For me the highlight of the show was meeting fellow members. We had a lot of online chatting with
@christoph but it was really nice finally meeting with him and his knowledgable friend and having longer chats, walking around and listening to different systems together. He also introduced me to another fine gentleman
@audioquattr and we had some brief chats and exchange of ideas with him too.
For an audio/hifi hobbyists, the very rare chance to experience first hand, the first high fidelity speaker ever (made in 1926) in its original form is a big reward. I felt lucky and indebted to everyone involved bringing down and original Western Electric 12b, and even using a VT2 tube from 1918 for our listening pleasure. These are one of the rarest items in hifi. They also have some strengths that even totl hifi today hardly matches and that is very educational itself. I spent the longest time in total in this room. Visited at least 6 or 7 times and listened to a lot of music. It was also very nice to meet JC Morrison whom I have always followed with interest.
For the rest of the show, I tried to visit this year all the horns I could and some of the rest as well. I will write about a few of the horn rooms as I am not into the others too much and spent much less time in them. There were more than a few rooms that sounded good, at least in show situations which is a hard thing to pull off.
Aries Cerat room was nice and I met Stavros at last, another forward/different thinking designer I follow and applaud. I joked him about his room acoustics and how adding my diffusers would help but I guess it was lost in translation or show chatter
It was a very small listening space as the speakers were well into the room. I had the chance to sit in front right but then all I could hear was the right channel and I was so close I heard the tweeters and the rest in a very non coherent fashion. Then for the second time I had the chance to sit at the very back and it was a lot better. I enjoyed what I heard and it was evident Aries Cerat would be able to sound good if setup well in a suitable space. Kudos to Stavros.
Avant Garde room had a pleasant surprise for me. Not in terms of sound but in terms of design. I liked their colibri design and could see that reaching out to younger clients, cafes etc. I could imagine those matching a lot of cafes in Ibiza for example
Their main system sounded good unless they had high volume. When that went high up the sound became worse and that is not supposed to happen with good horn systems according to me. Still, this companies look for better design, component build quality is a lesson to learn for me and I applaud them for their ongoing research and optimization.
B&M - Backes&Muller was another pleasent surprise for me. I have not auditioned their speakers before, they are not very popular in my circles evidently. They were celebrating their 50th anniversery so it is me who missed them until now. I liked what I heard, another different thinking manufacturer. I think it was the BM line 60 model they were presenting. The frequency was extended both ways and the sound was really dynamic, I can also say it felt like very low distortion. It may well be as they had 23 drivers on each channel. The twelve 8" bass on the speakers were active if I am not wrong.
ESD room or more correctly ESD hall was an interesting experience to say the least. I had about 4 visits to this hall and one being the first afterparty which happened after 18:00 and they said they were going to play EDM music. The normal listening sessions I had there were very satisfactory and the sound was coherent as we were able to sit far enough. They played classical and it felt like a concert hall if the recording was good enough. It is more like an audiophile PA system but I say this in a good way. It means you need a big space and quite a bit of distance. However, it seemed they did not know which every PA designer knew; that bass is very inefficient and if you have efficient tops, you really have to go overboard to match them. They have missed this and it became evident when they tried to play EDM music at the after party, the sound got cut off. I could easily see the right channel top woofer going into over excursion and even hitting the coil and shorting. I tried to explain this but they were busy themselves trying to figure out what was going on. Just 3 sealed woofers per side for this ultra efficient large scale horn system is definitely not enough. If they wanted to go with sealed subs, they should have had at least double but preferably four times the number of bass woofers. Even then, I am not sure if messe halls provide that amount of current supply to drive those. In that case they should have gone more efficient subwoofer solutions and built horn subs and at least 8 of them... All in all another show delight which would be near impossible to experience at your own or friends place.
Fleetwood/OMA room was less exciting for me this year than the last. I really enjoyed the last years setup, those museum speakers and thos amps looked great. The small fleetwood which was on static last year was playing this year as the main speakers but they sounded quite ordinary for me. Not hifi ordinary as for dynamics and loudness it is above a lot of them. They sounded more like good pa monitors but of course with a much better design and finishing . Their design and finish is good and if you love the looks, it would be worth the admission price. I would take it over a lot of "audiophile" bookshelfs. The small excelsior system is definitely not my cup of tea. When I first saw the photos I though it would be a JBL paragon size thing but it is very small and its design really did not work for me. I did not listen to it so I can not comment on sound. One highlight of this room is the music they play. At least I heard some funky tunes and variety of genres there! They also had beautiful photography books. It is a company that has a story and they know how to market it. They want to be hip and they are.
Klipsch demo room which had the Jubilee setup was one of the rooms I promised to visit as one of my friends seriously considered getting one. Now, contrary to most I love Klipsch. It is because they were the first hifi speakers that I heard when I was a child. Klipsch were where my journey has started. I still own heavily modified Klipschorns as a second system. Back to Jubilee! Roy Delgado is a designer who is one of the top for horn design and this modified tractrix profile with celestion axi and the special phase plug has become some kind of a legend in some limited circles. I had three different listening sessions there and I was underwhelmed. I do not know what they did wrong but these speakers can surely play better than this. First time I went the sound was harsh, the second time I was there it sounded busy (which should be the opposite, it should play relaxed), third time I felt like spectral balance was again tilted towards highs. Very dynamic, good off-axis sound but were problematic sounding for me to say the least at this show. Still, there is one more thing to get from the Klipsch room. Check the pricing of their cornwalls, la scalas etc. The pricing is very good in contrast with the rest of the show. Sill bookshelfs that cost 30k and a beautiful cornwall is costing just 9k.
Odeon is another company who succeeded to have good sound in show conditions. There is not much to say about it, it sounded coherent and good. Open, dynamic and coherent sound. It did not excite me very much but there is also not much to fault. Just personal preferences. Sadly, my Odeon room photo sucks so I am sorry.
Stein Music has brought their top line Bob L. I heard the fairfied four there and I know this recording. The texture was there, the dynamics were there, the balance was right. The only thing I think I can b*tch about is the midbass. I would have liked a more airier sounding one as it sounded a little thick for me. This is my view and the designer most probably is happy with it and I think he succeeded in what he wanted to do.
Tune Audio I have visited briefly. I think it was their Avaton model. It sounded good, brought the good qualities of a horn speaker. but may have had some of the bad as well. The looks don't do it for me and I felt like it could be more refined and the bass sounding more coherent with the rest. The off axis response felt like a big change and I wonder how that would translate to a room power response. I am talking more about what these systems are missing so do not get me wrong, this room sounded good too. If you had any of these systems in your house, I am sure they could be tuned to sound very good.
I guess the only other horn manufacturing loudspeaker company at MOC that I did not review here is Lorenzo Audio labs but they were most probably horns from only above 800hz, so I can be excused
I missed Admire Audio from last year, wish they were here again.
