Axpona 2022

[WilliamWykeham]

First place for me was a tie between MBL and the Avantgarde Trios, although they were mostly playing terrible music on the Trios. Secret is to go into the adjacent room and hear the Unos, where you can play the music you want.  After hearing track 1 from Currentzis’s Marriage of Figaro in that room I’m contemplating buying them. Everyone else who came in was impressed too.

 

Second place for me is a three way tie between the Wilsons(I think it is the Sasha?) with Moon Audio equipment, Vimbergs, and Volti Rival.  The Wilsons sounded straight up bad on day 1 because the amps hadn’t warmed up; they were standouts on day 2.  Vimberg I had never heard of but they are made by Tidal apparently.  This room was playing classical and other acoustic music. It was fantastic. I’m going to measure my living space when I get home to see if the Volti Rival will fit.  Had never heard horns before this event and I was entranced. And they played 3 classical tracks in a row for me. Meanwhile the new big Klipschs might have been my bottom ranked speakers but the room was always packed.  

 

Other speakers I found interesting were the Orchestralls, TAD bookshelves, Channel Island R3 (only $4k! Classical sounded pretty good), Harbeths driven by luxman 507, Bayz audio (but I only got to hear bad audiophile music), Scaena (imaging maybe too tall but quite compelling nevertheless), and new TAD floorstanders (good at low volumes).  

 

Speakers and/or rooms I didn’t connect with: Piega, Muraudio (fell apart once they played classical), Gershman, Stenheim, Malbork, the big Magicos sadly (S5s with vinyl were cool), Salk.

 

And I almost forgot - I’d have to hear it a few more times, but the Theoretical Bacch-SP (hard to find, I think on floor 15 or 16 at end of hall), makes me want to sell all my audio gear to afford it. Unfortunately the brilliant inventor of that device was giving lengthy explanations on how it works before getting to actual music and only one person at a time can perceive the effect, that person often hogging the space for themselves, but if you can check it out, it’s unlike anything I’ve ever heard. Someone from The Absolute Sound was in the one-person sweet spot and he said it was way better than any multichannel setup he had heard.  

 

 

[WilliamWykeham]

Correction - the Theoretica system is on 14th floor.  I was able to get 40 minutes by myself this morning and will have more detail later.  This is a not to be missed exhibit!  Try to nab time with him end of day with fewer people around. Ask for his 1950s symphonic stereo recordings in addition to his binaural recordings; the effect is basically the same.  

[WilliamWykeham]

Day 3 didn’t have as many revelations for me, but helped to refine impressions from the first two.  I went back to the Volti Rival room and just loved it again, maybe wouldn’t rank quite as highly as yesterday but it was still top 5 for me.  However, I think the Avantgarde Uno Fina has the edge.  Hard to say for sure as both the front end and back end for the Voltis weren’t comparable to the Avantgardes.  I heard a few folks saying they preferred the Unos to the Trios; can’t relate to this view personally.  

 

The Wilson Sashas on the first floor sounded amazing again, very full-bodied, but the Sashas in the smaller Mytek room sounded almost like completely different speakers and much less impressive.

 

The Innuous Statement power supply difference was immediately audible to me, and a big improvement.  Convinced me I need to step up my game on my own custom server.

 

I still couldn’t get into the M6.  I wanted to like it, but couldn’t connect.  At all.  The S5 with digital sounded a bit bland today in comparison to Friday’s vinyl. 

 

The Bacch-SP was a real treat, hearing musicians in such realistic depth of space.  It’s the effect I’ve always wanted from 2-channel but could never obtain until now.  However, the effect works best with binaural recordings and with things like orchestral recordings from the 50s with two mikes.  My Figaro test track just didn’t seem to benefit, really at all.  Edgar explained that multi-miked recordings don’t benefit as much.  So, I have to conclude this wouldn’t really work for a main system, but would be fantastic as a second one.  I might consider their mac software after I’m done with my adventures in speakers.  

 

I thought the Vinnny Rossi room was nice, but just nice after the Rivals and Avantgardes. 

 

Thought the big 3.2 Raidhos had a very poor showing, and also didn’t like the Borresons, although these two speakers had favorable impressions from some others.  Also didn’t really connect with the Martin Logans, which surprised me. 

 

Biggest LOL of the event was Paradigm guy playing his favorite Metallica track —Nothing Else Matters.  C’mon bro if you’re going to play Metallica at least give us some Master of Puppets.  

 

Faves ranked:

Avantgarde Trio

MBL (the big ones)

Avantgarde Uno

Volti Rival

Viberg

Wilson Sasha

 

Others I liked (no order):

Harbeth

Orchestrall

Tannoy (did I just lose cred?)

Channel Island R3

Tad floorstanders and bookshelves 

Margules

Marten

Eggelsonworks

Nenuphar

 

 

[WilliamWykeham]

Eagerly awaiting impressions from @Nenon and @austinpop.

 

A few final observations.  I had neglected to include Bayz Audio in my earlier list.  I feel like the music he was playing was suboptimal for evaluation, although I recall he might have played one jazz track that impressed me.  With more time and diversity of material this might have gone under my faves list.  What’s more interesting is that according to the Axpona website both this room and the Vimberg room, which I liked a lot, were using the Taiko Extreme. 

 

Next, I was surprised looking over my list that basically none of the brands I came to Axpona to hear appealed to me, while several brands that I had never heard of before (eg, Vimberg, Margules, Marten, Egglesonworks, Channel Island, Orchestralls, Cube Audio/Nenuphar) or that I had no expectations for (eg Volti, Avantgarde) really impressed me.  Wilson is the exception where I had read glowing reviews including from owners on this site, and the exhibit lived up to expectations.  Two theories: the brands I wanted to hear are slightly better known than most of the brands at the show, and don’t have to work as hard at events like this; they’ll generate sales regardless.  Another theory: the favorable reviews I read about speakers I wanted to hear at Axpona created outsized expectations.   

 

Lastly, I had just learned about Silversmith Audio cables before the show, from someone whose gear consists of VAC amps and Tidal speakers, and it was interesting to see a few rooms with these novel cables. 

 

 

 

[WilliamWykeham]

One final observation - while we are all aware of the necessity of burning in new speakers, I have not seen much discussion about the need to burn in used speakers that have been moved.  Recently I acquired used Magico A3s which on first

listen sounded like absolute bassy trash, making me think I would most likely sell them.  Well, after several days of burn-in they began to sound much more balanced and coherent.  Doubters will say my ears were simply getting used to the sound; I can only plead my impression of the magnitude of change.  I wonder which speakers may be particularly susceptible to the need for a lengthy burn-in after transportation, based on what I felt were fairly poor showings by a few highly lauded models.