I went. There was a surprisingly small number of rooms. How can a London based show have such a low turnout of exhibitors? The Whittlebury show was substantially bigger than this. Most rooms sounded average to me. OK so I was there early so maybe some kit needed to warm up a bit but a return to many rooms left me underwhelmed. One of the reasons I made the journey was to hear some Gershman speakers. In this case their Monitor Studio standmounts. I was hoping that they might have the relaxed presentation of their Avant Guarde model that I owned for a few years and really enjoyed but no. I suppose āStudioā says it all. Still pretty good just not what I was hoping for.
They did have a very nice looking Zavfino turntable in the system.
The Winters Audio room was impressive. The system was being driven by a Gryphon Essence 120 integrated paired with Giya loudspeakers and centre stage a direct drive turntable with a milled aluminium plinth from a new UK company called Onkk. Very nice if you like the curvacious look. Fitted with a Tri-Planer arm and a Murasakino Sumile cartridge. It all sounded really good.
Audio Note delivers again. I walked in to Rage Against the Machine being played. A nice change from the usual meh. Those small pair of Ax2 standmounts were amazing. Rage was followed up with some Gorillaz which again sounded great. A very impressive system at the low end of their product range.
The other room I really liked was the Russell K room which was running a pair of the RED 50se standmounts with Rega amplification. Lovely sounding speakers.
Quite disappointing overall. Ā£3 for a half filled cup of tea and ULEZ charges donāt help either. I doubt I'll bother next year.
Whittlebury was way better IMO.