in multiple rooms, and an Exemplar pre-amp and an Exemplar modified Sony SACD player as the source.