HiFi_201308.pdf

£4.9

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SMALL IS BEAUTIFULREPRODUCING THE RECORDED ARTS AUGUST 2013 • 102

www.hi plus.com

BEST EVER VINYL SOUND FROM ZANDEN!

REPRODUCING THE RECORDED ARTS AUGUST 2013 • 102

RCM AUDIO THERIAA

ARCAM FMJ A19

GERMAN PHYSIKS UNLIMITED II

MONOPULSE MODEL S

NAIM AUDIO’S DAC-V1 AND NAP100 – TOMORROW’S AUDIO TODAY?

SENNHEISER MOMENTUM – HIGH-END SOUND FOR YOUR SMARTPHONE!

t h e a b s o l u te s o u n d ’s

BEST EVER VINYL SOUND FROM ZANDEN!

i HiFi+ Cover Iss102.indd 1 18/07/2013 13:48

i IFC Enigma Full HiFi101.indd 1 17/07/2013 14:34

1 ISSUE 102

editorialW

here is audio going? What is its future, if

indeed it has a future? These questions are

a regular fixture of any conversation about

audio, whether it be between manufacturers,

distributors, press or public. Fortunately,

where perhaps a year or two ago, the predictions were pretty dire, it

seems reports of audio’s death were greatly exaggerated and there

are some signs of regrowth in traditional audio.

Better still, that regrowth seems to be in all sectors at last. There’s still a squeezed middle that has still yet to start buying once again, but where that meant replacement cycles grew in length, companies are now building new designs at all levels to help better fill people’s wish list and desires. It wouldn’t be summer without a new raft of Naim equipment, but not long after the cyber-ink was dry on the DAC and amp review, the Salisbury specialists released another three new models, this time adjusting the Nait range for those middle-income earners finally breaking free of austerity measures.

In a way, this is completely understandable. Income earned from interest is practically zero, and the stock market is too volatile for many casual investors, which means money saved is money losing money. Some of those people are burning through some of their investment portfolio on toys, because at least you get some fun out of the money.

While the squeezed middle was waiting for the downturn to end, the audio world had to follow the money, and for most brands that meant following fewer people with more money. As a result, successive layers of more expensive products have emerged to meet the

needs of wealthy audiophiles. This can be frustrating for those who were at the pinnacle of audio performance a few years ago, because there are now whole swathes of unaffordable products taking that crown. But the upside is the bandwidth of the business has expanded considerably; it’s possible to get good performance from surprisingly inexpensive components today, while those lucky few capable of living the ‘cost no object’ life are now capable of building systems that really push the envelope. The hope now is that – in the same way as the technology that goes into today’s S-Class Mercedes ends up in tomorrow’s VW Golf – there is some considerable trickle down from the best of the best. Because not many of us can afford the best of the best today.

Hi-Fi Plus is saddened to learn of the death of Dr Amar Bose, founder of the Bose Corporation. He was 83.

EditorAlan Sircom

Email: [email protected]

Contributors this issuE inCludE:

Roy Gregory, Jason Kennedy, Chris Martens, Paul Messenger,

Coleen ‘Cosmo’ Murphy, Stuart Robinson, Pete Trewin,

Denis D Davis

GrAPhiC dEsiGnErAlison Cutler

Fonthill Creative, Salisbury

PhotoGrAPhyAdrian Lyon, Simon Marsh

The Hi-Fi Plus Team

AdvErtisinGTom Hackforth

Tel: +44 (0)1425 655255Email: [email protected]

AssoCiAtE PublishEr:Pete Trewin

Tel: +44 (0)1425 655699Email: [email protected]

PublishErChris Martens

thE EditoriAl offiCE CAn bE ContACtEd At:

Hi-Fi Plus EditorialAbsolute Multimedia (UK) Ltd

Unit 3, Sandleheath Industrial Estate,Sandleheath, Hampshire

SP6 1PAUnited Kingdom

Tel: +44 (0)1425 655255Fax: +44 (0)1425 655477Web: www.hifiplus.com

Absolute Multimedia (UK) Ltd is a subsidiary of TMM Holdings LLC,8868 Research Blvd., Ste. 108

Austin, Texas 78758, USA

ChAirmAn And CEoThomas B. Martin, Jr.

All Rights Reserved.Not one word of Hi-Fi Plus may be

reproduced without the written consent of the Editor. We are perfectly happy

to co-operate, but we don’t want quotations to appear out of context.

Printed ByAdvent Print Group, Andover

Hi-Fi Plus is published twelve times a year by; Absolute Multimedia (UK) Ltd

ISSN 1465 5950

www.hifiplus.comISSUE 103 ON SALE: UK SEPTEMBER 5, 2013 ... US OCTOBER 10, 2013

Alan [email protected]

01 HIFI+102 Editorial_AS.indd 1 18/07/2013 15:21

The DreamGoes On...

The internationally reviewed and award winning Absolute Dream by Crystal Cable Series set new standards for metallurgy and performance.

With the new Dreamline Plus the dream can go on!

Using two of our precious all monocrystal conductors, Dreamline Plus makes it possible for more music lovers to listen to their recordings as they are meant to sound; live, in your own living room.

International Distr ibutors & Consultants of Special ised Hi-End Audio & Video Systems

58 Durham Road, London, SW20 0TW T: +44 (0)20 89 71 39 09

W: www.absolutesounds.com E: [email protected]

absolute sounds ltd.

CC_DreamlinePlus_Ad.indd 1 14/06/2013 13:4902 Crystal Cables Full HiFi101.indd 2 17/07/2013 14:32

3 ISSUE 102

contentsEQUIPMENT+

CRYSTAL CABLE AND SILTECHamp, loudspeaker and cable system

NAIM AUDIO DAC-V1/NAP 100USB DAC preamp and power amp

SENNHEISER MOMENTUMclosed-back headphones

ZANDEN 1200 MK IIIphono stage

ARCAM FMJ A18integrated amplifier

REL R-218active subwoofer

MONOPULSE Sfloorstanding loudspeakers

RCM AUDIO THERIAAphono stage

GERMAN PHYSIKS UNLIMITED MK IIfloorstanding loudspeakers

SONUS FABER VENERE 2.0standmount loudspeakers

ALACRITY AUDIO CATHERTUN standmount loudspeakers

GUTWIRE UNO-S/CHIME3/C-CLEF2

cable system

121622283236 40 4448556067

INCOMING!Your views and opinions5

COMMENT

SUBSCRIPTIONS

BACK ISSUES

ADVERTISER INDEX

INTERVIEW Emily Barker

CONTEMPORARY,AUDIOPHILE AND CLASSICAL MUSIC

CLASSIC ALBUM SUNDAYSCocteau TwinsBlue Bell Knoll

68

88

91

7986

96

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MUSIC

ISSUE 102

FEATURES7

72

MEET YOUR MAKER INaim Audio

MEET YOUR MAKER IICambridge Audio

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tel: 020 8948 4153 fax: 020 8948 4250 • email: [email protected] • www.audiofreaks.co.uk

Cardas • conrad-johnson • finite hi-fi • HiResTech • Karan Acoustics • Kuzma • Magnum Dynalab

McCormack • Muse Electronics • Rogue Audio • Running Springs Audio • Zanden Audio

Distristrist ibribr uted ExclusivelyExclusivelyExclusivel bybyb Audidid ofiofi rofrof earear ksksk

C

M

Y

CM

MY

CY

CMY

K

AF Cardas headphones log add.pdf 25/6/13 21:55:10

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5 ISSUE 102

Let’s get physicalThe rebirth of LP in the time of downloading is entirely understandable. It’s human nature. We like to collect physical artifacts, especially when there’s a hobby involved. Whether that’s art collecting, book buying, having a wine cellar or record collecting, there’s a drive to have physical things that goes beyond performance.

The physical performance of a Kindle is far ‘better’ than any paperback book, in that one lightweight device can hold the equivalent of a small bookshop. OK, your paperback is less likely to run out of batteries mid-flight, but the fact you can take basically every book you ever thought of owning with you wherever you go is a remarkable step forward for literature. However, for the bibliophile, no amount of virtual books in your pocket make up for the feel and the smell of books, and the pride of ownership that comes with a wall of filled bookshelves.

It’s the same thing with LPs. I recently put more than 1,000 CDs in the attic, now all stored in a Naim UnitiServe. It’s excellent, and the ability to have your entire collection at the touch of an iPad makes you approach your music collection in an entirely different – and I think better – way. But I can’t help looking at that bare wall that used to contain all my discs with some regret and longing.

Paradoxically, my son – who was born long after LP supposedly went away in the late 1980s – had never owned a physical piece of music until he hit his twenties. Now he and his bearded hipster friends all have record players and tour the second hand stores and charity shops. He says he likes LP because it sounds better than downloads, but I suspect this might be more style over substance, because his trendy 1970s Pioneer PL12D sounds in a very poor state. I think an iPod and especially my own SuperUniti sounds a lot better.

Brian Bull, via email

You might be right. The desire to possess physical things runs deep in all of us, but I think it also applies to virtual music as much as it does to physical things. There is a difference between a huge wall of vinyl and a huge collection of FLAC files, but the distinction might only be an intellectual one. Certainly those who deal with hoarding now have to cope with people who never put anything in the wastebasket of their PC, as well as those who keep every newspaper and Cornflakes packet they’ve used for the last 40 years – Ed

Right to reply Thank you for your review of our 3T The Rock Hybrid cable. We do have a few points we would like to raise from the review, that need clarification. Far from having ‘a bit of a tough time in the UK over the last few years’, we actually supply to more UK audio manufacturing companies than we did

Please send your letters to Hi-Fi Plus, Unit 3, Sandleheath Industrial Estate, Sandleheath, Hampshire, SP6 1PA, United Kingdom. Or email them to [email protected]

even five years ago. Also, the carbon used for the conductor coating is the same as is used in many of our products. We also claim that after 25 years of use the sonic quality is still the same as it was on day one. In The Rock, we don’t use linear Structured carbon conductors but 3T conductors with a carbon coating.

It is true that we don’t disclose too much about the construction of our cables publically, but we’ve found that when we disclose the real technical information, Chinese “friends” will come up with the same or minimal with look-a-likes in properties and/or cosmetics. However, 3T is a typical metal technology and the hybrid (carbon) coating is a small part in the whole concept. The secret of 3T is the unique metal combination where on fractions of the percentage a mix is made of 5 metals and one non-metal to produce this unique sonic quality.

The Vivaldi track is recorded exclusively with 3T microphone cables and all other connections. This gives the best source for sonic evaluation. On other tracks there was a mix between regular cables and 3T products Dr. Ault-Jouk van den Hul, the Netherlands

incoming!

+

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Meet Your Maker: Hi-Fi+ visits Naim Audio

MEET YOUR MAKER

Naim Audio is not nearly as well known in my home country (the USA) as it is in England, although this is certainly not for lack of trying on the part of Naim’s US distributor, The Sound Organisation (the TSO-folks are very committed Naim devotees). But audiophiles in the ‘States often find giving Naim

equipment a listen is something much easier said than done.I have been curious to learn more about Naim Audio and to try to find

out exactly what gives the company’s components their undeniable mystique. I also wanted to find out if the mystique was grounded in reality, or merely fanciful hype.

Upon signing in at the factory, the very first step in my tour involved putting on an anti-static grounding strap and slipping into a Naim-labeled, colour-coded visitors’ lab coat. Thus attired, I was able to begin the tour secure in the knowledge that I would not electrostatically “fry” any delicate components I encountered along the way.

As fate would have it, one of the first stops on the tour involved seeing the assembly area for one of Naim’s simplest audio components—namely, power cords —which, though perhaps humble still showed a lot about the firm’s design philosophies and overall attention to detail. Doug Graham, Naim’s Sales Manager and our tour guide for the day, explained that Naim mains cables look simple enough from the outside, yet that from the inside there is more going on than at first meets the eye. For starters, the

By Chris Martens

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MEET YOUR MAKER / Meet Your MAker: Hi-Fi+ Visits NAiM Audio

wires used are of top quality, and the mains plugs are purpose built units that, by design, provide shock and vibration isolation between the plugs and the cable body, itself. Why go to such great lengths? Naim feels strongly that a major—though often overlooked—source of distortion involves vibration inadvertently transmitted from outside a component to the circuitry within. This theme of careful attention to vibration isolation is one that is repeated on many different levels throughout most of Naim Audio’s product ranges.

Thus, at Naim, even something as basic and elemental as a mains plug comes in for special design attention. When I hefted the factory’s reference cable in my hands, I could immediately feel how that the mains plug was substantially de-coupled from the rest of

the cable. Naim maintains an extensive set of reference components (often ones built with clear Perspex covers) that factory technicians use as patterns and models as the work to assemble new units. Naim places a tremendous emphasis on the concept of building products right the first time. To this end, the firm lavishes a great deal of attention on incoming parts inspections and on preparing precise kits of parts for the assembly of new components.

Incoming parts—whether electrical, mechanical, or cosmetic—are carefully inspected and held to extremely strict QC standards. I was shown, for example, a Naim faceplate assembly that had failed incoming inspection and I frankly had to look long and hard (and even then at just the right angle) in order to spot any flaw at all.

What is more, every assembly step and procedure is carefully documented—often using assembly guide folders illustrated with full-colour photos and/or diagrams. For particularly tricky assembly processes, such as the intricate folding and dressing of ribbon cables as used within disc players, there are even step-by-step models to show how each fold and crease should be made. There is an emphasis on precision and upon getting the job done right the first time (an outcome upon which Naim keeps detailed statistics).


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There is also a strong emphasis on rigorous testing procedures—not just upon the conclusion, but also at various midpoints along the way. The idea, then, is to intercept and correct any possible problems at the earliest possible stage, so that when a component reaches the end of the assembly process it is extremely likely to pass a final, full-function test—something all Naim components must undergo before their chassis covers are ever installed.

Products tests are performed partly on lab equipment (and in many cases using purpose-built text fixtures designed and built in-house), but also include basic listening tests, where the idea, naturally, is make sure that Naim products sound the way they are supposed to do. These tests involve everything the company makes, from the smallest and least expensive streamer products on up through Naim’s mighty (and, let us concede, mighty expensive) 500-series components. Indeed, senior staff members audition and sign-off on all completed 500-series units before they are cleared for outbound shipment. Although no one particularly stressed this point, there seemed to be widespread internal awareness that 500-series components are the highest expression of Naim’s ideals, so that everyone involved treated those models with heightened care and something approaching reverence (much like autoworkers building, say, Bugatti’s Veyron automobiles). Spend any amount of time on the factory floor and you’ll come away with the sense that Naim folks absolutely, positively aim to make the 500-series models as close to perfection as possible.

Almost from the moment they were first announced, I have been fascinated with Naim’s innovative, but also iconoclastic, Ovator-series loudspeakers, so it was gratifying to have a chance to see how they are made. For those not familiar with the Ovators, let me mention that one of their most distinctive design features involves use of very unusual Balanced Mode Radiator (BMR)-type drivers, where an individual, flat-faced, circular driver takes the place of both traditional midrange and high frequency drivers whilst providing, it is said, both exceptional dynamics and ultra-wide dispersion. So, when one sees an Ovator loudspeaker with its grille removed, the driver array appears deceptively simple; one sees only a BMR drive near the top of the front baffle, plus a set of seemingly conventional woofers. But on the inside, one finds once again Naim’s characteristic attention to vibration isolation. Thus, BMR drivers are typically shock-mounted and positioned within dedicated, rear-vented isolation

tubes, while woofers are in their own heavily braced cabinets, and crossover networks are—you guessed it—position within their own vibration isolation chambers in the bottom of the Ovator enclosures. Then, as a final touch, upper-end Ovator models rest upon leaf-spring-equipped vibration isolation plinths. Obviously, these people take the vibration isolation concept to great lengths.

One of the most intriguing things I found in the Ovator assembly area was a special chamber where Ovator drivers are extensively run-in before being fitted to the loudspeaker. This step is said to greatly minimise the amount of break-in time that Naim speakers will require in the field. It also means that Ovator customers can begin enjoying their new speakers almost immediately, even though some additional run-in will be required before they sound their very best. I regard Naim’s factory-break-in process as a welcome breath of fresh air (new speakers should bring joy, I feel, not arduous hours of “suffering for the cause”).

My tour ultimately concluded with what was, for me, the best part of the entire visit: namely, a chance to spend some quality time in Naim’s very well equipped factory listening room, which features the firm’s middle-of-the-range Ovator 600 loudspeakers. In the room, I had a chance to hear and compare both Naim’s upper-mid-level 200-series components side-by-side with the 500-series components. With help from Simon Halliday, representing the Naim recording label, we had the opportunity to compare standard resolution (that is, CD-resolution) audio files vs. higher resolution (24/96 or 24/192) files of the same recordings. The results were eye opening, to say the least.

The quality of Naim equipment is such that, when listening to CD-resolution material, one would be tempted to think, “who could wish for anything more?” This vivid impression lasts right up until the moment that one hears the same piece of music rendered from a higher-resolution file. Can you hear the difference? Yes, quite easily. Do you have to be a finicky “Golden Ear” to hear the difference? Absolute not. In fact, I would say that anybody with even a smidgeon of interest in music could pick

“There is also a strong emphasis on rigorous testing procedures – not just upon the conclusion, but also at various midpoints along the way. The idea, then, is to intercept and correct any possible problems at the earliest possible stage, so that when a component reaches the end of the assembly process it is extremely likely to pass a final, full-function test – something all Naim components must undergo before their chassis covers are ever installed.”


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out the difference in about two seconds flat. What changes in the musical presentation, exactly? I would say there are many changes: greater resolution of low-level textural and transient details, a perception of expanded dynamic range, a heightened sense of soundstage width and depth, and, finally, a smoother and more relaxed-sounding presentation overall. But the net result is a sense of being drawn closer to the music, with a concomitant reduction in awareness that the music is being played through what is, after all, an electro-mechanical system. Once you hear what high resolution files can do, I think there can be no turning back.

And what of the sound of the Naim electronics and source components? I found that, in starting out with the 200-series

components, I once again experienced the thought, “who could wish for anything more?” Yet when we switched to the 500-series components, I found that everything I enjoyed about the 200-series models (the ever popular pace, rhythm, and timing, not to mention resolution and energetic dynamics) got even better. Naturally, all of these qualities were made manifest through the vehicle of the Ovator 600 speakers, which I thought made worthy vessels for the signature “Naim sound.”

With that said, however, I would concede that the sound of the Ovators—or more particularly of the BMR driver itself—can be polarising, something that I think has much to do with the driver’s unusual dispersion characteristics. I personally was captivated by the Ovators’ sound, but I also know trusted colleagues who find the speaker’s sound somewhat unnerving—as if the Ovators’ very wide dispersion can, by some, be interpreted as a quality of diffuseness bespeaking a certain lack of focus. Let’s just say Ovators will be extremely pleasing to some, but that they will not suit all listeners’ tastes.

Does all of this mean that I have been converted to Naimophilia? Let’s just say that I have a much better sense of what attracts so many audiophiles the world over to the Naim brand. I certainly like much of what I’ve heard thus far. +


soulutionnature of sound

Highend Audio Equipment made in Switzerland

Distributed by Select Audio

Tel 01900 601954

www.selectaudio.co.uk

soulution_213x276+3mm_Steinway 21.05.2010 12:57 Uhr Seite 1

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW

Crystal/Siltech system by Alan Sircom

I realised reasonably fast into the review that I have no frame of reference here. This is by far the most expensive system I have ever reviewed. The base components themselves – Crystal Cable Absolute Dream signal and power cables throughout, playing through Siltech’s complete three-box SAGA amplifier and into the Absolute Dream-filled Crystal Cable Absolute

Arabesque standmount loudspeakers – add up to a fairly consequential sum in their own right. But used with an appropriate source or two, with a support system of commensurate performance and quality and of course the Absolute Dream cables required to hook those sources together and to the SAGA amplifier and… well, you are talking about a system that costs the equivalent of a fairly nice piece of real estate in one of the more moderately salubrious parts of the planet. Toto, I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore!

It’s hard to put a total price on a system where a component and room-related variable (the amount of cable required) can massively alter the cost of the system – if you have a good integrated source and have the equipment sitting between the loudspeakers, the overall cost might be half that of one where the speakers are sitting several metres from the main system and where a multi-box CD player requires power and connection from the same stable. And, given the cost of the amplifier and speaker cables alone adds up to close to £180,000, and the easiest way of thinking about Absolute Dream is that almost everything is ‘roughly £10,000 per metre’, this is a system that’s conceivably scratching the half-million mark.

When faced with something that’s several orders of magnitude more than you might ever (absolute) dream of owning this side of a lottery win, there are three lines of reasoning that hit you. The first is to go all ‘come the revolution’. The

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / CRYSTAL/SILTECH SYSTEM

12 ISSUE 102

by Alan Sircom

second is the inverse, viewing

it with gushing superlatives, like

one of us normal folk do when we get an

all-too-brief taste of the squillionaire lifestyle. Then

there’s what should be the right way – judging it as an

audio system, irrespective of price, pride of ownership and all those other aspects that have little to do with outright sound quality. Of course, a system of extraordinary price calls for extraordinary performance, and while you usually get some aspects of exemplary performance from every super-

high-end system, some of them manage to go a little further. This has that potential.

But let’s break this system down into its component parts, even if two of those parts are known to regular readers and one more has been extensively modified to achieve ‘Absolute’ status. The Siltech SAGA amplifier (that’s short for Structural Analogue Gain Amplifier, although in future times it may form part of a Nordic tale of audio finery) is a three box unit, of which we have already tested the C1 preamp. To recap, the C1 is a battery-driven tube line preamp using four rare ECC86 tubes from the last days of valves (Siltech owns a hefty NOS collection of these late-model car radio tubes, but using one of the more obscure preamp valves will necessarily limit the number of C1’s ever sold).

This is joined by the V1 and P1, although these should be thought of as a complete amplifier in their own right. Put simply, the V1 is the voltage interstage amplifier and the P1 is the current amplifier. This is basically taking the main stages of a power amplifier and pulling them apart for the sake of sound quality. Both are zero feedback designs, and feature point-to-point wiring throughout with the kind of monocrystal wire that Absolute Dream is made of.

Both C1 and V1 use battery drive, using a 24V lead acid gel pack that needs replacing every five years or so. Press in the right hand blue button on either device and you have the option of ‘forced charging’ (allowing you to hear the system while the batteries are charging) or the right hand blue button switched off and the devices are in ‘running off battery’ mode, delivering 15 hours of uninterrupted battery playtime, and it’s worth practicing good battery hygiene in order to listen under battery power. The P1 is too much of a brute to rely on batteries (they’d only drain fast and sound not good anyway) so instead it relies on what Siltech calls ‘Apollo Lightdrive’; not the name of a character in a bad sci-fi movie, Apollo Lightdrive means the small power supply drives


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a high-efficiency LED, which illuminates a high-efficency photovoltaic cell commonly used in space, This completely galvanically isolates the P1 from its own power supply. This has been tried before and successfully so – Densen’s DP Drive phono stages use a similar arrangement to good effect – but as far as I know never on something as power hungry as the current stage of a power amplifier. That’s a first.

Another first is the separate pathways for single-ended or push-pull mode on the V1, right down to the choice of tubes in each circuit. This is not one of those on-the-fly changes; it’s not even a “I feel triode-y today” response. It’s under the base and designed to match your tastes and your speakers. That being said, the amplifier is designed for near complete load intolerance. As a consequence, its power output is not a stated issue, although it delivers 380W per channel into eight ohms and this doubles down into two ohms. It also has a theoretical dynamic range of 145dB, which makes it principally more dynamic than any source component. The key point in this is striving for low microphony; not just by tube standards, but lower microphony than many solid state amp designs. That is borne out in practise… but it’s always worth experimenting with reducing that microphony still further.

I’ll skip neatly over Absolute Dream cables because they are still fresh in the magazine having only been reviewed a few issues ago and remain unchanged from there. Suffice it to say it’s one of the best cables ever and it costs like it knows that!

Then there’s the Absolute Arabesque speaker, which uses practically all the same components as its cheaper brother, save basically for Absolute Dream from 4mm plug to the signal wires used in the drive units. That necessitates a lot of Absolute Dream, and to help visually identify one from the other, the drive units surrounds on the front baffle are finished in a lovely shade of gold bling (a more restrained silver of the cheaper models is also available).

We could easily spend four pages discussing one aspect of the system in depth, so any discussion of the complete system will be editorial at best. But in some respects at this level the function of the products is a given. You expect optimum performance, and that’s what you get.

The choice of source is interesting here. This is the kind of system that does show off any good digital source, but it has a slight soothing effect to prevent the brashness that some find from streamed music (especially internet radio) breaking through. That ultimately means it serves up an ‘all good’ sound from most sources, but is best used with sources that deliver a similar presentation, which puts it closer to an extended and musical, if slightly rich and soft sound than a super-clean, super detailed player that can come across as soulless here. This source doesn’t need to be super-expensive (the conrad-johnson HD-3 has been used behind the scenes to great effect) but it needs to be good. Some of the more notable players that this system has worked well with (alongside the HD-3) consistently stem from the Wadia and dCS stables. However, running to a full set of Absolute Dream cables for all four boxes on a dCS Vivaldi is equivalent to the GDP of a small Polynesian island. You have been warned.

As a complete system, it makes for one of the best systems you will ever hear. Or make that ‘not hear’ as it has less of a signature than almost any system I’ve ever heard. Like my first point about price, the Crystal/Siltech system gives the reviewer almost no frame of reference, because it makes so little

impression on the music. Normally, you can benchmark a component against other components, but

with this system, you tend to look to the real musical world for benchmarks. The endless dynamic range, the grip over the speakers, the complete fidelity of the cables all add up to something more real, more

there sounding than almost every system you’ve heard. It’s like hi-fi just had

an all round upgrade, and there was no music this did not apply to. The nearest you get in hi-fi terms

is the big/small system idea raised to an exponential level – the system combines all the benefits of the big amp and speaker

performance (endless power, moving lots of air, deep bass) with little amp and speaker benefits (speed, precision, point source imagery).

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channel into eight ohms and this doubles down into two ohms. It also has a theoretical dynamic range of 145dB, which makes it principally more dynamic than any source component. The key point in this is striving for low microphony; not just by tube standards, but lower microphony than many solid state amp designs. That is borne out in practise… but it’s always worth experimenting with reducing that microphony still further.

across as soulless here. This source doesn’t need to be super-expensive (the conrad-johnson HD-3 has been used behind the scenes to great effect) but it needs to be good. Some of the more notable players that this system has worked well with (alongside the HD-3) consistently stem from the Wadia and dCS stables. However, running to a full set of Absolute Dream cables for all four boxes on a dCS Vivaldi is equivalent to the GDP of a small Polynesian island. You have been warned.

As a complete system, it makes for one of the best systems you will ever hear. Or make that ‘not hear’ as it has less of a signature than almost any system I’ve ever heard. Like my first point about price, the Crystal/Siltech system gives the reviewer almost no frame of reference, because it makes so little

impression on the music. Normally, you can benchmark a component against other components, but

with this system, you tend to look to the real musical world for benchmarks. The endless dynamic range, the grip over the speakers, the complete fidelity of the cables all add up to something more real, more

there sounding than almost every system you’ve heard. It’s like hi-fi just had

an all round upgrade, and there was no music this did not apply to. The nearest you get in hi-fi terms

is the big/small system idea raised to an exponential level – the system combines all the benefits of the big amp and speaker

performance (endless power, moving lots of air, deep bass) with little amp and speaker benefits (speed, precision, point source imagery).


+

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TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

SAGA C1 Control Amplifier

Bandwidth: 1Hz–3.5MHz, -3dB

Dynamic range: 128dB

SAGA V1 Voltage Amplifier

Bandwidth: 1Hz–110kHz, -1dB

Dynamic range: 130dB (triode)

Delay in-out: 50nS

SAGA P1 Current Amplifier

Bandwidth: DC–110kHz, -1dB

Dynamic range: 145dB

Power output: 380W (8 ohms), 760W (4

ohms), 1250W (2 ohms)

Price for system: £85,000

Manufactured by: Siltech

URL: www.siltechcables.com

Crystal Cable Absolute Arabesque

Type: Two way hybrid loudspeaker

Driver Complement: 1x 140mm RAAL

ribbon tweeter

3x 180mm Scan Speak Illuminator

laminated paper coned bass/mid

Absolute Dream wired throughout

Price: £90,000 per pair

Crystal Cable Absolute Dream Cable

Monocrystal silver core, Kapton and

PEEK dielectric, gold-plated silver and

silver plated copper monocrystal braid.

CrystalSpeak Absolute Dream

loudspeaker cable £23,220/2m pair

CrystalConnect Absolute Dream

interconnect cable £10,690/1m phono/

XLR pair

CrystalPower Absolute Dream power

cord £9,830/1.5m

Manufactured by: Crystal Cable

URL: www.crystalcable.com

Distributed by: Absolute Sounds

URL: www.absolutesounds.com

Tel: +44(0)208 971 3909

How this works is, frankly, uncanny. You expect something big from orchestral works, separating the complex lines of a Beethoven or Mahler symphony, making the listening room sound more like an auditorium in microcosm. But what you don’t expect is what it does throughout; such as, the organic ‘feel’ of a grand piano, sitting perfectly solid and real in your living room. Or, the sound of a voice you know extremely well – like Ella Fitzgerald – which suddenly makes every audio system you’ve heard sound fake and arch compared to the real deal.

There is also a question of the replay of ‘audiophile’ recordings. They become less relevant because the Siltech/Crystal system makes most recordings sound like audiophile recordings. It’s like your music just got better. OK, so a lo-fi album like Brothers by The Black Keys is never going to sound like it was recorded by David Chesky, but it brings out the best, regardless.

This is perhaps the only deviation from the complete fidelity approach. This system does make everything sound pretty and beauteous. Not in a lush, rose-tinted second-harmonic euphonic way, more like a finding the hidden musical intention in the piece and expressing it and expressing it beautifully. This is great for classical, jazz, and folk, good for rock and not so hot for punk and indie music, where sometimes you need more raw than beauty. That being said, I’m not entirely sure if a system of this kind will ever be caught playing punk and indie music. There are systems that do all things equally – a system revolving around Constellation Audio’s amps reviewed last month, for example – but if you are going for maximum sonic beauty, and a hitherto unparalleled amount of fidelity, this is the system for you.

The question ultimately becomes how far from the Crystal/Siltech tree can you fall, before performance begins to suffer. In a way, this is an academic exercise, as I doubt too many SAGA amplifiers will be used with freebie wire, but this is a system ultimately so finely balanced that swapping out any component in the chain risks sabotaging much of what the system does so well. To some, that’s the description of a prima ballerina. To others, that sounds like a prima donna. My take is it’s more divine than diva, but there aren’t too many permutations you can make away from the system in hand before it begins to be one of those ‘good, but expensive’ systems.

Another way of looking at this is the amplifier and cables raise the game so much that there are few components that can keep up, and those that can often go in other directions (Avalon or Magico or Wilson can do similar grade things, but do very different sonic things from the Crystal Arabesque) and the system goes slightly out of balance. Stay on the path and if can you get past the price tag you only hear one of the world’s best.

The Crystal and Siltech system shows that that ultra high-end market isn’t just about bling. This changes the landscape of audio dramatically, even if it only changes the mountaintops at the moment. But the best thing about this is a year or two ago, this would have been the best without parallel. That within a very short time we have systems like this and more suggests we are heralding in an age of audio wonder.


16 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

Naim DAC-V1 DAC & NAP100 amplifier by Malcolm Steward

“As well as providing preamplifier outputs, the DAC-V1 will also drive your headphones through its internal Class A headphone amplifier and 6.35mm socket, which is so much more convenient and sensible than the usual frail mini-jack connection.”

When Naim Audio released its highly acclaimed and widely lauded (full-width casework) DAC in 2010, the one facility that appeared to be missing was any means of making a computer through

USB connection. The design had USB ports but these would not connect to a PC output, only to a disk drive or memory stick. Naim’s second venture into DAC territory with the less expensive (half-width) DAC-V1 gives laptop/computer music lovers no such cause for complaint or concern. The new DAC is an asynchronous USB converter with multiple digital S/PDIF inputs, a precision volume control and a high-quality headphone amplifier.

While the DAC-V1 is perfectly suited to being positioned on a desk near a computer it is also highly versatile and can integrate seamlessly into a traditional hi-fi system or be used with any two-channel audio source such as a games console, satellite box or any other device with a digital output through one of its five S/PDIF inputs. The DAC-V1, says Naim, can also be combined with the Naim UnitiServe hard disk music server and its matching power amplifier, the 50W (into 8 ohms) NAP 100, which will drive a wide range of demanding loudspeakers, says Naim, to create a compact high-end music system.

As well as providing preamplifier outputs the DAC-V1 will also drive your headphones through its internal Class A headphone amplifier and 6.35mm socket, which is so much more convenient and sensible than the usual frail mini-jack connection on most contemporary DACs. The headphone amplifier uses the preamplifier output amplifier to drive the headphones. Once headphones are plugged in, the output current drive is automatically increased five times to provide dynamic drive for all headphone impedances. The amplifier runs from a high voltage power supply so has the ability to drive high impedance headphones with the voltage swing they require for an open and dynamic sound. The result is the audio stages are kept as simple and pure as possible for both normal and headphone modes. Class A’s legendary inefficiency – hence its facility for extremely hot running – hardly matters in a headphone amplifier but keeps distortion low, which is a vital consideration for any headphone listener.

The first experiment I tried with the DAC–V1 was hooking up a Logitech Squeezebox to it through the USB input using an Atlas Element USB cable. I say experiment because that is what it was: the Squeezebox – albeit a software-tweaked example – is an okay source. Nothing more. End of story. It is not the sort of device anyone with any sense would expect to work anything more than adequately connected through Naim Reference-class electronics driving Neat Ultimatum XL10 loudspeakers. To my great astonishment, it fared extraordinarily well. It sounded rather splendid, in fact, with a refined, informative sound as smooth and polished as a very smooth and polished thing. It might not have had the authority and tactile nature of a top-quality streamer but it was not so far removed as to make one feel uncomfortable. The music had the qualities and characteristics that one expects from Naim electronics: especially acute timing and natural dynamics, along with a sense of rhythmic get up and go, where appropriate.

I have long appreciated the timing qualities of Naim electronics and their tonal candour. This ebullient forthrightness lends itself to the wide variety of music to which I listen, revealing effortlessly the subtlety and chiaroscuro in the music of consummate, radical guitarists such as Joe Pass and modern jazz maestro, Bill Frisell. There is a wealth of technical stuff to enjoy in Frisell’s playing – the distinctive

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / NAim DAC-V1 DAC & NAP100 AmPlifier

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tone of his vintage guitars and amplifiers along with his motley collection of often budget – for a professional player – distortion, delay and loop pedals – but it is the masterful way he uses them that unfailingly brings a smile to your face; and that is what matters most.

In the early days of Naim Audio its sole focus seemed to be on extracting those emotional clues from recordings: this was something it did remarkably well. Those people who discredited the brand were swift to point out that this, along with “Pace, Rhythm and Timing” was all that the equipment could do (as though that were not enough to satisfy any music lover) and that it did not provide the dressy elements that, say, a Krell amplifier could furnish the listener with. Over the years Naim has – I doubt intentionally – addressed some of these considerations and the performance of my all-Naim-electronics feeding the awe-inspiring Neat Ultimatum XL10 loudspeaker system can deliver fine three-dimensional soundstage creation, startling dynamics, and vocal and instrumental texture and purity. This system fronted by the DAC-V1 certainly did not disappoint in any respect – it was effortlessly musical and communicative, and it also delivered all the cosmetic aspects one would rightfully expect from an ‘American’ sort of system. One would have to say though that it did not have the euphony or warmth of some of the valve driven systems to be heard at High-End shows or in dealerships but that is no great loss for any listener who appreciates genuine openness and honesty in his music.

Human involvement in the music was so obviously appreciable with this DAC: outstandingly so when a top quality source was employed – the Naim HDX SSD used as a streamer being a case in point here, sounding little short of stupendous. The system’s uncanny timing ability played a huge part here demonstrating adroitly the slightly less than perfect timing

and phrasing that real people – as opposed to electronic sequencers – produce.

That having been said, the DAC-V1 is not merciless: for example, it made YouTube videos on my laptop PC sound more than half-way decent and so made those low-rent videos far more entertaining than they would be using the in-built computer audio system.

Ultimately, there is often a vast chasm separating great hi-fi from equipment that plays music with the emotion that the composer intended the listener to appreciate. The DAC-V1 most thankfully sits on the latter side of yet comfortably also straddles that divide…

The partnering amplifier for the DAC is called the NAP 100 and is housed in a desk-top-convenient, half-width Naim enclosure. I imagine it takes the place of the earlier, similarly


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19 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / Naim DaC-V1 DaC & NaP100 amPlifier

proportioned NAP 90, which was discontinued as the NAP 90 mk3 in 2000, in the amplifier hierarchy. The NAP 100 delivers 50 Watts per channel into eight Ohms, and 75 Watts per channel into four Ohms. This is a dual mono design based on the circuit topology found in the SuperUniti ‘reference’ all-in-one player/amplifier. This is one major strength of Naim’s 20cm-width products: they are 100% beef rather than pallid vegetarian alternatives to the real thing. A quick look inside the casework will reveal the hefty mains transformer powering the usual regulated, over-specified, linear power supplies.

The connection between the DAC-V1 and the NAP 100 is the familiar to Naim owners, 4-pin to 4-pin DIN SNAIC cable, but if you wish to use the NAP 100 with another manufacturer’s pre-amplifier or DAC, there is also a pair of RCA phono inputs available.

The DAC-V1 is also relatively inexpensive by Naim standards, costing £1,250. However, it still offers the same DAC technology to be found within the NDX streamer. This uses Naim-written code in a SHARC ASDP, which means the DAC-V1 provides 16-times oversampling and up to 24-bit 384 kHz resolution through its asynchronous USB connection. The rest of the connections – BNC, RCA and TosLink – will deliver 24-bit 192 kHz resolution. There is a hefty linear regulated power supply with discrete mains transformer windings for the digital, analogue and DAC stages, and galvanic isolation to keep digital interference out of the analogue circuitry.

The NAP 100 is a classic interpretation of the traditional Naim power amplifier using discrete transistors in its topology and is fuelled by a muscular linear regulated power supply arrangement. Descended, says Naim, from the SuperUniti of

2011, the amplifier has that reassured conviction and security about its sound that characterises Naim’s designs of this century. I feel that the latest generation of Naim amplification can sometimes sound a little too smooth and polished in some systems and I find myself yearning for the sound of the ‘Chrome Bumper’ and ‘Olive’ models, whose presentation could be a little more ascetic.

That is fortunate because I sat down to listen to the NAP 100 without realising that I had left the DAC-V1 set to ‘fixed volume’, which meant I had no control over the volume without having to negotiate my way through the DAC-V1 menu to cancel that and return the remote volume control to its functioning status. The first rip I played was, of course, that restrained AC/DC ditty “Back In Black”. I do not know who was more surprised by the volume: my wife who was three rooms away in the office or me, sitting only a few metres from the loudspeakers. It was loud. Very loud. Even for me. And I like loud. Mind you it was more than simply deafening. The NAP 100 was doing a fine job of portraying the exquisite tone of Angus Young’s Gibson SG over-driving his Marshall 100-Watt Super Lead amplifier.

The same ‘ambidextrousness’ also emerged when playing both traditional and contemporary jazz. Art Pepper’s “You’d Be So Nice To Come Home To” – from 1957 – being a case in point. The music was presented in a wide, deep, well scaled sound stage and offered sublime instrumental separation with each instrument and player being brilliantly defined and clearly detailed. The low frequencies – the bass, drums, and piano seemed particularly well-handled in this respect with all of the band’s instrumentation enjoying a vivid


20 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / Naim DaC-V1 DaC & NaP100 amPlifier

TeChNiCal SPeCifiCaTioNS

DAC V1: 1 x USB 2.0, 1 x BNC, 2 x coaxial RCA,

2 x Toslink inputs

4-pin DIN and 2x RCA analogue line outputs

1/4in headphone output

24-bit/192 kHz (S/PDIF inputs), 24-bit/384 kHz (USB input)

Price: £1,250

NAP 100 power amp: 2 x 50 W into 8 ohm

29 dB voltage gain

4-pin DIN and 2 x RCA analogue line inputs

4 mm recessed speaker outputs

Price: £650

Manufactured by: Naim Audio

URL: www.naimaudio.com

Tel: +44(0)1722 426600

tonality and texture. Leading edges of notes were especially well portrayed, as was the rest of the note envelope, which ensured that the band’s timing was resolutely crisp and precise. The interplay between the musicians was a joy to relish and this 24-bit 96 kHz rip from vinyl appeared to leave not a stone unturned in creating a near tangible listening experience.

Similarly, the NAP 100 gave an equally dramatic account of “Egg Radio” from guitarist Bill Frisell’s album Gone, Just Like A Train. The way the amplifier delicately conveyed the lush tone and texture of Frisell’s guitar convinced listeners

that here was an amplifier that had considerable subtlety and finesse. As before it offered wonderfully accurate note-shape information ensuring that not only were tone and texture accurately recreated but timing was equally precisely defined. This kind of performance meant that listeners were guaranteed to appreciate the unique skill and mastery of this truly innovative player and the good-natured humour – and guitarist in-jokes – he injects into much of his repertoire.

For my final run-through I transferred the DAC V1 and NAP 100 combo to my desktop and drove it from my UnitiQute UPnP streamer’s BNC coaxial digital output with the system completed by my shelf-mounted Neat Iota. I was most happy with the authorative way the NAP 100 drove the Iotas, which was no less than superb, even if it didn’t show the UnitiQute a clean set of heels. It truly brought out the full quota of skill and sparkle in Bill Frisell’s albums East/West especially the bass and drum driven timing of “Pipe Down”, which demonstrated a satisfying impulsive bounce.

The surprising thing was that the NAP 100 managed to make the tiny Iotas sound almost full range such was the appreciable power and solidity of Victor Krauss’ bass line that the 2.6 litre cabinets and diminutive, palm-of-my-hand-sized, bass-mid drivers managed to produce.

While I freely admit that I expected the DAC-V1 and NAP100 combination to be good I have to confess that I did not expect it to be quite as persuasive a performer as it turned out to be. Nor did I expect it to be as unfussy as this system was… my desktop is not the ideal environment for an audio system yet this combo worked amazingly fluently and certainly comfortably persuaded the Neat Iotas to venture closer towards the edge of their performance envelope.+


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22 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

Sennheiser Momentum Headphones by Chris Martens

Amongst audiophiles, the German firm Sennheiser has long been famous for its critically acclaimed top-tier HD-series headphones (specifically, the HD 600, HD 650, HD 700, and HD 800), all of which are high-performance, open-back, circumaural (that is, around-the-ear) designs. But this very

fact begs a question. Open-back ‘phones are all well and good for purist audiophile applications, but what about music lovers who hope to listen on the go and would like to use their ‘phones in environments where there may be too much background noise for open-back ‘phones to work? It is with those very listeners in mind that Sennheiser created its new closed-back Momentum headphone, priced at £259.99.

In simple terms, the design brief for the Momentum calls for a sturdy, relatively lightweight, closed-back headphone that offers a high degree of comfort and noise isolation, is quite easy to drive, and provides authentic, Sennheiser-grade sonic accuracy. But, it would also be fair to say that the Momentum is geared to appeal to style-conscious customers—customers who might initially have been drawn to products such as Monster’s now iconic Beats by Dre Studio headphones, but who are seeking something fundamentally better at a comparable price. Happily, offering “something better” is what Sennheiser is all about, as the Momentum clearly demonstrates.

In keeping with recent trends for headphones that seek to bridge the “lifestyle” vs. “audiophile” divide the Momentums come with not one but rather two flexible, matte rubber-clad signal cables. One could be considered the “purist” cable and provides audio signal leads only. The other, which could be regarded as the “convenience” cable, comes fitted with a beautifully made three-button, smartphone compatible mic/remote module and the requisite four-conductor mini-jack plug. Not too surprisingly, the metalwork on both the remote module and on the swiveling housing for the four-conductor plug are simply exquisite, reflecting a full measure of typically Germanic manufacturing precision. A nicely made semi-hard-shell case and a ¼-inch phone jack adapter plug complete the Momentum’s accessory package.

From the moment you lift the Momentum headphones from their included carrying case, you have the impression (an accurate one, as it happens) of handling something finely made. The Momentums are offered in two colour combinations—one featuring dark brown trim and the other sporting black

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23 Chester Group Full HiFi102.indd 23 17/07/2013 14:30

Take Centre Stage

Xtension 10The Hi-Fi News ‘Highly Commended’* Xtension 10 turntable fromPro-Ject Audio puts you at the centre of the musical performance. Whetherit’s recreating a rock concert, an orchestral symphony, or whatever else you have inyour record collection, the Xtension 10 turns any vinyl recording into a captivating, ‘live’ experience.

With a retro-styled mass-loaded chassis, which is decoupled by high-grade magnetic feet, the Xtension 10 boasts a near-perfect base for vinyl playback. Combine this with the top-of-the-line 10CC Evolution Tonearm, high-mass vinyl sandwich platter and built-in Pro-Ject Speed Box DS, and you are left with a truly desirable turntable package. All for only £2,250.

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Hi-Fi News 1 28/06/2013 16:4524 Henley Full HiFi102.indd 24 17/07/2013 14:29

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / SennheiSer MoMentuM headphoneS

“Happily, the Momentums for the most part prove an exception to this rule. They are, instead, quite transparent and open sounding, with a lively and articulate quality that eludes some of their closed-back competitors.”

trim with red accents (not by coincidence the very same colour scheme made popular by the Beats by Dre ‘phones). Both the headband and ear pads are treated to soft yet also durable leather covers. The metal ear cup housings, in turn, have matte-finished outer shells and attach to the headphone’s brushed metal headband “slider” frames via ingenious swiveling ball-joint-like connectors that give excellent freedom of movement and adjustment. The only caveat I might mention is that the Momentum ear cups are not, as circumaural ‘phones go, overly capacious, meaning that those with larger ears might find the Momentums a little too close-fitting for optimal comfort.

Most listeners, however, will slip the Momentums on and, no matter what size or shape their heads might be, will experience a secure (but not overly tight) fit that strikes that just-right balance point between comfort and noise isolation. Most importantly, though, the Momentums sound as good as they look, which is more than can be said for any number of like-priced “lifestyle” headphones. With many of the Momentum’s competitors one has the sense of looking at “lifestyle” products created more with an eye toward visual impact than serious sound quality. With the Momentum, thankfully, the priorities are exactly the other way around; these ‘phones are about sound quality first and just happen to look cool into the bargain.

Popular headphone mythology holds that most closed-back headphones will tend to exhibit a somewhat compressed, dynamically constrained, and generally “closed in” sound. Happily, the Momentums for the most part prove an exception to this rule. They are, instead, quite transparent and open sounding, with a lively and articulate quality that eludes some of their closed-back competitors. They also provide, as advertised, quite good levels of passive noise isolation—good enough, in fact, that I suspect many listeners would see no need to take the further step of seeking out active noise-cancelling phones. What is more, the ‘phones exhibit a reasonably high degree of neutrality of tonal balance, long a Sennheiser hallmark. But one of the biggest differentiators between the Momentums and Sennheiser’s four upper-end HD-series headphones is that the Momentums are quite easy to drive, so that one might conceivably use an iPod or smartphone to power them—something we would not recommend with the four top HD models.

Above, I used the phrase “reasonably high degree of neutrality” to describe the Momentum’s tonal balance. I used this qualifier because I think there are some small ways (and they are indeed small) in which the ‘phones deviate from strict textbook neutrality, though in ways that are generally complementary to the music.

Specifically, the Momentums exhibit a delicate and tasteful degree of bass lift that, in many respects, reminds me of the similar touch of low-end lift engineered into PSB’s headphones (bass lift designed, in the PSBs, to mimic the low-frequency room gain typically enjoyed by most loudspeakers). In the Momentums, the effect is to convey an added, but by no means egregious, touch of bass weight and depth that you could observe, for example, on a track such as “Swamped” from Floratone’s eponymous debut album [Blue Note Records]. Floratone’s music lives at the intersection of futuristic jazz and Americana-style roots music and thrives on a well-developed sense of the groove. The Momentums play right along with this theme, giving just a bit of added “oomph” to Viktor Krauss’ acoustic bass and Matt Chamberlain’s kick drum, while still leaving plenty of space for guitarist Bill Frisell’s eclectic lines to ride high up above, surfing the groove below.

I also found that the centre of the midrange seemed just slightly recessed, again not in a particularly overt way, but just enough so as to take a little of the “edge” off some of today’s somewhat “hot-sounding” vocal and guitar recordings. A good example might be Brandi Carlile’s “Have You Ever” from The Story [Sony], where Ms. Carlile’s vocals and accompanying guitar always sound articulate but can sometimes be cursed with too much of a good thing in terms of excess transient energy that adds distracting sharp edges in a sonic sense. Through the Momentums, Carlile’s voice and the guitar remain energetic and evocative, but the harsher sonic edges are simply and tastefully tamed without further ado. As a result, the Momentums give audiophiles the desirable qualities of openness and evocative richness through the midrange, but with unpleasant qualities (edge, glare, and brittleness) backed off just enough to make a wide range of recordings (even imperfect ones) perfectly listenable.

Normally when an audio reviewer says that with a given product “harsher sonic edges are … tamed,” that would be code-speak for, “ Sorry, folks, but the high end in this product is rolled off.” But happily, that is not the case at all with the Momentums. They offer pleasingly clear and articulate treble response that conveys the sense of “air” in well-made recordings while also letting you hear


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26 PMC Full HiFi102.indd 26 17/07/2013 14:29

“The more time we spent with the Momentums the better we liked them and for a host of good reasons. They are well made, well priced, beautiful to look at, comfortable to wear and offer seriously high levels of sound quality”

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / SennheiSer MoMentuM headphoneS

technical SpecificationS

Type: Closed-back, circumaural (around the ear), full-size headphone

Accessories: Semi hard-shell carrying case, 6.3mm adapter plug, signal

cable with smart remote, stand signal cable, multi-language manual set

Driver type: dynamic driver (diameter not specified) with closed-back

enclosure

Impedance: 18 Ohms

Maximum SPL: 110 dB

THD: <0.5%

Weight: 190 grams

Warranty: 2 years, parts and labour

Price: £259.99

Manufacturer: Sennheiser UK Ltd.

Tel: +44 (0) 1494 551 551

URL: www.sennheiser.co.uk

In the USA: Sennheiser Electronic Corporation

URL: www.sennheiserusa.com

the delicious shimmer and ring of high-pitched percussion instruments floating in air until they decay back into silence. The Momentum’s treble sophistication is much in evidence on Jack Johnson’s “Wasting Time” from On and On [UMVD Labels], where the song’s chorus beautifully captures the rhythmic “ping” and shimmer of a ride cymbal heard in isolation for a few seconds and gently keeping time. Vocals and instrumental tracks in the recording also feature long and almost ghostly reverb tails, which the Sennheiser’s extended treble response enables them to capture with the greatest of ease. As you listen to the Momentums on tracks like this one, then, it may suddenly hit you (as it did me) that these ‘phones are far more sophisticated and sonically accomplished than most of the like-priced “lifestyle” competitors with which they will do battle in the marketplace.

The more we spent time with the Momentums the better we liked them and for a host of good reasons. They are well made, well priced, beautiful to look at, comfortable to wear (except, perhaps, for those with larger ears), and offer seriously high levels of sound quality. Moreover, they are easy to drive and are thus ideal for listeners who want much of the sound quality of top-tier ‘phones, but do not wish to incur the expense or inconvenience of using a dedicated outboard headphone amplifier. In a sense, then, the Momentum is a “have your cake and eat it too” sort of product—one that provides a satisfying marriage of audiophile sound and lifestyle looks and convenience. We suspect many contemporary music lovers will find that combination hard to resist.

+


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EQUIPMENT REVIEW

Zanden 1200 Mk III Phono-Stage by Roy Gregory

Fourteen or so years of Hi-Fi Plus embrace an awful lot of products (especially if, like me, you were wearing both the Editor’s and the Principal Reviewer’s hats for a goodly part of that time). Throw in a policy of selecting review products that

we liked, had confidence in or found particularly interesting, and the range of individual units clamoring for attention could easily get out of hand. Except for one thing: while a lot of those products seriously extended my musical expectations and altered my understanding of just what each part of a system might contribute, only one totally changed my perception of the audio landscape. Products like the Connoisseur phono and line-stages, along with the Berning Quadrature Z mono-blocs, have become as near to permanent partners as any reviewer ever gets. The Avalon Isis (still) casts an incredibly long shadow, while my system has never been without a VPI turntable. But if push comes to shove there’s always another great turntable line-stage, amp or speaker out there.

In some respects, the same is also true of the Zanden 1200 phono-stage, which has recently been extended in its Mk III guise. As beautifully crafted and effortlessly stylish as all of the Zanden products, this is to my mind, Yamada-san’s masterpiece. A two-box unit, it shares that innate understanding of the physical and mechanical aspects of

product design that seems to come so effortlessly to the great Japanese designers, combined here with a carefully honed tube circuit teamed with transformers to boost the MC input. Sonically, the units are noise and trouble free. In fact, they are ghostly quiet for a tube design. Musically, the results are quite magical. The sense of instrumental colour, presence, acoustic space and separation are so natural as to pass almost unnoticed. The dynamics are emphatic and the pace and timing equally fluid and uninhibited. By any measure, this is an exceptional phono-stage.

That’s hardly surprising when you consider just how seriously Zanden takes record replay, with dedicated MM and even mono versions of the 1200 available. Which brings us directly to the singular feature that set the Zanden apart from all preceding phono-stages (at least the ones to actually grace my system). Audiophiles and record collectors (predominantly but not exclusively Japanese and Korean) have long been aware of the issue of differences in or deviations from the standardised RIAA record replay EQ curve. In theory, pretty

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / ZANDEN 1200 MK III PHONO-STAGE

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much all the records made after 1956 should conform to the RIAA standard – meaning that all records should work with all replay electronics. That should be good news for everybody, especially as it effectively pre-dates the introduction of stereo records. So, if you are playing a stereo disc and your phono-stage conforms to the RIAA replay standard, everything should be fine.

The fly in the ointment is those two little words, “In theory…” What becomes apparent, if you dig a little deeper, is that many record labels stuck with their own EQ curves for some considerable time before adopting RIAA. Some seem never to have adopted it. The same Japanese collectors who pushed the price of early pressing stereo records through the roof also demanded phono-stages that could offer optimised replay for their precious discs. The first such phono-stage I ever encountered was the FM Acoustics 222, a slim, fully balanced design with continuously variable EQ parameters. But the Zanden was the phono-stage to find its way into my System, because it was the first that offered push-button selection of different, pre-determined EQ curves. One listen in my own home and, more importantly, with my own record collection and the world was never going to be the same again.

The original Model 1200 we tested only offered three curves (RIAA, “Columbia” and “Decca”) whereas the current version offers five (adding “Teldec” and “EMI” to the mix). Ever wondered why DGG discs sound so bad? Why all their conductors sound mechanical, their orchestras sound constipated and their performances ponderous and graceless? That would be because they didn’t use the RIAA curve. Switch to Teldec EQ when playing a DGG disc of almost any age and the musical improvement is huge. This is no subtle tonal trimming or “bit of added warmth”. This is so slap you in the face obvious that you’d have to be wantonly obtuse not to hear it. Likewise early Decca pressings, which gain, body, presence, rhythmic integrity, drama and a

remarkable sense of acoustic space – once you replay them with the correct EQ curve. This isn’t just about tonality; it’s about the whole energy spectrum, the sense of musical pace and dramatic shading, coherent space and coherent playing. Optimising EQ delivers better musicians delivering a better performance – and in the case of the Zanden (and a few other models) it really is as simple as pushing a button or turning a knob.

Which leaves me all the more bemused that record replay EQ is such a violently contentious subject. Never mind all those Japanese, Korean and European listeners who happily use this facility to increase their listening pleasure. Never mind those manufacturers who go to the not inconsiderable trouble of engineering the capability into their phono-stages (surely the most fragile of electronic designs). There is a small group of aggressively vocal EQ fundamentalists for whom RIAA is the word of the Lord and 1956 – or ’55 depending on who you listen to – was the Year Zero. EVERY record made after that date conformed to the RIAA standard – AND YOU’D BETTER BELIEVE IT! The problem is I don’t, and nor do a lot of other people. Not only was this particular bit of record industry bureaucracy virtually devoid of proper oversight (it covered literally dozens of separate and distinctly individual labels), the record production process itself is such that no individual is party to every step of the chain, or the technology employed, making the anecdotal evidence trumpeted so

“This isn’t just about tonality; it’s about the whole energy spectrum, the sense of musical place and dramatic shading.”


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’s

is now available for iPad and iPhone

hi- + can be downloaded to your Apple iPad easily as a subscription, single issues or back issues.

For more details visit www.hi plus.com or search for ‘Hi-Fi+’ on the App Store.

HIFI+ iPAD.indd 1 11/05/2011 10:30

31 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / ZANDEN 1200 MK III PHONO-STAGE

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONSEQ curves: RIAA, TELDEC, EMI, COLUMBIA, DECCA

Inputs: Low impedance MC cartridge x1

High impedance MC cartridge x1

Input impedance low: 36Ω, hi: 470Ω

Output impedance: 3kΩ

Gain Low MC: 68dB (1kHz, RIAA)

High MC: 56dB (1kHz, RIAA)

Frequency deflection: 0.5dB (20Hz - 20kHz) max

THD: 0.1% @ 300mv RMS output, 1kHz

Signal to Noise: -70dB (IHF-A, 5.0mv RMS)

Tube compliment: 6922 x4, 6CA4 x1

Price: £25,300

Manufactured by: Zanden Audio Systems

URL: www.zandenaudio.com

Distributed by: Audiofreaks

URL: www.audiofreaks.co.uk

Tel: +44(0)208 948 4153

loudly by the EQ Ayatollahs about as substantial as the hot air they expel when voicing their dogma.

Frankly, I couldn’t care less about the arcane debates regarding the date that this or that happened, or when that this or that label did what. I don’t need to, because I’ve got the only historical artifacts that matter to me – the records in my collection. When I play them I demagnetise them, de-stat them, use a clamp and adjust the VTA on a record-by-record basis. If the phono-stage in the system (not a choice I always get to make) offers adjustable EQ, then I select the appropriate curve and listen. If there’s any doubt I can select an alternative – normally RIAA. I mention this because part of this equation is what kind of listener you are. If you just want to put on a record and get on with it; if you own mainly post CD pressings or modern 180g audiophile discs; if you don’t bother with older or second-hand records – then you probably don’t need adjustable EQ curves.

But, if you own a large collection of older records (which I do); if you habitually hunt out early pressings (which I do); if you listen to a broad range of music, but especially early stereo recordings, be they classical, jazz or pop (all of which I do) then you owe it to yourself to investigate the issue of record replay EQ. Only you can decide whether it matters to you – and that is as much about who you are and what’s in your collection as it is about the clearly audible benefits. But for me, it represents a rotary switch that transforms

the musical virtues of around 40% of my record collection (Decca, EMI, DGG and Columbia) and that’s not something I’m going to willingly forego. The real beauty is that it’s a simple case of trial and error. Pick up the record you want to play, try it on one setting, try it on another and pick the one you prefer. Occasionally, you might need to try three different curves (a case in point being an EMI UK pressed Columbia SAX – where I tried RIAA, Columbia and EMI to be on the safe side – before settling on the expected EMI setting) but the preference will always, in my experience, be abundantly clear. No clutching at straws here, hit the correct curve and the music just sounds right.

The ability to really optimise record replay EQ has literally transformed my listening, opening the way to a whole host of artists and recordings that were previously unremarkable at best or so unrewarding as to be unlistenable at worst. It’s a huge musical bonus from the collection I already own – not to mention the opportunities it unveils for future secondhand purchases – and I have Zanden and their 1200 MkIII to thank for that revelation. Thank you Yamada-san. Thank you indeed.

I do) then you owe it to yourself to investigate the issue of record replay EQ. Only you can decide whether it matters to you – and that is as much about who you are and what’s

31 ISSUE 102

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS RIAA, TELDEC, EMI, COLUMBIA, DECCA

Low impedance MC cartridge x1

High impedance MC cartridge x1

Input impedance low: 36Ω, hi: 470Ω

Output impedance: 3kΩ

68dB (1kHz, RIAA)

56dB (1kHz, RIAA)

Frequency deflection: 0.5dB (20Hz - 20kHz) max

0.1% @ 300mv RMS output, 1kHz

-70dB (IHF-A, 5.0mv RMS)

6922 x4, 6CA4 x1

Zanden Audio Systems

www.zandenaudio.com

Audiofreaks

www.audiofreaks.co.uk

+44(0)208 948 4153

in your collection as it is about the clearly audible benefits. But for me, it represents a rotary switch that transforms

RIAA, TELDEC, EMI, COLUMBIA, DECCA

record replay EQ. Only you can decide whether it matters to you – and that is as much about who you are and what’s in your collection as it is about the clearly audible benefits. But for me, it represents a rotary switch that transforms

+


32 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

Arcam FmJ A19 integrated amplifier by Alan Sircom

Here’s the thing. No matter how far along the audiophile road you might be, no matter how good or big or expensive or posh your system is…

there’s always room for less. Maybe you are downshifting, maybe it’s a recommendation for someone not so far along the journey, maybe you are in the market for a second system, or maybe – just maybe – you never quite bought into the whole high-end dream and kept your financial feet on the ground. Whatever the point, sometimes you need an amp that isn’t a statement piece or an extravaganza. Sometimes, you just need a bloody good amp.

The Arcam A19 is a bloody good amp. On paper and externally at least, it’s a fairly run-of-the-mill affair, albeit with some handy

bonuses. It’s a 50W per channel integrated amp, set in Arcam’s seemingly unchanging Full Metal Jacket livery

(which already makes it heavier than many of its similarly priced rivals), but the kind with a display. It comes with a built-in – and by-passable – MM phono stage and five line-level inputs and tape loops – probably more than any mortal might need at this time. There’s also a decent headphone socket (more on that later) and a power feed for one of Arcam’s ever-increasing range of digital rProducts. The cynic might say the absence of a built-in DAC is to force people to use that Arcam link with something like an rDAC; Arcam says its because putting a DAC inside the case undermines the sound of the entire amplifier. Whatever, the host of rProducts on offer does add reasonably-priced flexibility that might be lost with just one on-board DAC (there’s four different models in total, including a natty Bluetooth DAC) and we should give Arcam the benefit of the doubt, because the brand isn’t known for its hoodwinking skills. It comes with a small, but quite natty little remote too.

We could bang on about run-in, placement, cables, conditioners and the rest and although the Arcam can talk that talk, it’s a more down-to-earth product at its core. Although the key to the FMJ aluminium and steel cases is noise and resonance reduction, the company has quietly dropped buzz-phrases like ‘Mask of Silence’ or ‘Phono Plug of Incredible Fortitude’ (I made one of those up). This is a plug it in and play it, no nonsense kind of amplifier. It just so happens that its no-nonsense approach comes in the shape of a very competent amplifier. It’s neatly load-tolerant compared to many of its rivals, with a meaty 320kVA power transformer, unless you are hooking it to some kind of amp-crushing abomination (unlikely given the price tag of the A19).

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / ArcAm FmJ A19 integrAted AmpliFier

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by Alan Sircom

“Put another way, this has to be just as good at playing Skrillex as it has to when playing Stravinsky, while using speaker cables from Wickes. And it’s here where the Arcam shines.”

Here’s the thing. Those who go by the spec sheet – but don’t really ‘get’ the spec sheet – will stop at the following term; it’s a chip-based amplifier, using monolithic output stages in place of discrete output devices. Cue the inevitable snorts of derision from audio’s arsonists, who have no need to hear something in order to pour scorn on it. But here’s the other thing. If you weren’t in possession of that little ‘monolithic’ nugget of info, and simply heard this amplifier hooked to a pair of good loudspeakers, you’d never know. Instead, you’d just think “what a bloody good amplifier!” and be done with it.

I say this because that was precisely my voyage of discovery with the A19, albeit with a little twist. I spent the majority of the listening test completely unaware of what went on under the A19’s hood, and just enjoyed it as an amplifier in and of itself. It was only after the bulk of the test was done, that the nature of the amp revealed in research, never in sound.

In a way, lower priced amplifiers have a tougher task than their higher-end brothers, because the music played through them is not the reasonably predictable mix of classical, jazz and well-recorded rock that audiophiles gravitate toward. This amp is an amp of the people (by price and performance) and as a consequence has to do well without too much pampering and with popular tastes. Put another way, this has to be just as good at playing Skrillex as it has to when playing Stravinsky, while using speaker cables from Wickes. And it’s here where the Arcam shines.

It’s an unassuming amplifier that goes well with everything. It’s one of those designs that makes the best of impressive cables but doesn’t demand them – buy some if you fancy treating yourself, not as a mandatory part of the whole audio process. It’s also extremely load tolerant (within broadly defined parameters – it will make most loudspeakers at the price sound as they should, rather than as the A19 allows them to sound, but it will struggle to make a great sound from a speaker with an impedance that drops too low). Best of all though, it’s equally adept at everything you can think of musically, within reason (and yes, I did play Skrillex’ ‘Bangarang’ and Stravinsky conducting himself on the Rite of Spring).

The A19’s strongest point is its equanimity. Play Rutter’s Requiem on Reference Recordings and it’s all about the large-scale imagery and the sheer detail. Put on Leonard Cohen and it’s all about the vocal articulation, put on Daft Punk and it’s all about the rhythm. It doesn’t do any of these things with the absolute precision of the ‘anointed one’ amplifiers that excel in those particular facets of performance, but instead it does everything well.

This has the great advantage of not drawing your attention to the audio chain, but the music. The good stuff extends the test listening sessions, but

the really good stuff gets played way beyond formal listening tests, and this got a lot of playtime. I could happily live with this amplifier for the longest time, if my magic reviewer powers were suddenly to leave. And this is the cheapest amplifier I’ve been able to say that of in some time. The little Rega Brio R has some competition on its hands.

The only specific aspects I’d highlight about the A19’s performance is the outstanding bass and OK dynamic range. There’s a sense of grip and order to the bass; it’s perhaps not the deepest around (although the wubby-wub-wub dubstep beats of the first James Blake album was portrayed with a lot of earth-moving energy) but it’s precise enough to delineate the fast playing of Stanley Clarke on his School Days album.

The limits are those of any 50W amplifier that doesn’t have the sort of power reserves of a big old Krell. Large scale orchestral pieces with great dynamic sweeps (such


34 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / ArcAm FmJ A19 integrAted AmpliFier

technicAl SpeciFicAtionSContinuous power output (20Hz—20kHz

at 0.5% THD), Both channels, 8Ω, 20Hz—

20kHz: 50W

inputs

Phono (MM) cartridge

Input sensitivity at 1kHz: 5mV

Input impedance: 47kΩ + 100pF

Frequency response (ref. RIAA curve):

20Hz—20kHz ± 1dB

Signal/noise ratio (Awtd) 50W, ref. 5mV

input: 80dB

Overload margin, 50mV at 1kHz: 20dB

Line and AV inputs

Nominal sensitivity: 1V

Input impedance: 10kΩ

Maximum input: 4.6Vrms

Frequency response: 20Hz—20kHz ±

0.2dB

Signal/noise ratio (Awtd) 50W, ref. 1V

input: 105dB

outputs

Preamplifier output

Nominal output level: 630mV

Output impedance: 230Ω

Heaphones Output

Maximum output level into 600Ω: 4V

Output impedance: 1ohm

Load range: 16Ω—2kΩ

Accessory power output

Using accessory power cable supplied,

provides two 2.1mm DC connectors:

6V, 1A

Dimensions W x D x H (including feet):

43.2 x 27.5 x 8.5cm

Weight: 8.5kg

Price: £650

Manufactured by: Arcam

URL: www.arcam.co.uk

Tel: +44(0)1223 203200

as the first and last movements of Solti’s rendition of Mahler’s Eighth Symphony, on Decca) get to sound hard and harsh unless played at very low levels. However, the soundstage rarely folds into itself unless pushed to the extreme, so the double-whammy of an amplifier approaching its end-stops is avoided. Personally, I think there will be many who would live happily with the compromise of not playing perhaps five pieces of music as loud as they might like, for the financial savings made. And if you use a pair of speakers that make good partners for the A19, chances are you are not going to notice those limits in the amplifier anyway.

When it comes to loudspeaker partners, I used the A19 with my discontinued but still excellent Avalon NP2.0 floorstanders to great effect, feeling no great need to change a thing. And, although I didn’t have chance to test it personally, the Arcam A19 has been used with the KEF LS50 often enough at shows, and is recommended so heavily by those who put systems together, that it seems an obvious recommendation. And the amp is more than good enough to partner the LS50 well.

Finally, there’s that headphone socket. It’s both detailed and powerful enough to benefit from and warrant the use of some of the more rewarding, but hard to drive headphones currently in circulation. However, as all of those are worth more than the amplifier itself, we’re unsure how many HiFiMAN or Audeze headphones will end up benefitting from the A19’s output. But that just means, every headphone commonly used with such a design – even including more meaty 600-ohm professional headphones – shouldn’t pose a problem.

Arcam rarely makes a dog’s breakfast of an amplifier, but there are good amps and good amps. This one’s exceptional. This one is Arcam hitting it for six, knocking one out of the park, and all the other vaguely sport-related clichés that point to something excellent. +


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35 High End Cable Full HiFi101.indd 35 17/07/2013 14:42

36 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

REL R-218 by Jason Kennedy

The R-218 is a fairly compact not quite cuboid subwoofer that stands 13.6 inches high on its aluminium feet. It has a down firing ten inch paper drive unit

and a class D amplifier designed in-house by Bill Herman for grip with green credentials. The cabinet itself is more complex than it appears with an MDF exterior bonded to a marine ply inner box in order to increase stiffness. The feet are also higher than they were on the preceding Series R to allow for a longer throw driver which in turn should mean greater power.

The controls drive high, LFE and low level inputs with the former being recommended for stereo 2.1 systems and connected by a Neutrik Speakon plug that is supplied with acres of cable. I have one complaint about this cable and that’s that you need to look at the manual to establish that the yellow core is positive on the right channel, black is negative and red positive on the left channel. Labelling would be great here. Placement and set-up are more complex than with regular speakers. REL recommends a corner on either side of the speakers and gives comprehensive notes and material suggestions for the process. It took a while but in the end I had managed to augment the bottom end of PMC Fact.8 floorstanders with the R-218 in an integrated and coherent fashion. However by the next day there was too much bass so I turned down both level and crossover by a couple of degrees.

And a lot of fun it is too, but not in quite the way I was expecting. For a start the 218 does not extend the bass dramatically further than the Fact.8. It does however unearth plenty of low notes that are beyond the speaker’s reach and that is the point after all, I suspect that if I want to feel an anvil hitting the deck one of the bigger subs will be required. What I heard however was more

than enough to make the R-218 seem quite a useful addition to the system. Oddly it has a similar effect to a super tweeter, expanding the scale of the soundstage significantly on pretty much everything you play, regardless of whether there are serious low notes in the mix. You can hear what the air was doing during the recording, which seems odd but it’s another way of saying that the reverberant characteristics are better presented so that the scale of the environment is clearer. Kraftwerk’s Tour De France has some nice low notes on it, not least on ‘Elektrokardiogram’, which can be uncomfortable with

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / REL R-218

TEchnicaL SpEcificaTionS

Type: Down firing active woofer

Active Drive Unit: 10 in., 250mm long

throw, steel chassis

Lower Frequency Response in Room:

25Hz at -6 dB

Input Connectors: Hi Level Neutrik

Speakon, Lo Level single phono,

LFE phono

Gain Control Range: 80 dB

Power Output: 250 watts (RMS)

Phase Switch: Yes, 0 or 180 degrees

Amplifier Type: Class D

Protection System Fully Electronic

with SET SAFE: Dimensions (WHD),

Including Feet: 12 x 13.6 x 12.5 in., (305 x

346 x 318 mm)

Net Weight: 29 lbs. (13.2 kg)

Finish: Gloss Piano Black or White Lacquer

Supplied Accessories Mains Lead,

Neutrik Speakon Interconnect 10

Meters Nominal

Price: £850

Manufacturer: REL Acoustics

Url: rel.net

Tel: (+44 1656) 768-777

some full range speakers. Here however it made more sense, you could feel the depth but the REL exerts sufficient control to stop it becoming distorted.

One effect that will suit some better than others is a slight smoothing of the midrange. I enjoyed the relaxation that the R-218 brings to the presentation, but can imagine that those looking for a more intense presentation might not. It’s hard to understand why this should occur but one possibility is that the sonic picture is less black and white, you can hear more of the harmonics and so transients are not so clear cut. One benefit is that you can play at higher volume levels without discomfort; on James Blake’s ‘Limit to Your Love’ the bass drum really connects to the room, so much so that a door started to rattle, but there’s no getting away from its visceral appeal.

I also like the way that the REL digs out low notes that had previously been only hinted at, on Laura Marling’s ‘Breathe’ for instance the bass drum has far more depth and reverb on it than previously encountered. It’s also important to point out that timing is not affected by the presence of this sub, the leading edges still take charge in this respect and the sub provides the back up but does not blur.

I also used the R-218 with Q-Acoustics’ remarkable Concept 20 standmount, which is not only a more appropriate size but also available in the same finish. Here the extension was rather more marked and thus the

benefit greater, in all other respects the effects were the same. More finesse through the mids and highs, greater spaciousness in the image and a generally wider angle view of the music.

I suspect that a bigger sub would be more fun but the R-218 is a very effective and room friendly device in rather dashing attire. Having got used to it I realise that it’s going to be difficult to let go, but such is the reviewer’s lot (cue violins!). Actually violin sounds superb, somehow more natural because of the extra dimension that the sub brings out of the venue and because it gets rid of the grain in digital formats that instruments like this can reveal. It’s a world of adventure with a sub like this I can tell you.+

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C

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CM

MY

CY

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AD_Unlimited Mk II_A4_2013Jul_hires.pdf 1 10/07/2013 22:09

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40 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

MonoPulse Model S by Paul Messenger

MonoPulse is one of Britain’s smaller speaker makers, but it has been around for more than a decade, has a very distinctive range of speakers, enjoys a steady demand (especially from Scandinavia), and seems

perfectly happy to remain a small operation.The current line-up consists of three models – two

floorstanders (A is for audiophile, S for slim) and one stand-mount (C is for compact). The £1,775/pair Model S is the smaller of the former, all of which share much in the way of technical features and physical presentation. In a business dominated by wood-veneered boxes, it’s a pleasant change to find a cloth-covered speaker in a selection of colours.

That said, this relatively new model does represent a significant change for MonoPulse. For example, the Model S is significantly simpler than the 62S, which is arguably its immediate predecessor. Lacking the latter’s supertweeter it’s a simple two-way, and the elaborate metal-framed enclosure is replaced by a more conventional rectilinear box.

Our examples came nearly all in black, decorated by cerise (ie pink!) highlights. Most is cloth, though the back panel is leather adorned by cerise stitching, and the top surface is a carbon fibre panel surrounded by cerise piping; just below the drivers, a matching badge embellishes the front. Another distinctive (and welcome) touch is a carrying handle, usefully integrated into the back panel and facilitating moving the speakers around for best imaging and bass evenness.

Neater still in my view is the floor-coupling arrangement. Putting spikes directly into the base of a speaker as slim and shallow as this (18cm x 20cm) is a recipe for a knock-over disaster, which MonoPulse counters by means of a very neat arrangement using chunky steel outriggers. These are retracted for packing and transit, but each may then

be pulled out to expand the footprint by slackening and re-tightening a couple of bolts. Thumbwheel-equipped spikes are then attached at the ends, ensuring a firm fix with no risk of stripping threads, and keeping the enclosure’s port (that fires downwards through the base) clear of the floor. Said port is tuned to a claimed 39Hz, and worked fine under our conditions, but additional damping tubes are available FOC if required. The speaker is normally aligned for a listening ‘window’ about 90cm from the floor, though the spike heights may be adjusted to tilt this optimum axis slightly up (or down) to suit your favoured listening height.

The key technical feature here lies in offsetting the drivers with respect to each other and the listening zone. Close inspection is difficult because the drivers appear to be rear-mounted and are well covered by a fixed and decidedly opaque cloth grille. The tweeter appears to be sited below the bass/mid driver, and is also recessed to a rather greater degree than that provided by the normal baffle thickness. The two drivers are electrically linked via what’s described as a ‘patented asymmetric’ crossover network, the objective being to maintain accurate impulse synchronicity and precise musical leading edges through the crossover region.

The driver line-up consists of a 160mm (nominal frame diameter) bass/mid unit with a polypropylene cone, plus a 28mm fabric dome tweeter that operates above 3.5kHz and is fed via a fourth-order (24dB/octave) crossover network. The accompanying leaflet might be brief, but it’s very much to the point, and includes an unusual amount of useful advice.

The manufacturer’s specified 87dB sensitivity is confirmed in our tests, which is a good figure in view of the speaker’s fine bass extension to 25Hz (-6dB in-room). However, although the impedance is generally held above 8 ohms through most of the band, it does dip abruptly to around 4 ohms in the crossover region (at 4kHz), somewhat compromising the amplifier loading. The port output looks well damped and is tuned to 38Hz, though the impedance also reveals a significant little peak at 210Hz (the same as that seen on the 62S model), probably due to the vertical standing wave inside the enclosure.

In most respects the far-field averaged in-room response is rather impressive, though it’s not particularly smooth, does tend to emphasise the higher frequency part of the spectrum, and shows somewhat alarming 3dB peak at around 4.1kHz, immediately followed by a dip at 6.1kHz.

“A matching badge embellishes the front. Another distinctive (and welcome) touch is a carrying handle, usefully integrated into the back panel and facilitating moving the speakers around for best imaging and bass evenness.”

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I thought it would be interesting to dig out my 2010 62S measurements, to see how the newcomer compares to this similar but also somewhat different earlier model. The bass is now slightly better damped, and relative output (and sensitivity) is significantly enhanced through the broad midband. The big difference is seen in the presence band (1.5-4kHz), where the newer Model S is significantly too strong, whereas the 62S had shown a modicum of restraint here (like the majority of commercial designs),

Unfortunately, that measured presence excess is directly reflected in, and tends, initially at least, to dominate the sound quality. The Model S has a bright, light tonal balance that certainly favours low level listening, as it can start to sound rather sharp and aggressive – not to mention a tad fatiguing – if you want to turn the volume up high.

It’s certainly true that this presence ‘forwardness’ does offer certain advantages, especially in the way it makes speech unusually clear and intelligible even at very low listening levels. Despite a somewhat ‘edgy’ quality, it brings a welcome openness to the overall character, and there’s no denying that one does adjust quite quickly to the departure from strict neutrality. But there’s also no denying the effect is fairly obvious, particularly when the speakers are first connected, and it does remain a notable characteristic, even once one’s ears have made the adjustment.


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The manufacturer claims that this design delivers superior leading edge definition, and I can’t disagree with the assertion that the Model S has fine overall coherence, and in this respect is somewhat reminiscent of that achieved by loudspeakers using single full-range drivers. Stereo imaging is precise right across the soundstage, and even shows reasonable depth perspectives despite the forward tonal balance.

Dynamics could have more grip and a greater sense of drama, though in fairness this aspect of the performance is pretty typical of a speaker of this sensitivity and type. Much the same is true for the dynamic range, which is much as one might expect, but doesn’t set any new records in this regard.

One obvious if perhaps somewhat surprising strength lies in the bass region, which might be a little dry for some tastes, but which is also impressively smooth, even and deep. This ensures that the speaker provides a firm underpinning to bass-rich material without any of the boomy exaggeration that is regrettably all to common, especially amongst modest port-loaded designs.

Sufficiently ‘different’ in both appearance and tonal balance, the MonoPulse Model S certainly justifies its existence in a marketplace that all too crowded with lookalike and soundalike clones. This is certainly not a speaker that’s been designed either by committee or computer programme, and that alone must be a good thing. The presence forwardness will certainly not suit every taste. When the volume is turned up the sound can become a bit

Technical SPecificaTionS

Make: MonoPulse

Model: S

Drive units: 160mm bass/mid with polypropylene cone

28mm soft fabric dome tweeter

Sensitivity (claimed and measured): 87dB

Measured frequency response

(in-room far-field averaged): 24Hz – 20kHz ±6dB

Impedance (claimed): 8 ohms (nominal & minimum)

Impedance (measured): 8 ohms nominal, 4 ohms minimum

Max power: 250W max, 150W continuous

Dimensions (WxHxD): 18x91x20 cm

Weight: 11kg

Price: £1,775/pair

Contact: MonoPulse

URL: www.monopulse.co.uk

Tel: 07785 558238

edgy, exaggerating some individual instruments in the mix, but it also ensures plenty of explicit detail when playing at low late-at-night levels. Add in the fine overall coherence, precise imaging and the dry, even and extended bass and it all adds up to a very neat overall package. +


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EQUIPMENT REVIEW

RCM Audio THERIAA phono stage by Alan Sircom

RCM Audio might not be the first name you reach for when it comes to up-scale phono stages. The company is a small six-man affair out of Katowice, in Poland. When not making phono stages, RCM’s other job is a Polish high-end

importer with brands like SME and Dynavector in its arsenal, so perhaps its resolutely turntable-related product line (just three products, two of which are phono stages alongside an integrated valve amplifier) makes sense.

RCM Audio’s best-known product up to this time was the Sensor Prelude IC, a two box IC based MM/MC phono stage with passive RIAA equalisation, in two drab boxes. This sub-£2,000 phono preamp is the kind of giant killer that many have compared favourably to practically every phono stage irrespective of price, and has a habit of turning reviewers into owners in minutes. It was so good in fact that it was hard to see how to better it, unless you are in the habit of referencing things by their size and thickness of front panel. The nearest thing to criticism of the RCM (prosaic nature of the cases aside) was that it had relatively limited cartridge loading options, especially compared to top-flight stages from Pass and Burmester.

This created something of a conundrum for RCM Audio. The Sensor Prelude IC was almost too cheap for today’s high-end buyers, but getting significantly better performance from what is one of today’s best phono stages was proving difficult. However, learning from the Sensor Prelude IC allowed the company to come up with THERIAA. In fact, the THERIAA could be summed up as a dual mono, high-specification

version of the Sensor, but without the small value decoupling capacitors dotted around the circuit.

It is still a two box IC-based MM/MC phono stage with passive RIAA equalisation, in two boxes, albeit ‘drab’ is replaced with ‘well-built, but functional’. But the sophistication of the adjustable gain and loading (this time using expensive Omron DIP switches) and an expensive laundry list of high-spec components from Elna, Nichicon, Vishay and more has helped bring the linearity to the RIAA curve from an already deeply impressive ±0.3dB to a remarkable ±0.1dB across the 20Hz-20kHz range.

That ‘well-built, but functional case’ – made by Fischer Elektronic of Germany – is not just for show. The case is made from anodised aluminium with custom damping plate and the 10mm thick aluminium partitions that entirely separate the two channels help to minimise any potential environmental noise pollution, which can be a problem specific to trying to eek out the maximum performance out of a cartridge. It will never appeal to those who are looking for highly polished front panels and delicate curves milled into an inches-thick panel, but if you value the sound of your LPs rather than the look of your replay system, this is for you.

RCM Audio recommends using the phono stage in balanced mode throughout if possible (this isn’t as odd as it sounds, the output from a cartridge runs in balanced operation) and it makes a difference. I used it with an SME Model 10 and principally with the Benz SLR cartridge as a front end, into a number of amplifier and speaker combinations to see

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / RCM AudIo THERIAA pHono sTAgE

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if the ‘wow’ I got when using it into something illustrious also applied when using it with things a bit more down to earth. It might be odd using a phono stage that costs four and a bit times as much as the Sugden A21se it was connected to, but the ‘wow’ factor shone through nevertheless.

It’s principle ‘wow’ factor likes in its absolute honesty. The kind of honesty you realise you don’t hear that often from phono stages until you hear something like THERIAA. Here’s how it works; you put on one record, shake your head in disbelief because you must be hearing things, then put on the next and realise, no, it wasn’t some kind of hallucination. It really is that good. I put it up against the lovely sounding Pass Labs two boxer we use as the studio reference phono stage (which just happens to be a close price match and just as flexible in cartridge loading). The Pass is a fixture because it combines excellent detail resolution with an ability to prevent the poor sound of some vinyl recordings from undermining the enjoyment of the album. It does this by sounding a touch ‘warm’. But THERIAA does the same, and does it by sounding absolutely honest. I’ve got a dodgy Spanish import of Dylan’s Blood On The Tracks that I use for this kind of torture, because it sounds like it came off the 1,500th generation 8-track master and was pressed on ‘oil crisis’ vinyl that is almost see through. Most make it sound thin and weedy, because it is, and an unloved version of a beloved classic album of pain and divorce. The Pass works because it warms up the sound, but THERIAA works to bring out that thin and weedy sound and still make it sound like Dylan’s arguably finest hour. It doesn’t mask it, warm it up or present it as something other than it is, and in the process makes a sound more insightful than many stages.

Naturally, this also makes THERIAA extremely good at determining the difference in vinyl quality. I have a good version of Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours and an outstanding version on two 45rpm thick slabs of near-silent vinyl. Not only does THERIAA let you know which one is which with unquestioning accuracy, but lets you ‘in’ on the music in both.

I realised quickly with THERIAA that the words are all about the quality of everything else in the chain apart from the phono stage. That’s because it’s one of those rare pieces of equipment that doesn’t impose itself on the signal chain. These are rare in the extreme in phono stages. Here, there is an absence of character, letting you hear either what your phono cartridge is doing, or – better yet – precisely what is happening in those grooves. In a way, what this reminds me of in the world of phono stages is the

Burmester 100, which borders of being an archival-grade phono stage for transcribing albums in a forensic manner. In some ways, THERIAA has the edge over the Burmester, because there is the merest sense of additional richness to the Model 100 that THERIAA doesn’t have. And yet, for all that, it’s never stark or etched. It’s just… the sound of vinyl.

I know there will be those who object to the concept of a high-priced phono stage that doesn’t include a range of EQ curves, but this delivers such a powerful and honest performance on RIAA, I don’t really care. If I had a lot of records cut in the ‘red zone’ (pre-RIAA mono recordings and some of those more controversial late 1950s/early 1960s stereo pressings that may or may not be following the RIAA curve) I might be more upset, but I’d be more upset that I couldn’t get THERIAA performance on more than RIAA. However, the name is a bit of a giveaway – but I guess THERIAACOLUMBIATELDECEMIDECCA is a bit of a mouthful.

Otherwise the sole criticism I can think of is now one of excess, but excess in the right way. This is a demanding phono stage; not in a fussy, ‘make a mistake and I’ll tell your


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TECHnICAl spECIfICATIons

Input Sensitivity: 0.2-5mV (adjustable)

Gain: 52-76dB (2Vrms output)

Input impedance: 20ohm – 47kohm

Input capacitance: 100pF

Input mode: balanced/unbalanced

Input: RCA

THD: 0.01%

Signal to noise ratio: 85dB

RIAA linearity: ±0.1dB (20Hz-20kHz)

Output impedance: 70ohm

Output level: 2Vrms (nominal), 9Vrms (max)

Dimensions: 44x26.5x12cm (preamp), 20.5x27x10.5 (PSU)

Weight: 13.5kg

Price: £8,795

Manufactured by: RCM Audio

URL: www.rcm.com.pl

Distributed by: Select Audio

URL: www.selectaudio.co.uk

Tel: +44(0)1900 601954

friends’ kind of way, but more in a ‘if you don’t have a deck and cartridge of the best quality, you’ll think this is just another phono stage’ manner. It will always sound extremely good, but the ‘remarkable’ part that will have you up all night playing records only happens when everything is in place. This means some with good phono front ends will likely compare something like the Sensor Prelude IC with THERIAA and conclude there’s not much of a difference to justify the price hike. Those with a front-end worthy of being in such vaulted company will have no such qualms and hear a monumental difference between THERIAA and mere mortal phono stages.

The thing about RCM Audio’s THERIAA is it could pass unnoticed next to the big guns. But it’s actually the kind of product that defines the best of high-end audio, a phono stage that just replays vinyl masterfully. No fuss, no frills, no fancy-schmancy casework, no big budget marketing campaign or slick salespeople telling you how wonderful it is. You just plug it in, and know how good it is, if your vinyl chain is up to the challenge. If you take your vinyl seriously, be thankful things like THERIAA exist, because they show there’s more to high-end audio than meets the eye. +


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EQUIPMENT REVIEW

German Physiks Unlimited Mk II loudspeakers by Alan Sircom

German Physiks is one of those brands that makes a fairly broad range of loudspeakers, but traditionally they all have three things in common; they are omnidirectional, they need large rooms to work well, and they need deep pockets to own. In some cases, make that very large rooms and very,

very deep pockets; the top Gaudi Mk II finished in carbon fibre will set you back more than €300,000 per pair. But with room sizes at an all-time low and purse strings tightened to the point where you can pluck out a tune on them, something more down-to-earth was needed.

Ironically, given the nearly limitless budget needed to reach its top range, that down-to-earth model is called the Unlimited Mk II. It is designed specifically to bring the German Physiks omni sound into small rooms.

The key to the German Physiks sound is the carbon-fibre ‘DDD’ loudspeaker unit, which sits at the top of the Unlimited Mk II’s simple, satin finish cabinet. And the reason why DDD is key, is it’s the same mid-treble driver found in all the brand’s speakers this side of about £35,000 and the same basic design as found throughout. As you go up the range, so the number of DDD units, the type of bass loading and the number of bass units in the system increases, but essentially the Unlimited Mk II could be considered the fighting weight version of some truly awesome loudspeakers.

The Dicks Dipole Driver (DDD) is based on a concept minted 35 years ago by mathematician and engineer Peter Dicks, although production samples didn’t appear for another 15 years, under the German Physiks banner. Dicks helped create a design that addressed fundamental problems inherent to drive-units; specifically in terms of cone break-up, phase and directionality. The driver essentially works as a four-way system, at low frequencies working pistonically in its resonant range, then pistonically above resonance, next moving progressively into bending wave mode and finally using modal radiation at high frequencies. This is a massive oversimplification of some very sophisticated mathematical modelling, which resulted in a drive unit that looks like a downward firing horn, but behaves in some very clever ways. Those with encyclopaedic audio memories might recall a similar design from Ohm called the model ‘F’ that used a similar ‘Walsh’ technology, but put simply the DDD brings that design into the modern age, with use of materials like carbon fibre.

In fact the term ‘put simply’ neatly goes on to describe the Unlimited Mk II. It’s that DDD unit, put simply. It’s sitting atop of a vinyl wrapped pillar with a downfiring 200mm bass unit. Only the name on the ‘hat’ atop the DDD unit and a pair of speaker terminals mark it out as a speaker, and not a plinth on which you might use to display a bust in an art gallery.

The Unlimited Mk II has a reasonably simple demand when it comes to partnering amplification – current. It’s not an especially demanding loudspeaker when it comes to the power output of an amplifier – you could

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C-1.1 D-1 C-1.1D-1

C-1.1 C-1.1C-4.1

C-1.1

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / German Physiks Unlimited mk ii loUdsPeakers

“the Unlimited Mk II takes some getting used to. How much getting used to depends on how much live, unamplified music you listen to in the flesh. If you go to regular concerts and recitals, the transition to understanding... is fairly speedy.”

happily use it with a good small 50 watt amplifier design, or impress your audiophile chums with a kilowatt powerhouse, because the loudspeaker is hugely tolerant of such things. What it likes though is good stiff current delivery. I used a range of amplifiers, everything from the Arcam A19 (not a good match) to the Devialet D-Premier (sublime) with valves and solid state and hybrids and everything in between. In my opinion, the best balanced ‘matches’ in a purely sound per pound manner (that’s pounds sterling, not pounds avoirdupois) were the Naim SuperNAIT and Sugden’s evergreen A21se.

The purpose of the Unlimited Mk II is two-fold, to keep the price low, and to make an omnidirectional loudspeaker that works in the smallest of rooms. That last demands some care with positioning, but perhaps not in the way you’d imagine. The mid and top ends are reasonably easy to integrate into a room, although they could do with the speaker being about 30cm from the rear and side walls. The bass, on the other hand, needs to be handled with a little more care. You may find the speakers need to be slightly further out into the room to integrate the deep bass with the rest of the speaker sound. This is in part because the upper bass to the treble is so well integrated, the disconnect between the bass and the rest of the presentation is that bit more noticeable if not right. But the good thing is you can hear when it’s in the right position

better, because suddenly there isn’t that half octave inconsistency at the far left hand of the piano.

The Unlimited Mk II takes some getting used to. How much getting used to depends on how much live, unamplified music you listen to in the flesh. If you go to regular concerts and recitals, the transition to understanding the Unlimited Mk II is fairly speedy, but if instead you listen mostly to recordings of that live, unamplified music it might take some time to shake off the time spent in front of boxes.

But when – if – you get it, you begin to hear things very differently. The pin-point stereo image is gone, replaced instead by the sort of flow you get to hear in the concert hall, and the loudspeakers do a fine job of disappearing. One of the concerns here is when you go back to more studio-oriented albums, with a singer front and centre; if they become diffused, the overall presentation can be ruined. That didn’t happen here – even the a cappella version of Tom’s Diner by Suzanne Vega presented a right sized living, breathing and articulate person standing in front of the listener, rather than a disembodied floating head. The uncanny thing is that it did not matter where you sat in the room. German Physiks’ slogan sounds a little Marxist – “Free yourself from the tyranny of the sweet spot” (it could be ‘Audiophiles of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your cushions.’) – but it’s a fair point, you can sit remarkably off axis and still hear a fully stereophonic sound.

Vocals aside, it’s orchestral music that really shows what the Unlimited Mk II is capable of, although one of those occasional Radio 4 documentaries that has an ‘aural soundscape’ proved fantastically enveloping. Saint Saens Symphony No 3 (Munch/Boston SO, Living Stereo) had a sense of musical occasion that is generally either connected to the beauty of the soundstage (at the expense of everything else) or the temporal information (also at the expense of everything else).


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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / German Physiks Unlimited mk ii loUdsPeakers

technical sPecificationsOperating Principle: two-way

loudspeaker with 360° surround radiation

Frequency Response: 32Hz-24kHz

Sensitivity: 88dB/W/m

Impedance: Four Ohms

Power Handling (Nominal/Maximum):

110W/170W

Amplification required: Minimum

90W/4ohms

Crossover frequency: 200Hz

Crossover slopes:

DDD Section: 6dB/octave (electronic),

18dB/octave (acoustic)

Woofer Section: 18dB/octave

(electronic & acoustic)

Input connectors: 1x binding posts

Drivers: 1x carbon-fibre DDD driver, 1x

200mm woofer

Finish: satin white, black, light grey or

dark brown vinyl

Dimensions (WxHxD): 24x105x24cm

Weight: 28.9kg


Manufactured by: German Physiks

URL: www.german-physiks.com


Tel: +49 6109 5029823

This cut through all that and just made it sound like the sound of music in your room. Neither a hologram of the concert hall, nor a tapping-foot’s eye view (how’s that for bad anatomy?); just the music plain and simple. I moved over to Sigur Rós ‘()’ album, and stayed there through the whole emotionally draining ambience of it all. That becomes so enveloping, it’s as much a therapy session as a musical experience, and you come away entranced and ultimately uplifted for going through those feelings. They perhaps don’t ‘rock out’ too well.

The best way of describing the Unlimited Mk II performance is it’s a bit like listening to a live recording in an adjacent room, only without any of the attenuation the walls create. You know there’s a live event taking place, because the sound is dynamic and ‘real’, but there’s no imagery, and no need for imagery. If that makes any kind of musical sense to you, the German Physiks sound should be checked out.

Bass, even when properly integrated, is designed for use in a small room, so don’t expect the deepest, most delineated bass possible. I’d also say if you are really into music that lives in that 50Hz-80Hz region (say, a lot of dub reggae or organ music… and that’s probably the only time those two genre make happy bedfellows) you might find the difference between pistonic and bending wave designs just too abrupt a change and will settle for a series of dynamic drivers (the same can be said for dynamic subwoofers with electrostatic panels), but I think for those who really ‘get’ the German Physiks sound, that wouldn’t be a compromise, it would be a sacrifice.

That’s the thing about the Unlimited Mk II. It is not for everyone, but it should be on everyone’s list. It has one of those sounds that if it gets into your head, you will not be happy with anything else, and even the least ‘hi-fi’ sounding box of cones and domes will sound contrived. +


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EQUIPMENT REVIEW

Sonus Faber Venere 2.0 loudspeakers by Alan Sircom

Since its acquisition by Fine Sounds, Sonus Faber faced something of a conundrum. Its higher end models, like the Homage series, retained – and in some cases, improved upon – the sumptuous finish and refined sound quality that was always a

function of the brand, but the lower end has to deal with new buyers coming to the brand, and their demands have changed significantly in recent years. Sadly, at that end, the days of wood and leather are coming to a close.

Although also available in a walnut finish and a gloss black, the white lacquer finish on the review pair of Sonus Faber Venere 2.0 standmounts would have been unthinkable a decade ago. But far from cheapening the brand, this is proving a popular choice among new generation music lovers. In fact, a lot of the old design cues are gone (it’s not a rectangular box wrapped in bits of tree, and the top-plate slopes down toward the listener, thereby making the loudspeaker neither a plant-pot holder nor a lookout tower for a cat) and – in part because these design elements are not simply there for show – the speaker’s are all the better for that.

As has been long-held at Sonus Faber, the Venere follows the lyre shaped body type, with the cabinet expanding out at the sides and then tapering off to the rear, to help eliminate internal standing waves from parallel cabinet walls. But recently, to help minimise the problem still further, the top plate of the cabinet has been raised fairly significantly. To make this look less like either a bishop’s mitre (or a ski jump), the Venere 2.0 is backtilted slightly on the custom stands (more on these later).

The larger of two standmounts in the Venere range, the 2.0 is, as the name suggests, a two-way design, with a letter-box port at the front and bi-wire terminals at the rear. The company doesn’t make its own drive units, but ‘specs’ units to its requirements from drive unit manufacturers of repute; this means Sonus Faber can take advantage of the skills of the driver maker, while getting a 29mm soft dome tweeter and 180mm composite polyproplyene ‘Curv’ cone woofer. The DKM-derived tweeter sits in a very deep oval horn, but this oval is wider top and bottom, yet again to allow better dispersion when slightly back-tilted. The product development follows an increasingly common trend of starting on the computer and ending in the listening room, but Sonus Faber takes this common concept a stage further to ensure the products

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Sonus Faber Venere 2.0 by Alan Sircom

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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / SONUS FABER VENERE 2.0 LOUDSPEAKERS

on the production line receive a degree of fine tuned listening to ensure they are both consistent and consistently good. Not that there’s much to tweak; just a simple first-order crossover.

In short, the Venere project is the result of a team effort, distinct from the lone designer or the giant corporate plans of a committee design from a huge company. The result is a lot of loudspeaker in a relatively inexpensive box, and that is only possible through the medium of audio’s most oft-repeated mantra today; designed in Europe, made in China. The Venere range – like so many products today – is built in a Chinese factory using SF-trained staff, in a manner not dissimilar to the training method used by B&W – engineers are flown to the original factory in Italy, trained up on the company’s top lines and when shown to have the skill set needed to make good speakers the Sonus way, they return to China in order to build us excellent loudspeakers at relatively reasonable prices.

This is not that Sonus Faber you lusted after years ago, it’s a far more polished and consistent design in many ways. That doesn’t mean this is a bland, soulless design, but that it is the kind of loudspeaker that appeals to a very wide audience. It’s also a distinctly high-end loudspeaker in terms of soundstage and overall refinement. That tweeter especially is a real honey, making a sound that’s extremely smooth and very accurate right up into the upper registers. The acid test here for me is Stevie Wonder’s ‘Superstition’ – nothing takes away from the sheer groove of the track, but Stevie Wonder’s drum work in the opening bars is one of the most varied hi-hat beats ever recorded and that is easy to get wrong. It can be masked, can be randomly too toppy, too flat or too extended. Here it is just right.

And it can keep up in some very good company. This is the kind of speaker you can listen to having spent some time in the company of extremely expensive high-end models. Yes, the high-end model is going to be better in terms of absolute detail, clarity (especially in the bass) and frequency extension, but the Venere

“In short, the Venere project is the result of a team effort, distinct from the lone designer or the giant corporate plans of a committee design from a huge company. The result is a lot of loudspeaker in a relatively inexpensive box, and that is only possible through the medium of audio’s most oft-repeated mantra today; designed in Europe, made in China”


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EQUIPMENT REVIEW / SonuS Faber Venere 2.0 loudSpeakerS

Technical SpeciFicaTionS

System: Two-way vented standmount

Tweeter: 29mm fabric dome

Mid-Woofer: 180mm Curv cone

Crossover Point: 2.5kHz

Frequency Response: 45Hz-25kHz

Sensitivity: 88dB SPL (2.83V/1m)

Nominal Impedance: 6 ohms

Suggested amplifier output: 50W-200W

Dimensions: (HxWxD, speaker only):

45x24.6x33.9cm

Weight: 7kg each:

Finish: Black or White High Gloss

Lacquer. Walnut Wood cost option

Price: £1,349 per pair (standard finish)

Stands £349 per pair

Manufactured by: Sonus Faber

URL: www.sonusfaber.com

Distributed by: Absolute Sounds

URL: www.absolutesounds.com

Tel: +44(0)208 971 3909

doesn’t make you reach for the volume control or the off button. When you play something distinctly audiophile in performance – The Astounding Eyes of Rita by Anouar Ibrahem (ECM) for example – the sound retains all the spatial information and tonal beauty of the CD. That it doesn’t quite have the precision or the ability to play as loud as things that cost 10x as much are some of the only concessions to price.

The bass is good too, given the relatively small size of the loudspeaker. It does have a distinct limit (Sonus Faber quotes 45Hz, but fails to state whether that’s 3dB down or more) and it doesn’t pull up those deep bass lines. It does seem to have a slight bloom in the upper bass around the 80Hz mark, but this just makes the speaker seem like its bass is deeper that it is in reality.

So where’s the big downside? Put simply, it’s sitting between the speakers and the floor. The tall, spindly-legged speaker stands are as elegant as the speakers themselves, but the elegance quickly gives way to frustration, because the MDF uprights are held in place top and bottom by three push in screw threads and bolts. My advice would be to consider a more rigid stand; I used the Kudos S50, which was not too far from an aesthetic match and sonically pulled the better part of half an octave back into the bass. It didn’t have the same height, but this was a trade-off worth making.

In terms of partnering and placing the loudspeakers (assuming a good stand), it really couldn’t be simpler. It’s about as fuss-free as you can get from a good speaker and although infinite care and attention will bring improvements, you’ll get 95% of the way there with even something like an Arcam A19 and just putting the speakers in a basic triangle, with the speakers at least half a metre from rear and side walls. Ultimately, the ‘move the speaker the length of three carbon atoms to the left’ is not important here. Care in toe-in is slightly more important, and – although it might not fit with the elegance of the design – does seem to work best by adjusting both toe-in and rake angle of one speaker, then using that as an ‘anchor’ to fine-tune installation. This is the way Sumiko (Sonus Faber’s US distributor) sets up loudspeakers, and it works well here. The only caveat to that is partnering it with a system heavy on the syrup. The 80Hz in-fill that gives rise to it sounding deeper in the bass than it really is can sound both too fat and too slow when used with something that has similar traits. The Sugden A21se for example is a fine amplifier in most cases, but sounded thick-set here. On the other hand, the so-detailed-it’s-almost-lean Devialet D-Premier sounded perfectly balanced.

There is something intrinsically right about this speaker and its sound. The Sonus Faber Venere range may be essentially the brand’s starter components, but it doesn’t look and it certainly doesn’t sound like it’s on the nursery slopes. This is the loudspeaker that fits two types of customer

“When you play something distinctly audiphile in performance – The Astounding Eyes of Rita by Anouar Ibrahem (ECM) for example – the sound retains all the spatial information and tonal beauty of the CD.”

perfectly; those wanting a taste of the high-end who never plan on upgrading, and those who are planning a touch of downscaling or second system designing without compromising those high-end ideals. Too many high-end entry points act as a sweet taste of the good stuff, enticing the listener to upgrade and spend more. This doesn’t… the Venere is all you need.+


59 KOG Full HiFi102.indd 59 17/07/2013 14:37

60 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

Alacrity Audio Caterthun Classic by Jason Kennedy

It’s an iron age Scottish hill fort apparently. What this has to do with a company based in the south of England or the two-way speaker that has taken the name is not clear, but it makes you look twice before you try and say it. Alacrity is a young company and this is its first product. It’s not the most impressive looking speaker for the £2,000 asking price and

the lack of badging or labelling of any kind suggests that it will stand or fall on performance alone. It cannot be easy to get a foothold in the hi-fi market today; the costs of manufacturing in small numbers means that it’s impossible to compete with the big boys. Most small companies tell me that every £10 they spend on parts equates to at least £100 on the retail price. That sounds extreme but the fact that the manufacturer only gets paid a third of the retail price gives some explanation. The only answer is to build something a little bit

different and hope to find a niche audience. This would appear to be Alacrity’s approach because on paper the Caterthun doesn’t look like it stands a chance, but in the same way that measurements can never tell you what a product sounds like, appearance and spec are equally deceptive.

The real wood veneer is very professional however and the drivers are of a high quality, but it takes more than that to compete in today’s hard fought market place. On the other hand, plenty of long standing brands started out the same way and only time will

tell whether Alacrity will join their ranks.The website describes the

Caterthun Classic as a boundary-proximity design, by which I understand that it is intended to be placed close to the rear wall. The front firing reflex port backs this up to some extent as does the pleated surround of the main driver. This is an uncommon sight on modern two-ways, and usually equates to high sensitivity and short excursion, but this is specified at 88dB, which is not unduly efficient. The cone appears to be polypropylene and is 120mm in diameter but sits in a 170mm chassis that sits on top of the cabinet rather than being recessed into it. The tweeter is less distinct and looks like a hundred others except for a short horn to assist sensitivity, the dome is a soft textile that’s rather larger than the 20mm indicated in the company’s specs, it’s closer to 25mm.

The cabinet itself is 16 inches tall and a little deeper than it is wide, Alacrity

supplied me with the bird’s eye maple version, which is a lovely veneer but does increase the price a little (£250). It has bi-

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62 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / AlAcrity Audio cAterthun clAssic

“I would go so far as to describe the Cathertun’s balance as ‘fruity’; it has quite a fulsome upper bass, which adds some extra juice to the overall presentation. It’s an appealing if less than neutral sound that makes for plenty of entertainment.”

wire connections on the back which I was strongly recommended to use, the absence of a bridging bar making this the only option. It is recommended that the speaker be placed 10 to 15cm from the rear wall for best results so I put them thereabouts on a pair of 60cm Custom Design stands. I then ran two lengths of Townshend Isolda EDCT speaker cable to, in the first instance, a Trilogy 990 power amp controlled by a Townshend Allegri and used my Resolution Audio Cantata Music Centre in its recently released UPnP guise. This delivers a smoother sound than my usual digital source and allowed the Caterthun to project Antonio Forcione’s guitar and Sabina Sciubba’s voice clearly into the room in an exuberant and bodacious fashion. I would go so far as to describe the Caterthun’s balance as ‘fruity’; it has quite a fulsome upper bass, which adds some extra juice to the overall presentation. It’s an appealing if less than neutral sound that makes for plenty of entertainment. Putting on Cornelius’ Sensuous which features an acoustic guitar bass string that gets looser with every pluck made me realise that the speaker might be a little too close to the wall, so I pulled it out a bit which improved focus but didn’t greatly change the balance.

I tried using the Cantata as a straight DAC with a Naim Unitiserve providing signal via a length of Chord Co’s remarkable Sarum

Tuned ARAY digital coax. This has greater edge definition and pace than the UPnP route, which helps liven up the Caterthun but not to the point where it starts to provide serious definition. It’s a warm, relaxed speaker that would rather deliver a musical sound than one that puts you on the edge of the seat, which bodes well for long term enjoyment. The only fly in this particular ointment is a spike in the upper midband that can jar on occasion, high piano notes seem prone to a glassiness that seems out of kilter with the rest of the presentation.

It does deliver rather appealing bass however, this is where the wall mounting and the driver choice clearly come into play. With the muscular piece Idemo Dalje by Speed Caravan there are some very low notes among the bludgeoning beats and these were delivered in remarkably well extended form. The Cathertun’s mellow presentation also helped to make this oft abrasive piece far more musically enjoyable. This was probably the first time I’ve listened to it all at an appropriate level, because while the leading edges are not as clear cut as they might be, the sense of timing is pretty good.

This means that more refined music also works well. In this instance, I enjoyed one of the late Beethoven Quartets (No.12 in E flat, Op.127, Alban Berg Quartet) which escapes the cabinets with ease and has plenty of tonal depth in this speakers’ hands. They also bring out the body in the cello, which underpins the piece nicely; all the listener needs to do is enjoy the emotional depth and gravitas that is so strong in the work.


63 ISSUE 102

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64 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / AlAcrity Audio cAterthun clAssic

technicAl specificAtions

Power Handling: 200 W (110 RMS)

Sensitivity: 88 dB

Minimum Impedance: 8 Ohms.

W x H x D: 205 x 415 x 250 mm

Weight: 10kg per cabinet

Crossover Frequency: 2.25 khz

Bi-wireable

Connections: 4mm Gold

Bass Port: Front Reflex

Drivers: LF 17cm Bass Mid / HF 25mm

Soft Dome

Finish: Range of oiled, real wood veneers


Manufacturer: Alacrity Audio

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Most of my listening was done with the Caterthun Blu-tacked to a metal stand with spikes into the carpet, but experimentation with support interfaces led me to try an alternative approach. The foam rubber feet supplied with Guru’s Junior bookshelf were attached to another stand (Hi-Fi Racks) and spaced appropriately for the Cathertun, but they are probably too soft for the heavier speaker. The change produced by this move was not subtle, the speaker produced considerably more shape, depth and speed with the relatively isolated mounting. I was quite surprised to find the sound got louder with no extra gain from the amp. It seemed to be an all round improvement especially if you enjoy a full scale soundstage and good pace, both of which were enhanced. The direct coupling of speaker to floor that spikes and Blu-tack produce has a tuning effect on the sound that will work better with some cabinet/stand combinations than others, but here I much preferred the relative isolation provided by the foam feet.

I also tried a different amp in the form of Naim’s new NAP 100. This half width design has a 60 watt output which is somewhat at odds with Alacrity’s instruction to use as much power as possible (or words to that effect). It nonetheless proved a rather good partner; its inherent musicality coming through and the pair delivering a vibrant result with a high fun factor. There still isn’t much of the LE definition that Naims are typically good at but no shortage of low end solidity.

I got more space and tonal richness from the Trilogy power amp, its extra grip also proving useful for extracting depth of bass. This pairing also worked in

beguiling fashion with female vocals. Stevie Nicks stands out in ‘Gold Dust Woman’ and you can appreciate just how easy it was to fall in love with her, or was that just me? Laura Marling is having the same effect on many today, her latest release ‘Once I Was an Eagle’ sounds a little warm on the Caterthun but it she is irresistible nonetheless.

The Alacrity Caterthun Classic is not another me-too loudspeaker. The man behind it, Jonathan Carrol, has some unconventional theories about speaker design and these are apparent in the sound. Whether this approach will suit your musical taste, room and electronics is hard to predict but it does at least offer a new variation on the theme. It also provides good results for a speaker that can sit near the wall which will be welcome in many households. It’s not the best speaker at its price by most measures, but it has an entertaining character that will suit some music lovers down to the ground. +


65 ISSUE 102

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67 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

Gutwire cable system by Alan Sircom

The name derives from the catgut strings traditionally used by classical musicians (which, in a peculiar twist of logic, are made from sheep intestine, and not the insides of Chairman Meow). Gutwire, however, bears no relationship

to the violinist’s strings of choice, but instead is a Canadian cable and accessories brand of some distinct note.

Gutwire’s cables are rare in the high-end world in that they are just good, solid high-purity copper, very well shielded using copper braid and Mylar, insulated with Teflon, hand-made and cold-welded… and those last two make the cables necessarily expensive. The great thing is this makes the cables remarkably consistent; what you get across the board is a very similar sound, just a sound capable of being used in more and more exotic systems as you climb the Gutwire ladder. This doesn’t happen so often with brands when you start with copper, go through silver-coated-copper and end up with adamantium-wrapped-kryptonite.

We can’t quite escape from the world of high-end materials science though; the top Vision speaker cables are laced with Germanium (Gutwire also made an iPhone 4/4S case that was made of Titanium and Germanium and cost a small fortune – and it made claims about Germanium releasing positive ions to help counteract the negative ionic effect of the modern world: all I know is it doesn’t fit if you use a glass protector on the read screen of the iPhone 4S).

You know the company is taking the whole thing

really seriously when you discover it also has a line

in vibration support, which has just been upgraded from NotePad to NotePad2.

The small pads are made from a combination of polyethylene, aluminium foil and nylon cloth. They look

like large versions of Black Ravioli, except they are designed to sit on top of a product, ideally in places like on top of a CD transport mechanism or an amplifier’s transformer. The pad did help quieten down the spinning disc drive of the Lyngdorf CD1’s transport mechanism slightly, but whether this was due to putting a 350g weight on the top plate of a CD player or down to its EMI and RFI absorbing properties remains to be seen. Still, it shows dedication to the cause. Naturally, I can’t determine whether the claim for the NotePad2 to degrade over time is a valid one, unless I sit on the review for another three to five years. That’s not sitting on the fence; it’s waiting for the fence to need a new coat of creosote.

So, instead of going for the nursery slopes of Gutwire, we went for the more impressive end of the scale, with the brand’s top UNO-S interconnects and Chime3 speaker cables, although we pulled back from the top power cords, because they were only available in Schuko terminations at the time of writing (so we ended up with the C-Clef2, although for 20A power connectors, we also used the more up-market Pure3). The speaker features 16AWG and interconnect cables sports 16AWG high-purity, oxygen-free copper conductors.

The signal cables all feature a resonance controller/terminator, an impressive bit of metal at both ends of the cable. In the interconnect, this lozenge-shaped terminator helps keep the cable’s individual conductors in their deliberately loose lay and the speaker cables in their individually shielded sections within their overall inch-wide sheath. Meanwhile the power cord is just as thick, but not inflexible, and has a flying croc-

“The name derives from the catgut strings traditionally used by classical musicans (which, in a peculiar twist of logic, are made from sheep intestine and not the insides of Chairman Meow).”

67, 71 HIFI+102_EqRev_Gutwire_AS.indd 67 18/07/2013 17:12

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12 ISSUE 82

13 ISSUE 82

FEATURE / ClassiC album living Room at vintage

DISCLAMER: As I was effectively compare of this event for the full three days, my objectivity must be considered compromised. However, this does give a unique perspective on the event that might not be so readily available had I been simply an attendee. Please take both of these points into consideration when reading the following. AS

In 1951, in an attempt to lighten the burden of post-war austerity measures, the Festival Of Britain transformed London’s South Bank from a bombed out wasteland to a Modernist’s concrete dream. Sixty years later, in an attempt to lighten the burden of post-Credit Crunch austerity measures, London’s South Bank was once again transformed. The

last weekend in July this year saw the Royal Festival Hall given over to the Vintage festival, run by Wayne Hemingway and honouring everything good, British and fun from the early 1950s to the late 1980s. Held over the RFH’s six floors, it was like a vertical Woodstock, but with less mud and more petticoats.

As a part of the celebrations, and sponsored by Bowers and Wilkins, Loud and Clear (a high-end dealer based in Edinburgh and Glasgow in Scotland), and Classic Album Sundays assembled a Best of British system to play some of the Best of British albums from the 1950s, 60s, 70s and 80s. Classic Album Sundays is billed as a ‘Collective and Audiophile Experience’; the idea is to ‘respect the recording’, playing the album from beginning to end, asking people to turn their mobile phones off, not to talk over the music and have that music played through a good system at ‘reasonable’ volume. There’s a brief five minute or so preamble about the music played and, in this case an even briefer introduction about Classic Album Sundays, a short history lesson and how Britain still makes exceptionally good audio equipment.

In order of presentation, the albums played were Lonnie Donegan ‘The Lonnie Donegan Showcase’ (presented by Pete Donegan), The Beatles ‘Revolver’ (presented by Dean Rudland) David Bowie ‘The Rise & Fall of Ziggy Stardust & the Spiders from Mars’ (presented by Greg Wilson), and The Smiths ‘The Queen is Dead’ (presented by Danielle Goldstein) on Friday 29th July. This was followed by Billy Fury ‘The Sound of Fury’ (presented by Alan Sircom), The Beatles ‘Sgt Peppers Lonely Heart Club Band’ (presented by Greg Wilson) Pink Floyd ‘The Dark Side of The Moon’ (presented by Alan Sircom) and Joy Divison ‘Closer’ Presented by Mark Moore on Saturday 30th July. Finally, Tommy Steele ‘The Tommy Steele Story’ (presented by Jay Strongman), The Beatles ‘Abbey Road’ (presented by Greg Wilson), Led Zeppelin ‘Led Zeppelin IV’ (presented by Andy Smith) and Kate Bush ‘Hounds of Love’ presented by Ben Murphy were played over Sunday 31st. In addition to the complete album presentations, the intervening periods were filled with sounds from that decade.

The assembled system comprised a Rega P9 turntable with an Rega Apheta moving coil cartridge and a Rega Ios phono stage for the vinyl front end, a complete four-box dCS Scarlatti digital front end (for both CD and high-resolution file-based

FEATURE

music from a MacBook Pro), Naim NAC 552 preamplifier, a pair of NAP 500 power amplifiers into a pair of Bowers and Wilkins 800 Diamond loudspeakers. The equipment all rested on Quadraspire stands, the system was hooked up with Chord Company Sarum interconnects and power cords and Signature loudspeaker cables and all of the electronics were being fed from two ISOL-8 SubStation LC and one SubStation HC power conditioners. The total cost of this system was around £130,000.

Of the albums played, three (Lonnie Donegan, The Smiths and Tommy Steele) were played on CD, one (Abbey Road) was played file-based on 24-bit FLAC and all the rest were played on vinyl.

In all, the albums from the 1960s to the 1980s were played to full houses (approximately 70 people, in a very long room) while the earlier 1950s sessions reached a smaller audience, and the moments between albums had the room part filled. As a rough count, the system was played to more than 1,000 people, hardly any of whom would count themselves audiophiles.

The fascinating aspect of this was just how many people stayed from beginning to end and did turn their cellphones off as requested. In an un-air-conditioned glass room pushing 38° heat at times, in a large concert hall filled with distractions of all kinds, in an event that cost £60 admission,

Classic album living Room at vintageBy Alan Sircom

people happily sat down and listened to a whole album with a group of people they had never met before, applauded at the end and then spent the next half hour discussing their memories and feelings about that album.

As MC, I spent some several albums facing the audience and the collective experience is a remarkable one. For the whole of Ziggy Stardust, we had a complete air-band; air guitar, air bass, air drums and a room full of people who knew every last lyric. There was a waft of air – like the pump from a bass port – from 70 heads nodding in unison at those three drum beats before the chorus on Lucy In The Sky with Diamonds, a lot of headbanging and air guitar to Stairway and a powerfully cathartic experience (and some tears) after an album of Joy Division.

I took a chance after the first couple of sessions. When Ziggy Stardust had finished, I said “And that’s what a 39 year old album sounds like… on one-hundred and thirty thousand pounds worth of audio equipment.” I wasn’t sure if this would be met with incredulity, gasps, shock, or blank stares (this was playing to an audience with no preconceptions about audio, or high-end prices). The reaction was an understated smile, nod and a whispered “cool” (this was a British audience, remember; that’s virtually uncontrolled orgasmic pleasure by our standards). This sparked questions from a few freshly minted proto-audiophiles, mostly about

the sheer number of boxes (“well that one’s basically an atomic clock” went down exceptionally well) and people wanting to know how they could get similar.

Even though the system was set up by John, Andrew and Jem from Loud and Clear this wasn’t there to sell the system; Londoners are like all big city dwellers and wouldn’t dream of travelling to visit an audio dealer in Scotland. It was to plant the seeds of playing music in the way it deserves to be played, and playing it on a damn good system.

All in all, this was something special. Criticisms were few and far between and all musically-based (“too many Beatles albums” and “why didn’t you play the Jesus and Mary Chain/Echo and the Bunnymen/Frankie Goes To Hollywood” being the biggest ones), and those of us on the event side of things got to play a lot of music we like to a lot of people we’ve never met before and mutually enjoy the experience. Plus, climbing out on the roof of the Royal Festival Hall gets you a great view of London!

Finally, we also saw this outside, as part of the Tracey Emin ‘Love Is What You Want’ exhibition at the Hayward Gallery opposite the Royal Festival Hall. It seemed spookily appropriate.

Left: The wall of sound

Top: Rega and dCS

sources

Right: Bowers &

Wilkins 800 Diamond

loudspeakers

+

moving coil cartridge and a Rega Ios phono stage for the vinyl front end, a complete four-box dCS Scarlatti digital front end (for both CD and high-resolution file-based

concert hall filled with distractions of all kinds, in an event that cost £60 admission,

standards). This sparked questions from a few freshly minted proto-audiophiles, mostly about

20 ISSUE 82

21 ISSUE 82

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / Kaiser Kawero! ViVace loudspeaKer

Kaiser Acoustics is a relative newcomer to the hi-fi scene. It has only been involved in speaker manufacture for the last three or so years, though the companies and individuals responsible

for the two distinctly high end models have many years of experience in hi-fi and related fields, a fact that became very obvious during the course of the review.

This Kawero! Vivace is the more recent model, and our examples, attractively finished in a rather fetching high gloss magenta and with a carbon fibre front panel, made a brief UK public appearance at the March Heathrow show. This nominally Vertex AQ room was actually being operated by personnel from West Country dealer The Right Note, which is distributing Kaiser speakers in the UK. Those who visited the Munich High End show in May might also have found and heard this Kaiser speaker, this time presented in a high gloss orange.

The base price of the speakers is £22,360/pair, but picking several items from a comprehensive upgrade option list took the cost of our examples up to a substantially more extravagant £30,444. Many of these optional extras are listed separately (see Box), but the key items included on our samples were the Vertex AQ/Mundorf Supreme crossover network (+£3,400); replacement of copper internal wiring with Mundorf gold/silver (+£1,075); replacement of standard feet with Stillpoints (+£980); and the high gloss finish with carbon fibre front panel (+£2,580).

These are luxury, state-of-art prices, so how does the Kawero! Vivace measure up to competition near the top of the market? For starters, whatever the finish that is chosen it’s a

Kaiser Kawero! Vivace loudspeaker

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

By Paul Messenger

very elegant loudspeaker, and is also significantly more compact than most models of comparable price and pretensions.

This is actually a two-and-a-half-way design, and although it doesn’t look at all bulky, that’s largely down to clever design choices, and the end result certainly doesn’t lack bass output – if anything rather the reverse. The main body of the speaker contains a fairly small, front-mounted 150mm bass/mid driver operating in its own sub-enclosure at the top of the main carcase, and loaded by a rear-mounted 180mm Revelator ABR passive radiator. The main bulk of the enclosure is devoted to a 180mm rear-mounted, port-loaded bass-only driver. Judging by the swirly patterns on their diaphragms, both these units are very sophisticated drivers made for Kaiser by Danish OEM maker Scan-Speak, based on the Illuminator series, using cones made from a carbon fibre/foam/paper sandwich, and titanium voice-coil formers.

The Mundorf-made tweeter is mounted in its own little head unit, mechanically decoupled from the main enclosure and pivoted about a vertical axis. It’s an AMT (Air Motion Transformer) unit, and as such somewhat resembles a ribbon transducer, albeit with a heavily pleated diaphragm that should considerably enhance the available headroom.

The delicious standard of finish here deserves more than a passing mention – the carbon fibre front panel combined with a high gloss magenta enclosure and a high gloss black ‘head’ gives a very stylish and hi-tech appearance. But what’s really interesting from a technology perspective is that the enclosure proper is built from something called ‘tankwood’.

No I’d not heard of it either, nor it transpires have Google or Wiki, though the original German brand name Panzerholz proved more productive and informative. Apparently it’s made by just one German company, and I daresay the name derives from the fact that one application is to make the doors of VIP limos bulletproof. It’s actually a form of beech plywood, but the layers are impregnated with resin under high temperature and pressure, which bonds the layers together, effectively to form a composite. However, the fact that it starts off from a fibrous – and therefore non-homogenous – base could well be advantageous in damping terms.

Not surprisingly, tankwood is also very dense – drop a piece in water and it will sink, not float – and is very difficult indeed to machine. It wears out diamond-tipped tools for breakfast, which apparently adds significantly to the cost of working it, but has the minor advantage of being able to take a bolt thread without the need for an insert.

The tankwood construction is undoubtedly largely responsible for a very substantial weight of 82kg, which invariably comes as a surprise when trying to move what is, after all, a quite compact loudspeaker. The sides are formed in two sections split at a slight angle, considerably adding to the elegance and helping avoid parallel surfaces, while the tapering shape that’s substantially larger at the base than the top will ensure fine stability on the three Stillpoint feet. It should also be pointed out that this Vivace model is significantly better looking than the original, ongoing and more upmarket Kawero!

The links between Kaiser and Vertex AQ, and the fact that this speaker was fitted with the optional Vertex AQ crossover network explains why the review samples came from South West dealer The Right Note, which was the first to promote and sell the Vertex AQ accessories. And I suspect that my own longstanding enthusiasm for the Vertex AQ approach, including recently purchasing HiRez Roirama speaker cables, is a major reason why I received the speakers to review. Presumably it was also assumed that my system

what’s in a name?

Quite a lot it turns out, especially when it’s as curious as the one attached to this costly floorstander.

The word Kaiser makes it pretty obvious that this is a German brand. The speakers are actually made by Kaiser GmbH, a substantial and very advanced wood-based engineering operation that specialises in acoustic solutions. It’s a family firm, was founded in 1948, and is located in beautiful alpine scenery near Untergriesbach, in the extreme bottom right hand corner of Germany.

The Kawero! bit is a composite of the names of the three hi-fi enthusiast friends who originally worked together to design and develop the speakers. The ‘we’ part of the name refers to Technical Director Rainer Weber, who’s based in the ancient city of Regensburg, 140km back up the Danube, where he holds a senior position as an acoustician in automotive component specialist Continental AG. This involvement gives him access to all manner of interesting new technologies and materials, and he’s worked with Kaiser to create a top class listening room in the city, where the development work is carried out.

The Vivace word remains a mystery, though it does help distinguish this junior two-and-a-half-way model from the original and ongoing three-way Kawero! – not that the latter seems particularly lacking in vivacity!

20 ISSUE 82

would deliver the sort of signal that would work well with the Kaiser speakers.

That certainly turned out to be the case, ultimately at least. Even though the initial impressions weren’t entirely positive, when the time finally came for the speakers to be collected, they’d truly won me over despite their quirks, and I’m missing them a lot now that they’ve gone.

Loudspeakers are complex devices: the sound that they create is essentially a slave

Kawero! Vivace measure up to Kawero! Vivace measure up to competition near the top of the competition near the top of the market? For starters, whatever market? For starters, whatever

first to promote and sell the Vertex AQ accessories. And I suspect that my own longstanding enthusiasm for the Vertex AQ approach, including recently purchasing HiRez Roirama speaker cables, is a major reason why I received

24 ISSUE 81

25 ISSUE 81

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / ASR EmittER ii ExcluSivE intEgRAtEd AmplifiER

If there’s a funny anecdote about a

product, ideally one that doesn’t involve

explosions or court cases, it’s always

a good starting place. Here’s the one

attached to the ASR; I got told there’s

an integrated amp coming my way one

Friday, but it never arrived. As I was walking

out of my front door on Saturday morning a

large van turned up, with apologies because

the even larger van given over to delivering

the ASR Emitter II Exclusive couldn’t make

it down my road. The Emitter amp was

weighing the van down and the delivery took

up a small roomful of cardboard boxes, each

one heavier than the last.

ASR Emitter ii Exclusive

integrated amplifier

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

By Alan Sircom

about. There’s six inputs as standard (with an option for a seventh, a balanced

input, headphone output and two flavours of phono stage, along with the

different finish options), but the best method is to stick to ‘direct’. There’s even

a remote!

Whether it the bank of batteries, the Philbert-Mantelschnitt transformers,

the 20 MOSFETs in the Class AB power amp stage, the battery arrays or

the 862,000µF of buffer capacitance is unclear, but this is an amp that takes

its time to come to fruition. It sounds excellent right out of the boxes, but

hundreds of hours later, it sounds a heck of a lot more excellent. Given that it

achieves its full conditioning from straight out of the warehouse in slightly more

than eight days and it stays that way, this isn’t some kind of ‘wait until the

warranty expires’ scam. From an engineering standpoint though, aside from

rechargeable batteries and their memory, the idea of electronics ‘conditioning’

is distinctly left-field. Regardless, a week or so after you receive new boxes,

you get most of the true ASR experience.

That experience is one of absolute neutrality and accuracy. Uncannily so.

There’s little point banging out the old cliché about veils lifted, jaws dropped

or envelopes pushed. It does all that. It does all the dynamic range you could

wish for, all the detail you could want, as wide a soundstage as its possible to

throw in your room and from your speakers, clarity, articulation, resolution and

more. Even pulling out individual pieces of music to highlight aspects of the

performance seems pointless, because you might as well list the entire record

collection. And you get all this from the first bar of the first piece of music. And

still you are left with more. Or maybe less.

You see this amp is so exceptionally ‘right’ sounding that it transcends

all those hi-fi attributes. They read trite on the page. As does anything about

‘musicality’; this amp doesn’t do ‘musicality’. It simply does what an amp

loudspeakers, but if an amplifier could get a

solid metal bar to make music, it would be the

Emitter II Exclusive. Three transformers turn

out eight different individually rectified and

buffered voltages. The input block is made

from brass, the output terminals are rated to

100 amps and mounted 50mm apart, the

PCBs are made from thick copper-tin tracks

and mounted on high mass 60mm2 rails,

and the 20 MOSFETS in the output stage

delivering 280W into eight ohms, 500W

into four and 900W into two ohms. Short

of shock-mounting the four boxes in their

own ejector seat, this is about as macho as

integrated amps get.

There’s little point discussing the

physical appearance more than this, save

for the seen across the room LED read-

out. And, despite looking every inch the

hyperminimalist audio product, the ASR is

actually a joy to use, once the pain of that

hawser-wrangling installation is forgotten

“What is a volestrangler, anyway?” asked the delivery guy (the boxes have

the word Vollverstärker, German for ‘full amplifier’, written on the side).

“It’s an amplifier for a hi-fi system”

“Must be a pretty big system” is the before-the-watershed, cleaned up

version of his reply. He then asked for some painkillers and limped off, his

Transit van visibly standing taller as it pulled away.

You see, that’s the fun of the ASR Emitter. It’s technically an integrated

amp, but by all things normal, integrated amplifiers don’t have a habit of

turning up in four boxes as big as a car engine. Neither do they weigh as

much as a car engine that often. Still, you gotta love those crazy Germans and

their wild volestranglers.

The mental process behind all the boxes is actually quite simple and

obvious when you think it through. There’s the amp proper, its power supply

and a pair of batteries to drive each channel of the amplifier’s line-stage. The

mains feeds the batteries and the whole system is there to allow you to listen

to music entirely unencumbered by any form of fluctuation on the power line,

because the battery takes care of that.

The basic plan of the Emitter II is over-engineering. This is the amp for beast

loads in big, bad rooms. Of course, it will happily drive more down-to-earth

21 ISSUE 82

purchasing HiRez Roirama speaker cables, is a major reason why I received the speakers to review. Presumably it was also assumed that my system

Kawero! – not that the latter seems particularly lacking in vivacity!

purchasing HiRez Roirama speaker cables, is a major reason why I received the speakers to review. Presumably it was also assumed that my system

“What is a volestrangler, anyway?” asked the delivery guy (the boxes have

the word Vollverstärker, German for ‘full amplifier’, written on the side).

“Must be a pretty big system” is the before-the-watershed, cleaned up

version of his reply. He then asked for some painkillers and limped off, his

Transit van visibly standing taller as it pulled away.

You see, that’s the fun of the ASR Emitter. It’s technically an integrated

amp, but by all things normal, integrated amplifiers don’t have a habit of

turning up in four boxes as big as a car engine. Neither do they weigh as

much as a car engine that often. Still, you gotta love those crazy Germans and

The mental process behind all the boxes is actually quite simple and

obvious when you think it through. There’s the amp proper, its power supply

and a pair of batteries to drive each channel of the amplifier’s line-stage. The

mains feeds the batteries and the whole system is there to allow you to listen

to music entirely unencumbered by any form of fluctuation on the power line,

The basic plan of the Emitter II is over-engineering. This is the amp for beast

loads in big, bad rooms. Of course, it will happily drive more down-to-earth

24 ISSUE 81

25 ISSUE 81

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / ASR EmittER ii ExcluSivE intEgRAtEd AmplifiER

If there’s a funny anecdote about a product, ideally one that doesn’t involve explosions or court cases, it’s always a good starting place. Here’s the one attached to the ASR; I got told there’s an integrated amp coming my way one Friday, but it never arrived. As I was walking out of my front door on Saturday morning a large van turned up, with apologies because the even larger van given over to delivering the ASR Emitter II Exclusive couldn’t make it down my road. The Emitter amp was weighing the van down and the delivery took up a small roomful of cardboard boxes, each one heavier than the last.

ASR Emitter ii Exclusive integrated amplifier

EQUIPMENT REVIEW

By Alan Sircom

about. There’s six inputs as standard (with an option for a seventh, a balanced input, headphone output and two flavours of phono stage, along with the different finish options), but the best method is to stick to ‘direct’. There’s even a remote!Whether it the bank of batteries, the Philbert-Mantelschnitt transformers, the 20 MOSFETs in the Class AB power amp stage, the battery arrays or the 862,000µF of buffer capacitance is unclear, but this is an amp that takes its time to come to fruition. It sounds excellent right out of the boxes, but hundreds of hours later, it sounds a heck of a lot more excellent. Given that it achieves its full conditioning from straight out of the warehouse in slightly more than eight days and it stays that way, this isn’t some kind of ‘wait until the warranty expires’ scam. From an engineering standpoint though, aside from rechargeable batteries and their memory, the idea of electronics ‘conditioning’ is distinctly left-field. Regardless, a week or so after you receive new boxes, you get most of the true ASR experience.

That experience is one of absolute neutrality and accuracy. Uncannily so. There’s little point banging out the old cliché about veils lifted, jaws dropped or envelopes pushed. It does all that. It does all the dynamic range you could wish for, all the detail you could want, as wide a soundstage as its possible to throw in your room and from your speakers, clarity, articulation, resolution and more. Even pulling out individual pieces of music to highlight aspects of the performance seems pointless, because you might as well list the entire record collection. And you get all this from the first bar of the first piece of music. And still you are left with more. Or maybe less.You see this amp is so exceptionally ‘right’ sounding that it transcends all those hi-fi attributes. They read trite on the page. As does anything about ‘musicality’; this amp doesn’t do ‘musicality’. It simply does what an amp

loudspeakers, but if an amplifier could get a solid metal bar to make music, it would be the Emitter II Exclusive. Three transformers turn out eight different individually rectified and buffered voltages. The input block is made from brass, the output terminals are rated to 100 amps and mounted 50mm apart, the PCBs are made from thick copper-tin tracks and mounted on high mass 60mm2 rails, and the 20 MOSFETS in the output stage delivering 280W into eight ohms, 500W into four and 900W into two ohms. Short of shock-mounting the four boxes in their own ejector seat, this is about as macho as integrated amps get. There’s little point discussing the physical appearance more than this, save for the seen across the room LED read-out. And, despite looking every inch the hyperminimalist audio product, the ASR is actually a joy to use, once the pain of that hawser-wrangling installation is forgotten

“What is a volestrangler, anyway?” asked the delivery guy (the boxes have the word Vollverstärker, German for ‘full amplifier’, written on the side).“It’s an amplifier for a hi-fi system” “Must be a pretty big system” is the before-the-watershed, cleaned up version of his reply. He then asked for some painkillers and limped off, his Transit van visibly standing taller as it pulled away.You see, that’s the fun of the ASR Emitter. It’s technically an integrated amp, but by all things normal, integrated amplifiers don’t have a habit of turning up in four boxes as big as a car engine. Neither do they weigh as much as a car engine that often. Still, you gotta love those crazy Germans and their wild volestranglers.

The mental process behind all the boxes is actually quite simple and obvious when you think it through. There’s the amp proper, its power supply and a pair of batteries to drive each channel of the amplifier’s line-stage. The mains feeds the batteries and the whole system is there to allow you to listen to music entirely unencumbered by any form of fluctuation on the power line, because the battery takes care of that. The basic plan of the Emitter II is over-engineering. This is the amp for beast loads in big, bad rooms. Of course, it will happily drive more down-to-earth

HIFI+ SUBS DPS.indd 3 23/05/2013 16:29

70 ISSUE 102

Stockton on Tees… the North’s hotbed of audio delightsMartin Logan Loudspeakers are on permanent demonstration at:

hi soundCastlegate Mill, Quayside, Stockton on Tees, TS18 1BZ, England.

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HFC 1306 A5 tonearms.indd 1 14/06/2013 16:36:01

70 AdPage Iss102.indd 70 17/07/2013 14:54

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Prices (as tested)

Gutwire Uno S interconnect: £2,750/1m pair

Gutwire Chime3 loudspeaker cables: £4,400/8ft pair

C-Clef2 power cord: £790/5.5ft

Pure3 power cord: £2,200/6ft

NotePad2 square: £39

iPhone 4/4S case: £150

Manufactured by: Gutwire

URL: www.gutwire.com

Distributed by: Epicurean Audio

URL: www.epicureanaudio.com

Tel: +44(0)780 556 7630

clipped lead for the option to float or ground the outer shielding. You can’t really get away with writing about Gutwire without mentioning the word ‘shielding’ dozens of times, because that’s its big USP, and the company subscribes heavily to the ‘we live in an electromagnetic and radio frequency soup’ view of the modern world. As someone who sees a list of between 18-25 wi-fi routers at home, perhaps this isn’t far from the truth. But what is more important is ‘does it matter’?

Judging by the performance of the cables as a complete family, the answer is ‘who cares, when it sounds this good?’ Short of building a Faraday cage around my listening room, I’m swimming in RF every day, and if the cable improves performance because it helps limit that, or that it down to another reason is ultimately immaterial. It’s the performance that counts. First, common to all the cables supplied for test is a sense of correctness to the tonal balance, with no stray brightness or dull spots in the presentation. The Gutwire sound is one of being impressive soundstage depth and size, and a tonally balanced presentation, albeit with powerful bass. If you are looking for a cable to act as some kind of filter or tone control, the Gutwire cables are not for you, but as an honest reproducer of signal, they are hard to beat.

A fine example of how this works is playing music that isn’t quite on the ‘audiophile approved’ list. Something like Nirvana’s epic Nevermind album. It’s trashy, thrashy brilliance of more than 20 years ago now. Gutwire neither polishes it or makes it screechy; it merely plays it as it should, in the process making you realise just how good both the power trio and the overall recording, mix and mastering really are. The cable lets both the rawness of the band and the polish of the session shine through, when many others just make it like noise. And not noise in a good way. Naturally, moving over to more conventionally better recordings is a treat too, but in a way those demonstration discs that always sound wonderful are less of a test than something more gnarly.

I try to block out the price of a product until I’ve got the performance down on paper first. I’m usually pretty good at playing ‘Predict-A-Price’ as a result, but I got the Gutwire cables spectacularly wrong. I thought these were up there with Crystal Cable Absolute Dream in performance… and price. There were aspects where AD beat the Gutwire designs (that high-frequency sparkle is unique to Crystal’s top cable) but in other respects it was a peer of one of the best. Outstanding! +

clipped lead for the option to float or ground the outer shielding. You can’t really get away with writing about Gutwire without mentioning the word ‘shielding’ dozens of times, because that’s its big USP, and the company subscribes heavily to the ‘we live in an electromagnetic and radio frequency soup’ view of the modern world. As someone who sees a list of between 18-25 wi-fi routers at home, perhaps this isn’t far from the truth. But what is more important is ‘does it matter’?

Judging by the performance of the cables as a complete family, the answer is ‘who cares, when it sounds this good?’ Short of building a Faraday cage around my listening room, I’m swimming in RF every day, and if the cable improves performance because it helps limit that, or that it down to another reason is ultimately immaterial. It’s the performance that counts. First, common to all the cables supplied for test is a sense of correctness to the tonal balance, with no stray

“You can’t really get away with writing about Gutwire without mentioning the word ‘shielding’ dozens of times, because that’s its big USP, and the company subscribes heavily to the ‘we live in an electromagnetic and radio frequency soup’ view.”

71 ISSUE 102

EQUIPMENT REVIEW / GUTWIRE CABLE SYSTEM

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72 ISSUE 102

Meet Your Maker: Cambridge Audio

MEET YOUR MAKER

Cambridge Audio—despite its name—is for the most part not based in Cambridge, but rather in London (although a few members of the Cambridge software development team do still maintain a presence in Cambridge). Hence, a lovely poster seen at the company’s headquarters that shows the London

skyline set against the Union flag, with a legend that reads, “Designed with passion in London – Cambridge Audio.” Cambridge’s headquarters can be found in the Southbank area of London on a small, narrow thoroughfare called Hankey Place.

In keeping with modern trends in audio, Cambridge’s products are designed in London, but built offshore—though the company maintains a very seriously-minded team of product/QC engineers who keep strict tabs on product output

from factories abroad. Those same engineers maintain feedback loops through which problems rapidly can be addressed or through which product improvements can be put in place, as needed. But all product design, development, and support efforts continue to be based in London, which I think gives Cambridge products a distinctly British flavour, no matter where they may be constructed.

At Cambridge’s Hankey Place facility a visitor will find (by my count, at least) five modern-as-tomorrow engineering sub-

By Chris Martens

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73 ISSUE 102

Ascona

HOMMAGE to Vinyl

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Motiv Ascona_Layout 1 18.06.2013 08:38 Seite 1

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black-ravioli musicworks studio-connections

west hampstead london0330 111 5653 www.sonatahifi.com [email protected]

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MEET YOUR MAKER / Meet Your Maker: CaMbridge audio

teams: one focused on electronic engineering, another on product design (mechanical engineering), a third on software engineering, a fourth dedicated to acoustic design, and a fifth focusing on service/QC and product testing. The firm works hard to make sure its new-generation digital products are supported by apps that are cleverly conceived, functionally sound, and very user-friendly.

Alongside the cutting-edge technology, there is a sixth team charged with marketing support. If you’ve logged any time with, say, products such as Cambridge’s versatile DacMagic Plus DAC/headphone amplifier/preamplifier you’ll appreciate what I mean. Happily, Cambridge understands—better than most manufacturers, in my view—that proper documentation and support materials are literally part of a product’s design—not extras haphazardly tacked on as afterthoughts.

I am a stickler for well-crafted product documentation and collateral materials, so that it was gratifying to see that Cambridge has an entire marketing support team working in this area (complete with a documentation overseer who makes sure support materials are in order before new models are released for production). Frankly, modern digital audio products have become so complex and have so many interactive and interdependent

features and functions that end-users need all the help they can get in order to keep things straight. Happily, Cambridge understands this and has responded accordingly.

Hi-Fi Plus Editor Alan Sircom and I had a chance to see each of Cambridge’s engineering groups in action, noting that the electrical engineering team was hard at work testing some soon-to-be-released new models (which we were asked not to photograph). The mechanical team, which also does the lion’s share of industrial design work for the firm, in turn showed us how CAD/CAM design tools are used to convert product ideas into product packaging concepts and, finally, into finished product designs. Several of the photos accompanying this article will serve to give some idea of how paper sketches become onscreen computer-visualised designs and of how the designs in turn become finished projects.

Not being software design specialists, we could only partly appreciate the lines and layers of code appearing on the screens of software team members labouring diligently to craft next-generation Cambridge software apps. But, as Simon Hewitt, Cambridge Audio Director of Marketing, astutely observed, “where once we might have focused primarily on electrical circuit design


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MEET YOUR MAKER / Meet Your Maker: CaMbridge audio

and mechanical construction for our products, we now must also focus on questions of convenience, connectivity, and especially ease of use from the very outset.” In the brave new world of high-end audio, products are judged not only by the sounds they produce, but also by the ease with which product functions can be accessed and put to use.

But another thing Cambridge grasps with great clarity is that, for modern content-streaming-oriented products, regulatory and qualification testing are major hurdles any manufacturer in the market segment must face. Compounding the problem, Apple’s designated testing firms are contractually restrained from providing consulting help for manufacturers whose products are under test. Thus, an audio manufacturer might learn that its latest would-be Apple-compatible product has failed a qualification test, but the test agency will not be allowed to say why the product failed, nor will it will be allowed to provide help in correcting the problem(s) at hand.

Many qualification tests involve the finer points of EMI (electro magnetic interference) tests, where products are examined both in terms of their resistance to EMI from without and in terms of their ability to prevent generating EMI “noise pollution” of their own. Clearly, this is a highly specialised area where not all audio firms have deep expertise, but Cambridge has had both the foresight and means to tackle the problem head-on. Specifically, Cambridge has taken the extraordinary (and costly) step of building its own internal EMI test chamber. In this way, Cambridge can put its new products through rigourous batteries of internal tests well before submitting them for external qualification tests. Cambridge acknowledges that this process does not necessarily mean all Cambridge models will pass qualification tests on the first try, but it does mean that problems, if any, are much easier to spot and rectify later on. Cambridge believes, probably with good reason, that its approach is far preferable to the scenario many of its competitors face, where a failed qualification test could mean the manufacturer would, almost literally, be “flying blind.”

Interestingly, Cambridge headquarters is located immediately adjacent to the offices for Richer Sounds, Cambridge’s exclusive UK distributors/retailers. According to Cambridge this location makes for a mutually beneficial arrangement where it becomes possible for Richer Sounds to invite sales team members from across the country to come to London for the day, specifically to receive in-depth training on Cambridge products. It also allows for visits to Cambridge’s listening room.

In the listening room, Alan Sircom and I had the chance to audition the firm’s new self-powered Minx Air-series wireless speaker systems, which at the time were only a few days away from release. The little Minx Air systems (and especially the larger Minx Air 200 system) proved to be astonishingly

good—enough so that all in attendance agreed that Cambridge had managed to push its wireless speakers across the divide between convenience-oriented “lifestyle” products and serious hi-fi. Since ours is a family-oriented publication, I won’t directly quote Editor Sircom on the subject of the Minx Air 200, except to say that he opined he might be able to do Hi-Fi Plus’s shortest-ever review, which would read something like this: “Oh, (expletive deleted). This thing is really good.” Enough said.

Finally, we also took the opportunity to audition Cambridge’s upcoming Aero-series speakers, including a set of the firm’s affordable Aero 6 floorstanders. Like the Minx Air systems (and other Minx-series speakers), the new Aero range uses BMR-type (balanced mode radiator) drivers in lieu of both traditional tweeter and midrange drivers. This design choice, in turn, means that the woofers used in the Aero speaker do not have to serve as mid-bass drivers, but rather can function more or less like pure woofers (or, depending on your terminology preference, as “sub-woofers”). In their own way, the Aeros were just as impressive as the Minx Air systems had been (especially when questions of value for money were taken into consideration), though they could not quite match the shock value of hearing the compact Minx Air system produce a huge, room-filling, high-fidelity grade sound.+


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It is without a doubt one of the nest hybrid valve/solid-state headphone ampli ers yet made, and one that demands an audition from those who seek the best.

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79 ISSUE 102

Interview: Emily Barker

Music feature

Emily Barker is an Australian singer/songwriter who has released three albums on her own label and recorded her latest release, Dear River, for

Linn Records last year. Her band, The Red Clay Halo, consists of Anna Jenkins on violin and viola, Gill Sandell on accordion, flute and piano and Jo SIlverston on cello, bass and banjo. Emily plays guitar and banjo and all four sing, often in harmony. Dear River is Emily’s first to feature a drummer, Nat Butler who will be touring with the band this autumn. The album was produced by Calum

By Jason Kennedy

Malcolm (The Blue Nile) and has been released as a 24/96 Studio Master download, vinyl and CD. The release includes a bonus selection of acoustic versions of certain songs which, as Emily mentions, were recorded live and which give you a good idea of what the band sounded like before the drums and production skills were brought in, it’s quite an insight.

Emily has also recorded the theme tunes for Wallander and The Shadow Line so her music is probably better known than her name. This year she will be doing a massive UK tour followed by dates in Europe and the US so that state of affairs could well be about to change. I caught up with Emily in late June (on the telephone) to find out what she’s about.

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iNterVieW / EmIly BarkEr

JK: What’s happening?EB: I’m sitting near Stroud in the sun, it’s beautiful so I’m having a great time. I’ve just finished organising an indie record shop tour and will be playing nearly every day in July.

How did you get into making music?It started when I was a teenager I was listening to a lot of Aretha Franklin and I loved singing around the house, but I never really took it seriously until my mid twenties when I thought I would give it a shot. I had been travelling for about three years around the world and I was writing a few songs and playing a few shows, but not fully dedicating my life to it. I dabbled with it at university but I dabbled with a lot of things and always really loved music. Eventually I based myself in the UK and decided to try and make things happen.

I get the impression you’re not much older than your mid twenties now and have three albums under your belt. You’ve done pretty well.Thanks! I’ve definitely gone beyond what I set out to do, I had a few goals in mind and one of them was headlining the Union Chapel which we did last year, and we sold it out, so that was definitely a milestone, I thought then that if it all stopped I’d be happy with what I’d achieved but of course that was only temporary! You got into writing theme tunes, how did that happen?I was playing at a house party and the composer Martin Phipps was there, he was working on the Wallander music and saw me and the girls, The Red Clay Halo, perform and really loved the song ‘Nostalgia’. He gave me a call and I went into the studio with him and reworked the song to make it less folky, I did the voice and guitar and he added some other instruments on top.

After I recorded the third album Almanac I sent a copy to Martin while he was working on the Shadow Line, the director wanted some harmonies for the title track and he thought the song Pause was perfect. Now I’m starting to actually write for TV and film rather than having songs picked for it. I’m really enjoying it, I like being on the road but it’s nice to work at home as well.

Is there anything about the way you have approached this album that marks it out for you?Sonically it’s different, I’m very conscious about not repeating myself and for this album I really wanted a rock vibe. We started going

there with Almananac but didn’t fully realise it so I was writing the songs with a rock arrangement in mind. Dear River is a lot more full. It’s got more punch and kick to it. It was great working with Callum Malcolm because that really excited him as well, he works a lot with classical but he was keen to draw the rock side of me and the girls out.


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IN SEARCH OF THE PERFECT LOUDSPEAKER?

The most critical and most neglected aspect of any high-end Hi-Fi system is the interaction between the loudspeakers and the room. This is greater than the effect of changing any other component in the Hi-Fi chain.

What we hear (unless we are in a field!) is a combination of sounds (a), direct from the loudspeaker and (b), reflected from room boundaries: walls, ceiling, floor, windows, curtains, furnishings, etc. The direct-versus-reflected ratio can often be less than 50%, which means that reflections can dominate what we hear. In the 1960s and ’70s it was believed that reflections should be suppressed, but that led to ‘dead’ rooms. In a concert hall, an even greater proportion of sound is reflected than in our lounges, so reflections (in moderation) encourage an impression of a ‘live’ performance.

The problem is that those reflections dramatically alter the

frequency response of the sound we hear, creating serious peaks and troughs

The issue is made more complex because every room is different, so even the sound from the finest high-end loudspeakers will vary in different rooms. What you hear in a dealer’s demo room will NOT be what you hear at home.

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CHAPTER 2: LOUDSPEAKERS AND ROOMS

WoS_A5_8.4.13.indd 1 08/04/2013 17:02

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INTERVIEW / Emily BarkEr

Lyrically, I worked to a theme for the first time, the theme is home, my personal take on home. I grew up by the Blackwood river in Australia and the songs incorporate childhood, family, first landscape and first idea of home. Then going out into the world, the path between two parts being home, the journey, is the second part and the third part is set in the UK where I’ve made a home away from home. Along the way I’ve told other peoples’ stories as well, my ancestors and covering themes such as exile, immigration and indigenous Australian politics.

It was really good to set some parameters and discover that there’s so much within that, usually writing songs there’s no boundaries, I really got stuck into the theme of how people define home to themselves.

Will you be taking this album home to Australia?Next year I’m hoping to do about three tours in Australia because I’ve not been over this year, we’re going to start touring in January.

Red Clay Halo, is that anything to do with the Gillian Welch song?Oh yes, I’m a big fan. It’s all about being a country girl and not being able to get red clay dust out of your hair and clothes and fingernails, I really related to that with the red dirt in Australia.

How did you end up recording with Linn Records them?I met Gilad [Tiefenbrun] a couple of years ago at a gig in Glasgow in a tiny venue called Brel, after the show he came and bought the CD and talked to me and gave me his card. I’d heard about Linn Records and systems from another person, so I thought this is a timely coincidence. So we kept in touch and once my tour was finished he flew me up to Glasgow to show me the incredible Linn factory and I was completely blown away by the work ethic, philosophy, their anti-waste attitude, everything. It’s a really interesting set up. They have a really great ethos and care about quality and are anti-obsolescence and all these ideas come across on the label.

I was dubious about signing to a label after releasing three albums on my own but

they embodied the things I believe in anyway and were very passionate about it. They also wanted to team me up with a producer and put us in a great studio in order to get the best quality for their studio masters and vinyl which was great. They are really so thorough too.

Was it a live recording, were you in the studio together?No we didn’t. We spent ten days in Gorbals Sound studios and we tracked everything up but the acoustic version we did completely live in one day.

You’re taking the full band on tour with you then?I am, the Red Clay Halo for the past seven years has been the three girls and myself but we’re bringing a drummer, a guy, poor fella! That’ll be all of October and November and we’re going to add some dates in Europe in the middle. I love it, you get into such a swing, I think it’s the best way, you get gig fit as well with voice segueing into songs.

That must be why it sounds so nice!That’s more what we like, we’ve been a quartet for a long time and try to cover the rhythmic and lower bass notes on cello and I have a stomp box as well so it’s generally pretty stripped down.

Who are your musical heroes?Definitely Aretha Franklin for voice, she’s got my favourite voice, Neil Young is a huge influence too, Comes A Time, Harvest and After the Gold Rush but I love his rocky stuff as well like Zuma. Gillian Welch definitely, the National I’m listening to at the moment and really enjoying, Lucinda Williams is quite a big influence and Nick Cave, he’s a genius.

Do you have a decent hi-fi?I’ve got a Linn. Very lucky me! +

Emily Barker and The Red Clay Halo will be touring the UK in October and November.


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A truly engaging USB DAC!The Bitzie USB DAC will play all your CD and

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85 ISSUE 102

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DEALER DIRECTORY

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86 ISSUE 102

recordreviewsHow To Read Them

CD

CD

HD

XR

CD

DVD

SA

CDSA

SA5.1

CD

Gold CD

HDCD

XRCD

DoubleDisc

DVD

SACD

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MUSIC

HomeAynsley ListerStraight Talkin’

Lister is a prolific blues-rock guitarist and singer. This is his 12th album in 13 years. Although firmly dipped in the blues, Lister is not afraid to experiment with fusing blues with rock and contemporary music. He is more Whitesnake than White Stripes, but it’s good, solid British Blues, well crafted and very well recorded.

Lister’s playing and singing style has been likened to Kossoff and Rodgers respectively. Although there’s a track called ‘Free’ on the album, it’s ‘Insatiable’ that has the strongest Free influences. There is a lot of blues-rock in the album, although ‘Straight Talkin’ Woman’ is more of a jazzy boogie groove and ‘Broke’ is a cool poppy number.

The sound quality is very good indeed, giving a powerful dynamic range to the sound and lots of toppy energy to cymbals and vocals, with the guitar tone chimey and clean when it needs to be snarly and distorted when its called for.

This tows a careful path between good bar-blues and AOR. This does appeal to a more mature audience, but is all the better for it, if you are looking for good rockin’. This is good British rock, best played loud and accompanied by heat, meat and lots and lots of beer. AS

RECORDING

MUSIC

The information contained in the record reviews is presented in the following way. Albums are identified by label and – where possible – serial number. Beneath this you will find one or more icons which denote the available formats for the recording. The first icon refers to the format reviewed.

The ratings at the bottom of each review reflect the reviewer’s opinion of the recording quality, and musical merits of the album. You’ll soon realise that a great many musically significant albums offer less than wonderful sound. Don’t let it put you off! For your information, the scale rates a standard, good quality pop recording as slightly below average.

This issue’s featured reviewers are:DD – Dennis D DavisSR – Stuart RobinsonAS – Alan SircomPT – Pete Trewin

CD Tomorrow’s HarvestBoards of CanadaWarp Records

The Scottish electronica duo Boards of Canada have been darlings of the indie scene ever since 1998’s excellent Music Has The Right To Children. The brothers are not exactly the most prolific writers in the business. This is the band’s fourth album in 15 years and the first since 2005.

This is lo-fi ambient wonderment, a crawl through electronica’s creepy underbelly. Think the sound of a numbers station played through gloom with a gentle back-beat that makes you unsure whether you are nodding along to something just mildly diverting or something genuinely horrific. But it’s all at one remove, than direct involvement. You are a viewer, not a participant.

It’s not hard to see that BoC is influenced by movie soundtracks, and that’s clear throughout the album. This sounds a little like a soundtrack to a 1980s sci-fi movie that never happened, from the opening that sounds like a film company ident, to cheesy lo-fi synthesisers, it’s one of the most ‘visual’ sounding albums I’ve heard in a while. I could write a film to this, but it would probably feature Lou Diamond Philips as a renegade robot soldier in a faraway starbase (that looks like the inside of an oil refinery). AS

MUSIC

RECORDING

MUSIC

CD180g

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MUSIC REVIEW / conTemporary

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Tess of the circleThornsCadiz Music

“Oh crap!” I thought. Yet another fey, folkie singer-songwriter with songs about her experiences of bad boyfriends and nice kittens. Imagine my surprise when Tess turned out have a fine tenor voice and a pair of testicles.

The Circle in the name is a collective of top session musicians, Tess Jones himself and guitar player Lee Clifton. This is Tess Jones’ second album, the first being an introspective solo acoustic number from three years ago.

Thorns drips with ‘references’ to everything from the Moody Blues to that newly rediscovered Rodriguez Cold Fact album. It’s slightly more rocky than the current singer-songwriters tend to be (who are basically either faux-folk or nice haircuts with guitars), but that tends to make it impossible not to think of the Moodys once more.

It’s very good, and very well recorded thanks to BRIT-winner Chris Potter at the faders, but there’s something oh so 1970s about this, which will either make you smiling and gasping for more or frustrated at the seeming pastiche of it all. ‘Eyes of a Clown’ is a perfect example; It sounds like Radiohead’s ‘Exit Music (For A Film)’ sung by a French crooner from the 1970s. AS

MUSIC

KveikurSigur RósXL Records

I’ve never really thought of myself as a Sigur Rós fan, but flipping through my collection I realised I have every studio album the Icelandic post rock noodlers have ever released. That’s probably how it goes with Sigur Rós, but Kveikur – their seventh studio album – is a darker, more brooding piece, something Mogwai might pen.

Gone is the bleak ambient sound that makes the band popular with advertising execs and Top Gear soundtracks; that came to an end with Valtari and the departure of keyboardist Kjartan Sveinsson. With Kveikur the now trio has gone for drive and energy. There’s depth and bombast on ‘Brennisteinn’ with huge drum sounds; there’s also minor chord thrashes and Jónsi Birgisson’s dreamy falsetto turns nightmarish. However, it’s more like a progression by a band that could easily drift into meaninglessness.

There is still a touch of the old Sigur Rós – Ísjaki (Icelandic for ‘iceberg’) is close to what you expect from the band – but mostly this is a major direction change. However, unlike previous albums, Kveikur sounds more like the band is pulling in themes from others. And it’s relatively thick-set compared to the sparse predecessors. But it’s still excellent. AS

RECORDINGRECORDING

MUSICMUSIC

Luther’s Blues – a tribute to Luther allisonWalter TroutRuf Records

Trout is one of the greatest blues guitarists alive at the moment. He’s also influenced by the past players, many of whom he called friends as well as colleagues, including Luther Allison (1939-97), who played with Howlin’ Wolf and James Cotton. Trout’s latest album is a tribute to a man once dubbed ‘the Bruce Springsteen of the blues’ and 11 tracks on the album are Allison originals, one is a brief dialogue from Allison, and one is an homage to Allison by Trout, called ‘When Luther Played the Blues’.

It’s a solid blues album, perhaps lacking some raw energy, but it more than makes up for this in polish and professionalism. It’s also very well recorded, with a sort of bar-room blues band feel. It’s very upfront and exciting – if a bit wall of sound – but as dynamic and impassioned as ever. And extremely consistent too.

There is perhaps a bit of a disconnect – Allison was more of a soulful presence, where Trout is blues to his core, and sometimes those two don’t sit comfortably together. And some of the tracks seem a little bit too stuck in the past – Freedom is a song about apartheid, and fortunately that’s out of place today – but this is a fine tribute to a guitarist who deserves respect and to be remembered. AS

RECORDING

MUSIC

CD CD CD10"

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88 ISSUE 102

exceptional bass...

stonkingly good...

“ “

Hifi Pig

explosive...

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deserves recommendation.sound quality...“ “

Hifi Critic

tight, well defined...fast and tuneful...“ “

TNT-Audioa choice of one.

The Caterthuns. From Alacrity Audio Ltd.www.alacrityaudio.co.uk

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88 AdPage Iss102.indd 88 18/07/2013 11:49

89 ISSUE 102

MUSIC REVIEW / AUDIOPHILE & JAZZ

MUSIC

Hard BopThe Jazz Messengers Impex/Columbia CL 1040

The first edition of The Jazz Messengers, cofounded by Art Blakey and Horace Silver, had its recording debut under that name on a 1954 Columbia album recently reissued by Pure Pleasure (‘The Jazz Messengers’ CL 897). By the time of this 1956 LP, Silver had left to form his own group and Blakey had continued on with the second version of the Messengers. The recording focuses on the outstanding front line of Jackie McLean and trumpeter Bill Hardman. Pianist Sam Dockery and bassist Spanky de Brest never became household names.

McLean and Hardman were only 24 when this record was made and Spanky deBrest a mere 19. All turn in fine performances of the standard ‘Stella By Starlight’ as well as a number of compositions penned by band members. The early Messenger Columbia sides received adequate recording, but for some reason nothing comparable to Columbia’s stunning recordings of the same period for Buck Clayton. Still, while falling short perfection these side present an excellent mono image and Kevin Gray and Impex’s Robert Pincus have given us a definitive version of the recording. The packaging is suburb--reproducing the original artwork but using superior materials. A beautiful package any hard bop enthusiast will lust after. DD

Cal Tjader/ Stan Getz SextetFIM LIM UHD 061 LE

Cal Tjader helped put the west in the term West Coast Jazz. He recorded dozens of recordings for San Francisco area labels Fantasy and Concord before they collapsed into one company and moved to Southern California. His work in the 1950s and 1960s is credited with having an influence on Latin rock development. Not bad from a kid with Swedish roots.

One of his finest early efforts was this 1958 session with Getz, with support from Vince Guaraldi, Eddie Duran, Scott La Faro and Billy Higgins, originally on Fantasy. The super group turned in exceptional performances, with a side of ballads and a side of more up-tempo material. First Impression Music focuses its efforts on maximizing the quality of both the mastering and the manufacturing of the CD. The analogue tapes were re-mastered by Michael Bishop using what owner Winston Ma calls Ultra High Definition 32-bit Mastering, and then the CDs are replicated using a proprietary process called PureFlection. FIM CDs have exceptional sound fidelity. The CD is packaged in the booklet form favored by XRCDs and includes original liner notes and a description of Ma’s mastering and production process. Despite the mono cover, this is a stereo recording and the sound and performance are to die for. DD

RECORDINGRECORDING

MUSICMUSIC

Little Girl BlueNina SimoneBethlehem/Pure Pleasure BCP 6028

Nina Simone started out life as a classical musician. She began supplementing her income by singing in local clubs in Atlantic City, New Jersey. She made her break into the recording business at the age of 24 year old when she was signed on with Bethlehem Records, a subsidiary of King Records. This was her first record, and Simone sings all jazz standards—‘Mood Indigo’, ‘Don’t Smoke In Bed’ and ‘I Loves You Porgy’, accompanied by Al Heath and Jimmy Bond. This album was originally released with a cover showing Simone seated on a park bench. This reissue uses a later cover that only identifies the correct album title on the back.

This cover, claiming to enclose the “original” and “best” Nina Simone, was probably crafted by Bethlehem to capitalize on sales after Simone’s success after moving on to Colpix (then Phillips, then RCA). Bethlehem is also offering a bargain priced reissue with the earlier cover; so don’t buy both thinking they are different! Ray Staff of Air Mastering did a fine mastering job on this issue, and I suspect the Bethlehem reissue did not lavish as much care on their version. While the sound of the original recording, like most Bethlehem recordings, does little justice to the piano and is rather two dimensional, Nina’s voice is well reproduced and her interpretations are outstanding. DD

RECORDING

MUSIC

CD 180g33 rpm 180g33 rpm

89-90 HIFI+102 MusicRev-Jazz_AS.indd 89 18/07/2013 17:18

90 ISSUE 102

MUSIC REVIEW / AUDIOPHILE & JAZZ

MUSIC

Jazz SambaStan Getz & Charlie ByrdVerve/Analogue Productions AP-3432

Of Stan Getz’s two best-known Bossa Nova albums, Getz/Gilberto is the one stamped on our collective conscious because of the unforgettable tune ‘Girl From Ipanema’. But this 1962 release with Charlie Byrd came out a year earlier and it also sold in unprecedented numbers for a jazz LP. This was the first Bossa Nova album recorded by North American jazz musicians, and introduced several classic bossa nova compositions to the jazz standard catalog.

Recorded in Pierce Hall at All Souls Unitarian Church in Washington DC, it has a different acoustic from the Phil Ramone studio recording of Getz/Gilberto, a little leaner perhaps, but still an excellent recording. This new two record 45 RPM issue was mastered by the late George Marino at Sterling Sound. It brings out a wealth of detail that allows the listener to sort out complex rhythms as never before. The reissue makes a clean original sound a bit distorted. A long out of print gold CD issued from DCC smoothed out the sound, but shaved off the high end bite of Getz’s horn sound. Marino restored the top end and cleaned up everything else below. This is another indispensible reissue from Analogue Production’s Verve series. DD

RECORDINGRECORDING

MUSICMUSIC

StardustWillie NelsonMobile Fidelity/Columbia MOFI 1-026

There may be someone out there who doesn’t know Willie Nelson or his best-known album Stardust but I’ve not met that person. Willie Nelson improbably recorded a set of pop standards, and it just as improbably became a major hit. ‘Stardust’ and ‘Georgia On My Mind’ are both jazz standards that have been rendered as pop crossover hits, none more successfully than Willie Nelson. Nelson is backed in this 1978 recording by a small band of piano, drums, guitar, bass, harmonica and his neighbor and producer Booker T. Jones on organ and piano.

While most any pressing sounds pretty good, Columbia changed all that when it released it on its ill-fated half-speed master series that managed to sound like half fidelity mastering. Classic Records had its way with the LP at 33 and 45 RPM (four discs!) but I always preferred an early original pressing to any of these reissues. Paul Stubblebine mastered this new version for Mobile Fidelity on its lower priced Silver Label. He has nailed the sound that made this a super disc. Compared to a white label promo, the differences are subtle. With first class mastering, Mobile Fidelity’s quiet pressing and low price, this is a no-brainer recommendation. DD

RECORDING

MUSIC

The Great DivideVon FreemanPremonition Records 66917-90759-1-4

Tenor saxophone player Von Freeman was one of our most neglected jazz artists, but in his Chicago hometown he remained a legend. Born in 1923, he and his brothers formed a band and backed visiting greats like Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie in the 1940s. He played in the Sun Ra orchestra, and recorded about a dozen LPs as a leader beginning in the 1970s. He remained in Chicago and acted as a mentor for Chicago musicians. Last year, the National Endowment For The Arts awarded him a Jazz Masters Award endowment.

In this 2004 release of jazz standards, Freeman reminds us of his tight wire approach to rhythm and his creative harmonic approach. His style danced close to the free jazz line, and The Great Divide is at once bluesy and melancholic. It’s Freeman’s tribute to Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins and Charlie Parker, and is both approachable and challenging at the same time. Premonition Records is a Chicago based reissue company dedicated to Chicago artists. They have taken this well recorded CD engineering by Jim Anderson, and had it mastered for LP by Doug Sax. A few cuts from the CD were left off to fit one LP and new cover art was commissioned. Highly recommended. DD

200g45 rpm 180g33 rpm 180g33 rpm

89-90 HIFI+102 MusicRev-Jazz_AS.indd 90 18/07/2013 17:18

91 ISSUE 102

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92 ISSUE 102

MUSIC REVIEW / CLASSICAL

RECORDING

MUSICMUSIC

RECORDING

MUSIC

Adiemus ColoresKarl JenkinsDeutsche Grammophon DG 0289 479 1067 1

This latest album is the 6th in the Adiemus series. As is to be expected Colores is bright and vibrant and has a South American theme. Each track is an exploration of different colours and all the tracks explore Latin rhythms.

Jenkins has a distinctive compositional style. He creates themes and expands and develops and returns to them, throughout the individual tracks. This recapitulation serves to relax the listener, while generating an anticipation of where the piece will take you.

The lyrics heard by the choir are words with no meaning, Jenkins has written the text to enhance rhythms and sounds rather than to tell a story, he leaves that down to the musical textures, rhythms and beats.

The album includes a dichotomy of relaxing tracks against some energetic and vibrant ones.

The final track, which is solely instrumental, is a memorising work, it begins with a beautiful trumpet solo from Venezuelan trumpeter Pacho Flores, the instruments below are creating their own long legato phrases and the music builds up, while the less than subtle key changes create a sense of eerie emptiness. And suddenly unexpectedly the piece ends leaving the listener hanging. PT

Exultate DeoMusic inspired by the Psalms of David Choirs of the Chapels Royal, HM Tower of London. Andrew Arthur (organ) Colm Carey (director)LIR Classics LIR026

The quirky and tricky chromaticism of Poulenc, the serenity of Palestrina, the energy of Leighton, the grandeur of Parry and lush harmonies of Herbert Howells are all here on this CD of settings of a variety of psalms texts. The singing comes from a professional choir of ten singers who provide the music at two of the chapels at the Tower of London, except that they’ve caught the tube to record this in the church of St Jude-on-the-Hill, in Hampstead Garden Suburb.

It’s a splendid recording, the last of Parry’s Songs of Farewell is movingly and sensitively sung. Particular mention must be made too of Purcell’s Hear my Prayer, and Bob Chilcott’s My Prayer, the latter takes much of Purcell’s material and bends it to make its own anguished plea. Perplexingly and although excellent, Mendelssohn’s Hear my Prayer separates the two. This is a very good listen; the choir shows itself to be adept in handling a variety of musical styles. SR

French Flavours Paul Carr Organ of St Chad’s Cathedral, BirminghamREGENT REGCD384

There’s an arresting and exciting opening to this CD with the Ouverture Libanaise by the Lebanese-born but now Paris-based Naji Hakim. Actually it adds a middle-eastern flavour to this collection of astonishing virtuosic playing. The French flavours aren’t wholly Gallic; for instance Hendrie’s Toccata and Fugue in F# minor, and an evocative transcription of Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé by David Briggs, who is himself immersed in the French organ tradition.

There is some skittish playing of the Esquisses 1 and 2 by Marcel Dupré and even Prokofiev’s March of the Three Oranges. Throughout, the excellent tone of the three-manual Walker organ is shown off in all its glory; an instrument which Paul Carr has known since student days. There is indeed plenty to transport you across La Manche, culminating in an astonishing run of Eugène Reuschel’s toccata-like Nuages which is as thrilling a conclusion to this recital as its start. SR

RECORDING

MUSIC

92, 94 HIFI+102 MusicRev-Classic_AS.indd 92 18/07/2013 17:20

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Intergrated Amplifiers Bel Canto Evo 2i £1200 Gamut DSi100 £2550 KR Audio Electronics VA 350i £3995 Lizard Wizard Audio £995 Marantz KI Pearl Lite £529 Marantz PM7003 £220 Musical Fidelity A300 £575 Musical Fidelity AMF 35i £4450 Naim Audio NAIT 3 £295 NEODIO NR600 SIGNATURE £3250 Primare I32 +MM30 Media board £3200 Storm Audio Vertigo V35 Integrated Amp £1750 Tube Technology Synergy £4990 Vecteur I 4-2 or Club Six £475

CablesAnalysis Plus Solo Crystal Oval 8 £890 Analysis Plus Silver Oval 7m XLR £1395 Argento Silver Reference ic £1295 Argento VDM Reference 1.5m ic £3250 Argento VDM Reference 1m ic £2495 Audio Note KSL-SPc (2x Stereo pair, price each) £550 Cardas Audio Golden Cross XLR 2m £790 Chord Company (The) Signature £499 Crystal Cable Crystalpower Reference 13A 1.5m £990 Crystal Cable Crystalpower Ultra 16A 2m £2250 Crystal Cable Crystalpower Ultra 16A 2m £2250 Crystal Cable Crystalpower Ultra 16A 2m £2250 Damiel Mk Ix £70 DNM Speaker & interconnect £600 FURUTECH Evolution rca £350 Harmonic Technology Cyberlight Wave interconnect £400 Harmonic Technology Cyberlight P2A interconnects £500 HMS Elektronik Gran Finale Interconnects £690 HMS Elektronik Gran Finale Speaker Cable £690 Hovland MG 2 phono cable £395 Kimber Cu Crystal £40

Krell 3.5m CAST (Marcus) £490 Mark Levinson CZ-Gel 1 XLR £250 MIT Oracle V2.1 ic (2m Bal) £2450 Nirvana audio 1m RCA £690 Nordost Blue Heaven 3m Bi Amp £350 Nordost Odin Supreme Reference £7500 Nordost Valhalla Reference 2/4 3.25m £3899 Russ Andrews 8TC £200 Stealth Audio Varidig AES/EBU £500 Tara Labs The 0.8 ISM Onboard Digital £995 Tara Labs The One + Solo FGS (1m XLR) £890 Tara Labs Analogue floating Ground Station £290 Tara Labs Phono Ground Station £290 TelluriumQ Black Speaker 1.1m pair £130 TelluriumQ Ultra Black 5.5m speaker pair £1995 Transparent Audio Digilink £125 Transparent Audio Reference interconnect with MM technology £1390 van den hul integration rca 1 metre £99 Virtual Dynamics Master LE £970 Wireworld Platinum Eclipse 1m XLR £1795

Pre & Power combos Quad 44 + 405-2 £350 Spectral Audio DMA 100s & DMC 12 £3490

Power Cables Crystal Cable Crystalpower Ultra 16A 2m £2250 Crystal Cable Crystalpower Ultra 16A 2m £2250 Crystal Cable Crystalpower Reference 13A 1.5m £990 Crystal Cable Crystalpower Ultra 16A 2m £2250 Damiel Mk Ix £70

Multi Channel Amps Bel Canto eVo 6 £1895

SubWoofers B&W ASW 4000 £1450 Naim Audio n-Sub £1100 REL Stentor III £1595 Sunfire HRS-8 £325 Velodyne DD15 £1595

Stands CD Racks CD Racks Bespoke £350 Elemental Audio 2 +1 Tier Stand £1295 Music Tools ISOStatic 20 & 38 £650 Partington Superdreadnoughts £150

Tuners (AM/FM/DAB) Accuphase T107 £590 Arcam T31 AM/FM £400 Burmester 931 Reference Tuner £2290 Day Sequerra FM Studio Monitor £2200 Magnum Dynalab FT101 £295 Magnum Dynalab MD108 T £2495 Marantz 10B £2690 Tag Mclaren T20 £299

Accessories Arcam AVR300 £250 Elevators (set of 7) £195 Hi-Fi Tuning fuses £35 Isotek 2K qube £690 Isotek Substation (6x150) £890 Kimber Ring Main Cable £250 LP Storage Boxes Record Storage £75 Ringmat Full Version £95 Sonus Faber Guarneri Homage 2x Bass drivers + 1 Tweeter £1290 Stax SR202 & SRM252II £790 Stillpoints Ultra 5 (Pack of 4) £2200 Stillpoints Ultra SS (pack of 4) £760

AV Processors Classe Audio SSP-800 £3990 Krell S1200U £4990 Lexicon MC1 £295 Proceed AVP £595

Multi Channel Speaker Systems ATC C4 ca active centre channel £1100 ATC SCM10.2 active monitors £1400 Linn AKURATE 225 £1200 M&K Xenon LCR 36, 26 dipole surround, mx 1000 sub £875

93 Choice Hi Fi Iss102.indd 93 18/07/2013 11:42

94 ISSUE 102

MUSIC REVIEW / CLASSICAL

MUSIC

RECORDING

MUSIC

Ginette NeveuThe Complete Studio Works, The Complete Box SetIntense Media: 600057

This box set contains a wealth of music recorded before Neveu’s tragic death. Her success is what led to her death. She was in great demand across the world and toured extensively. She died in an air crash in 1949, at the age of 30.

She was born into a musical family, her brother was a professional musician, also tragically killed in the plane crash, and her uncle was the very well-known organist and composer Widor.

These recordings are from about 75 years ago and the quality and expertise of Nevue’s musicianship is stunning. It is immediately obvious that she would have become a household name had she lived past 30.

The box set contains music from Sibelius, Chopin, Ravel and other lesser known composers such as Kreisler and Suk. The tragedy that surrounds Neveu and her untimely end makes the first disc extremely emotional, the sorrow seems to be heightened by this.

The 75 year old recording quality at times lacks depth and sounds fairly flat, however, if you get over that and actually listen to the music, you will be in for a real treat.

The box set represents good value for what you get. PT

Llandaff Cathedral: MajestasLlandaff Cathedral Choir.James Norrey (organ) and Richard Moorhouse (conductor)Llandaffmusic LM408

“Majestas is a gift to celebrate the love in creation of the new organ in Llandaff Cathedral.” So says the blurb. It’s at this cathedral near Cardiff that you can now find not only Epstein’s unmissable “Christ in majesty” sculpture which dominates the cathedral nave, but also a brand new £1m Nicholson organ.

This is the first recording of the choir with the new instrument, and very good both sound too. The clarity and cleanliness of the boys’ line is worth mentioning, and in particular in Percy Buck’s O Lord God, and a SSA version of Simon Lindley’s Ave Maria. Stanford is represented with his Te Deum in B flat and Ye choirs of new Jerusalem; the former is steady, the second has more flexibility, as does an exciting performance of VW’s O clap your hands. This is a good listen; the musical tradition at Llandaff has been a secret for far too long. SR

MUSIC

RECORDING

MUSIC

Mozart Violin ConcertosMarianne ThorsenTrondheimSolistene

TrondheimSolistene was founded in 1988 as a platform for professional concert training. Since then it has developed into an acclaimed ensemble which has travelled extensively across the globe.

Marianne Thorsen has been playing the violin since the age of four. She studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London and she has played with many leading orchestras including the BBC Symphony, Philharmonia and City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra formerly conducted by Sir Simon Rattle.

This album has two discs containing the same music, one CD and one SACD. The content is three lovely violin concertos No. 4 in D Major (KV218), No. 3 in G Major (KV216) and No 5 in A Major (KV219). It is interesting that the order in which these have been placed on the disc is not in chronological order. It struck me that the order may be to do with the keys in which they have been written; placing them in numerical order would give a Perfect Cadence at the end of each work.

We are presented with a great collection of music carefully selected by 2L and played masterfully by Thorsen and her accompanists. It is a relaxing album and one to share or savour for ones own pleasure. PT

MUSIC

RECORDING

MUSIC

SA

92, 94 HIFI+102 MusicRev-Classic_AS.indd 94 18/07/2013 17:22

95 ISSUE 102

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95 AdPage Iss102.indd 95 18/07/2013 12:37

96 ISSUE 102

Album of the Month: Cocteau Twins “Blue Bell Knoll” By Colleen ‘Cosmo’ Murphy

Classic Album Sundays

In ‘Beautiful Noise’, the forthcoming documentary about three of the most iconic “shoegazing” bands, My Bloody Valentine, The Jesus and Mary Chain and Cocteau Twins, The Cure’s Robert Smith says of the latter’s music, “it was the most romantic sound I’d ever heard.”

Romantic, melancholic, ethereal and dreamlike are words that frequently find their way into descriptions of the enigmatic trio’s music and with good reason. Because the Cocteau Twins refuse to present the listener something concrete to latch onto both lyrically or structurally, we can only subjectively derive our own narrative and draw our own emotions.

The Cocteaus were fortunate to find supporters including Radio One’s John Peel and label owner Ivo Watts-Russell, who provided a creative safe haven when he signed the band to his label 4AD. This early encouragement fostered a prolific start to the bands career as each year witnessed a host of records from seven-inches singles to 12-inch EPs to full-length LPs.

In 1986, they released two albums although one wasn’t a Cocteau Twins album per se but rather a collaboration with Eno cohort, avant-garde composer Harold Budd. ‘The Moon and the Melodies’ started out as the score for a television documentary but when the funding fell through the artists felt the music should be heard although they were adamant it should not fall under the auspices of the Cocteau Twins. Alongside that album they released an official Cocteaus album, ‘Victorialand’, but this one did not feature bass guitarist Simon Raymonde as it was more of an acoustic collaborative effort from the Elizabeth Fraser and Robin Guthrie partnership. Then there was silence.

Two years later they re-emerged not only with a brand new major label USA disbribution deal, but also with a more elaborate, fortified sound in comparison to ‘Victorialand’ which often sounded more like kernels of songs. They used instruments like harpsichord, marimba, xylophone and other percussive sounds for embellishment. They didn’t have a big computer MIDI set-up and rarely used keyboards but instead meticulously processed and treated their guitars, more interested in the sounds being produced rather than the notes being played.

This was much in the line with what Fraser was doing vocally as she continued to “speak in tongues”, playing with the sounds of syllables rather than writing lyrics with any direct intention. Whether

this was due to a reluctance of baring one’s soul only Fraser will know. However, Guthrie later criticized their prodigious use of effects on the album as covering up a lack of songwriting skills.

‘Blue Bell Knoll’ was a triumph and has since been regarded by the band as their first real album. From the opening title track the listener is bowled over by a thick, bold layers of swirling guitars contrasting the otherworldly beauty of Fraser’s soprano. She recently told The Guardian that they way in which she had to use her voice to compete against the “wall of sound” was exhausting and ‘an endurance test’. But this test is what makes the interplay of the fragility and delicacy of the vocals with the sonic onslaught so cathartic and so compelling. And it is this very chemistry which has identified “Blue Bell Knoll” as a classic album 25 years on. +

Blue Bell Knoll – Cocteau Twins

Recorded: September Sound Studios, Twickenham

Produced by the band

Released 19th September, 1988

Label: 4AD

96 HIFI+102 CAS_AS.indd 96 18/07/2013 11:39

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HEGELH300

Reference integrated amplifier with digital inputsThe alchemists of old devoted their lives to finding a way to make gold out of stone. As far as we know they never succeeded. However, with the H300, we finally feel that we have. At least, from an audio perspective.

On one side, the H300 is a spectacular integrated amplifier. With its 250 watts per channel, it is power-ful enough to pair with even the most demanding loudspeakers on the market. Hegel’s patented Soun-dEngine technology ensures completely undistorted and natural sound with a dynamic and powerful bass response. The H300 is, to a large extent, based on Hegel’s Reference products rather than its smaller brothers.

On the other side, it has 5 digital inputs and this is where the alchemy comes in. Hegel’s digital inputs are designed with unique technology that can make your computer, streamer or other digital device sound extremely good. You can take some of the most affordable digital music players on the market, connect them to the H300’s digital inputs, and get fantastic musical and dynamic sound.

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iii IBC Hegel Full HiFi101.indd 3 17/07/2013 14:33

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Documents

HiFi_201308.pdf