Rocky Mountain Audio Fest, Part Two: Notable Introductions
Jonathan Valin -- Thu, 10/16/2008 - 13:04
Introductions
The two “biggest†introductions were both in the Maroon Peak room, where Focal’s $180k Grande Utopia EM made its stateside debut and Clearaudio finally allowed the rest of us (Don Salzman and HP excepted) to actually hear (rather than merely look at) its massive, gorgeous $150k Statement record player.
I wish I could report that opening night was a complete success, but the room proved problematical. These are very big, very tall loudspeakers and I think the relatively low ceilings in this otherwise giant room were responsible for a slight bloom in the midbass (60-80Hz) that disguised the deep bass (and perhaps for a bit of aggressiveness in the upper mids). I would not say that the Utopia EM sounded “bad†(or close to it) on first listen; it just didn’t sound as great as I think it must be capable of sounding from the reports of other knowledgeable listeners and past experience with Focals. For instance on something like the first movement of Schoenberg’s Five Pieces [Mercury/Speaker’s Corner], it cast a very wide and open stage but the strings (usually gorgeous) sounded a mite wiry, the brass a mite aggressive, and the plucked doublebasses didn’t have the depth of pitch, the definition of pitch, or the dynamic bite they should have had because of that midbass bloom. When I returned to the room late on Saturday night, for a private listening session, the sound had turned buttery in the upper mids (perhaps adjustments had been made to the EMs or other parts of the system, or perhaps these huge speakers were just “settling inâ€). The Utopias sounded quite impressively big, rich, and dynamic on Bredemeyer’s Schlagstücke 5, but once again the lack of pitch depth and definition in the deep bass made the “big†dynamic moments of this piece (and, brother, they are big) slightly more congested than they usually sound. It seemed to me as if the speakers wanted to “go†without limits, but that the room didn’t. In any event they were losing a bit of clarity and dynamic scale on ffff, although they certainly weren’t losing sheer SPLs or impact. This said, the sound was still pretty impressive—particularly to those who aren’t as familiar with the recording as I am. Like all big Focals, the Utopia EMs have weight and authority galore and a midband richness of timbre that is quite beguiling and beautiful if a little overdone for my taste. What they didn’t have in this hotel room was quite the right pace and speed and clarity in the low end (or on the very top). Though I hate to say it, the Focal/Clearaudio room would also qualify as a disappointment if only because the Maroon Peak room didn’t let either product really strut its stuff. (One reason I’m sure that the room was the problem was that the big Wilson Alexandrias, which were parked in a similar room last year, had virtually the same sonic problems. Plus the two-way $12k Focal Diablo Utopias, which were fed by a Clearaudio Anniversary AMG table and Helios arm, sounded real good in Room 2013—making Marc Cohn’s cover of Willie Dixon’s “29 Ways†[MoFi] very rich and full-bodied—perhaps a shade too much so—but still quite lively, with excellent staging and reproduction of that burbling Hammond organ.)
If the Utopias and The Statement proved a bit of a disappointment in the Maroon Peak room, Da Vinci Audio Labs’ new $27k Unison turntable and $7.75k Nobile arm (equipped with Da Vinci’s $7.3k Reference mc cartridge) in Room 9021 sure didn’t.
Feeding the $25k two-way Deco 10 Signature loudspeakers from A.R.T. Loudspeakers of Scotland by way of a $57k Da Vinci Preziosa 300B preamp/line-driver combo and a $19.5k AcousticPlan Sarod phonostage and $12.5k Santor amp, the new Da Vinci table, arm, and cartridge sounded purely great on Cohn’s “29 Ways†with almost perfect neutrality and focus, not a hint of darkness or hoodedness, great Hammond organ, and bass that was very fast and clear (albeit a mite thick--probably room/port-related--on “Saving The Best For Lastâ€). Clearly a contender and one of the better sounds at RMAF.
Pioneer’s Andrew Jones intro’d the latest (very close to production) version of his TAD Reference Two mini-monitor, although there is nothing particularly “mini†about this large, stand-mounted two-way, either physically or sonically. At CES an earlier version had been parked against a wall in a tiny space. At RMAF the TAD had room to breathe—and to produce some shockingly deep bass for a two-way. Probably priced at or near $30k (putting it squarely up against the king of two-ways, the Magico Mini II), the new TAD is likely to turn more than a few heads when it comes to market late this year or early next. Though I’m not wild about the Bel Canto electronics Andrew seems to favor, which seems to me to add a darkish caste to the soundfield, the smaller TADs had enough coherence, detail, timbral beauty, energy, and, once again, deep bass to make an even more favorable impression than the highly favorable impression their earlier incarnations made in Vegas.
Shown for the first time in the states in Room 2009, the $31k Montegiro Luso turntable sounded swell with a $11.6k Da Vinci Grandeeza tonearm (but then what ’table doesn’t sound swell with this superb arm [soon to be reviewed in TAS by moi]?) and Koetsu Coralstone cartridge, feeding a pair of $17k Chario Sovrans (three-way floorstanders that employ a “reversed vertical alignment†configuration). On “29 Ways,†the Charios and the Montegiro/Da Vinci sounded exceptionally neutral and lively; bass was excellent though not particularly deep-reaching in this smallish room. Again on Norah Jones’ “Come Away With Me,†both speaker and turntable/arm were exceptionally neutral and alive; the combo sounded particularly pure and lovely on a Joan Baez cut. All in all, a very successful launch and one of the better sounds at RMAF.
In Room 518 Krell introduced its two-piece, aluminum-bodied $65k Modulari Duo—a 3.5-way with a two-way head unit and three woofers in a separate cabinet. Bass was, not unexpectedly, terrific. The entire sound was quite impressive, clean and a shade dark with tremendous soundstage width and very good depth and image focus. Like the Magico Mini II, you got absolutely no sense of a box with Krell’s thick aluminum enclosures. These new Krells could easily have gone in my surprise section, since they sounded better than any Krell loudspeaker I’ve previously heard. One of the better sounds at RMAF (but at a price, Ugarte, always at a price).
In Room 9004, Audio Machina’s $49.8k Maestro—a larger, more elaborate, more highly perfected version of the PURE System loudspeaker that so impressed me several years ago at RMAF (with its gorgeous hourglass shape, black-anodized aluminum body and yellow Fostex midrange, incredibly thin profile, and incredibly deep bass)—was introduced. I think the speaker’s designer, Dr. Karl Scheumann, is a greatly gifted fellow with a genuine love and feel for music and for loudspeaker design. Unfortunately, the smallish room and warm, overly ripe electronics didn’t serve his cause so well this time around. The Maestros did the same disappearing act that the PURE System pulled off, all right, but on cuts like “Keys to the Highway†or “Rainy Night in Georgia†the overall sound was just a bit too dark and recessed and polite for my taste. Anything but unpleasant or unattractive, mind you, but just not very “alive.†Having heard the PURE System in my own listening room, I have every confidence that the Maestros are much better than they showed in Denver—and was told by a party I trust that, after the room was reordered and the speakers put on the long rather than short wall late in the show, the sound livened up. This is a speaker I will keep an eye on and that I believe has the potential to sound as great as it looks.
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Jonathan
Nice to meet you at the show.
Errata: The retail price of the Grande Utopia EM is $180,000 per pair. Delivered to the home & setup by us with assistance from store staff.
As you noted, we had room problems, but then a hotel setting is always less than ideal. Meeting rooms are great for conferences but lousy as demo rooms. When we first did the setup on Thursday, we put cylindrical traps in all of the corners & it sounded absolutely lifeless. We wrote it off as cold equipment & left it playing overnight. Friday morning, with the equipment all warmed up, we listened again. Better, but no cigar. On a suggestion from Dominic from Focal, we ripped the traps out & it was remarkably better. So, we tuned the speaker again & this is what you heard in the late afternoon. The moral of this story: don't over damp your room!
Saturday morning we got brave & spiked them & retuned since the spiking improved the dynamic snap & bass depth fairly significantly.
That's the beauty of the GU EM - the ability to tune it to the local environment. There are around 1500 different possible settings. If you wanted less mid-bass & more deep bass, you should have asked & we could have easily tuned the speaker that way via the rear-panel jumpers & the EM control (or "flux capacitor" as a dealer dubbed it). Voila!
Unfortunately we couldn't do anything about the ceiling, which always wanted to hum along with the low bass. C'est la vie.
Ian McArthur
Audio Plus Services
Audio Plus Services
Ian,
It was nice to meet you, too!
As I hope I was careful to note in the show report, I didn't blame the speakers for the small problems I heard in the bass. I blamed the room (and particularly the low ceiling). This is, as you say, just the way it goes in hotel rooms. I'm quite sure the Grande Utopias are world-class speakers (I expect no less from Focal); they just didn't show their very best.
BTW, I've corrected the pricing in my blurb.
Jon
jvalin wrote:As I hope I was careful to note in the show report, I didn't blame the speakers for the small problems I heard in the bass. I blamed the room (and particularly the low ceiling). This is, as you say, just the way it goes in hotel rooms.
No worries, Jon. I thought it might be interesting for the AVG forumites to hear about the hoops we jump through to try to bring decent sound to a show. It is always an interesting experience. The electronics, the source, the cabling and conditioning etc etc are always different for every show, let alone the room environment which is always whacked in its own unique way. Small speakers tend to be much easier to place - as you experienced with the Diablos in the Musical Surrounding’s room.
I know it sounds like sales-speak but a large speaker (well, really any speaker but especially a large one) will only sound its best in a real home setting. They like carpets & stuffy chairs & real furnishings. Toss a couple of paintings on the wall as well. I setup three pairs of Grande Utopia EMs last week including the show pair (albeit I had some excellent assistance with that one so I better not take credit on a public forum). Three different rooms, three different systems. The one that sounded the best – and right out of the crate too – was in a gentleman’s home on Long Island. Of course, maybe it was just his smile that made them sound better . . .
Ian
Audio Plus Services
Jon,
Diablo's are not 9k a pair either, they are 12k plus optional dedicated stands if needed at 2k a pair.
These I also heard in France and were really stunning in Focal's room. I think alot of folks who can't afford products like mini's will adore these.
I was told my first pair is in transit as I write.
So many speakers.... so little time!
Please everyone vote and hopefully one of these guys can fix what's broken before the fun is gone for all of us!!!!!
Elliot,
Good heavens, someone fed me some bogus info! I will make the price change in the document.
JV
Jon, You can always ask me for the truth LMAO.
No false information here and I am not running for the Presidency either!!!
LOL
About the Grande Utopia EMs...I have to say that it's damn refreshing to see a dealer fess up to the fact that things didn't go as well as he'd hoped at a show. To me, this shows great character. I would trust someone who was this candid and honest. After all, a lot of money and a lot of time and a lot of hope went into that display.
Jon,
It is what I have been posting about a lot, not to make final judgements based on a show.
It is extremely hard to make great sound in a strange hotel room and many times it just can't be done.
You know that you don't just drop a major speaker system down, hook it up and have audio heaven, I am not sure your readers and many of the high end customers realize that.
I believe that the positioning of a speaker is just about the most important thing in making a system work. If it is not set in the right place for the room all the money downstream won't make it right.
BTW see we agree LOL
Quote:It is what I have been posting about a lot, not to make final judgements based on a show.
It is extremely hard to make great sound in a strange hotel room and many times it just can't be done.
I agree with this (and certainly agree that no one should make a final judgment, good or bad, about any product on the basis of a single show), But I have some caveats. First off, if the chances are slim that you're going to sound good with Product X in a hotel room, then why show Product X in a hotel room at all? There are several manufacturer I can think of who don't show actively (of course, they usually don't make loudspeakers, although sometimes they do). Second, the odds of success are pretty much even for everyone who is showing. Some folks manage to get good sound show after show. Gershman, for instance, or Symposium or Magico or Avalon or MBL (the 101 X-Treme excepted). Why is it that they succeed with great consistency where others don't? The Symposium Acoustics Panoramas are not tiny speakers; neither are the Gershman Black Swans. Third, if a product has one bad showing...well, them's the breaks. But if it shows poorly repeatedly, in different venues then I think you can legitimately conclude that something more than a "bad room" is going wrong. It could be ancillaries, it could be setup, it could be a combination of things, but it also could be the product itself. I mean where do you draw the line when it comes to making excuses or allowances? OTOH, I am living proof that you can write off great products by drawing hasty conclusions from shows. For instance, I had more or less dismissed the MBL 101 X-Tremes after two poor-to-unimpressive CES showings, until I heard them sound good in Munich. Even at that, I wan't prepared for the way they sounded in my room. Ian is quite right about this. Speakers simply don't sound their best unless they're in a real listening room, with a real mix of soft absorbent surfaces and harder, reflective ones. It is the environment they are designed to live in.
I go to shows hoping for the best. No one likes to hear something they don't like (often built by a longtime friend or acquaintance), much less to write about it. I certainly don't. But I feel it's my job to honestly report on what I hear. I realize that I could be misleading readers--mistaking a poor synergy or a bad room for a bad product. I consciously try not to do this. But I can be and have been mistaken. I'm sure MBL wasn't at all happy with me after my last CES report (although I make up for it in Issue 189). But they took the criticism, which was harsh but fair, very well and then just flat out proved to me that I was wrong--not about what I heard in Vegas but about the product's potential. This, I think, is the right way to approach these things. If you're confident that a show isn't representing the full potential of a product, then let it be reviewed.
I can't tell you why.. it is not my money nor my idea. I have done shows a few times like your competitors in NYC and Miami and a few others around the country and they are more often done to SHOW the product so they can get exposure or find new dealers to talk to or new clients to come hear them in a store. I think it is a risk and it is your job to report what you see and hear and as you state that is not always the way things turn out to be, but that is the risk and that can be the reward.
I also agree that if something sounds like crap in more than a place or two I would not bother with it myself and if a company gets too a show and the room, or the gear, or the gremlins won't let it produce good sound then WHY PLAY IT!!!!! That I do not get. I try in my store to not play things for people that are not ready to be played, particularly if the person is a serious listener. You only get one chance to make a first impression. SO the combination of potential at a show and a good listen in some showroom makes for making a good choice, a review can help as well!
If you want to make good sound at a show do your homework, see the room first and bring your own gear!!!!! Stuff you know and is broken in, not borrowing stuff you have never used. (this happens a lot folks!!!)
Very well spoken and very true.
First impressions ARE important. In fact, it seems to me that it's the one thing you don't want to get wrong. It's a lot easier to forgive and forget when you've first heard something sound great, although I've had it work the other way around (all of us have). The trouble is, as you clearly know, some folks don't have the patience or experience to wait. There is still a subculture of audiophile cowboys who like to shoot first, and the trouble is that ever since the Internet came into wide use they aren't just broadcasting their snap judgments to their pals; they're doing it worldwide.
Hello Jonathan,
It was great seeing you again and I'm pleased that you enjoyed the Clearaudio Statement table, it's a very impressive piece.
Peder Beckman
Director of Sales
Musical Surroundings
www.musicalsurroundings.com
We should start a new discussion thread: To Show or Not to Show.
We have never been skitterish displaying the big guns at a show despite the inherent dangers. We always control as much as we can but there will always be variables. Ultimately, we always have very good sound. That is our goal. Stunning sound is simply not possible in a show environment. I have participated in countless shows since 1981 & I have subsequently heard a lot of systems. Trust me, very good sound is better than many show sounds. I am sure that you guys would agree. I have yet to be really awed at a show . . . although Keith O. Johnson’s masters on his modified tubed reel to reel with Spectral playing Quad 63’s & Entec subs in Chicago circa 1987 was pretty darn good imho.
In this instance, we felt that it was important to play the speaker to show the public & the press what the speaker’s potential is. If we can get it to sound as good as it did (and it was very good), in an environment that crappy, imagine what it could sound like in a home. In marketing terms, it’s givin’ them a smell of the steak grillin’ on the barbeque.
So Jon, my advice with a Show Report is: be kind. And my advice to reader’s of show reports is: put it in perspective.
And Jon, at some show, in some strange city, we can sit & have a drink & giggle about the truly bizarre things we have seen at shows. Although, one night might not be enough.
Ian
Audio Plus Services