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best speakers ever heard

G T Audio said:
The Western Electric 16A. These were staggeringly good on female voice. I have never heard Ella Fitzgerald sound so realistic. It sounded like she was there in real life singing in the room.
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So beautifully made and presented too ... ;)
 
Bangaio said:
I can’t remember the reviewer or speaker - and they were banging on about the height of the sound stage and how you coils hear the room it was recorded in and gave example recordings and I thought these are all close mic’d multiple takes...
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Yes, I know that's true but the mics still seem to pick up much more that what's directly in front of them. I remember reading an article a while back, I think it might've been about the Universal fire, and it talked about how we don't know exactly what's on a master tape because we can put more onto the tape than we can get back off. It reminded me of listening to familiar records on John Watson's system and wondering just how much information is actually on a record.

Using 'Trick Of The Tale' as an example, an album I've been listening to for forty years, that would also be a close mic'd studio album. And his system let you see the size of the studio! And you could tell it was wood lined. Clearly, the mics had picked up reverberations off the walls of the studio and John's system could let you hear them.

Another possibility is that the speakers, or system, adds coloration which sounds like added spacial information. Not that I dislike that effect but it's another way a system can sound bigger than it is.
 
Mullardman said:
On the live v studio thing. I'm good friends with three out of the four 'Cavern Club Beatles', who do (or did.. before lockdown) regular shows in the Cavern Club Liverpool, as well as gigs all over the World. Their main show is a quite deliberate attempt to reproduce the studio recordings of the Beatles. I dounbt the Beatles could have done that way back, even if the'd wanted to. It's what people expect and enjoy...
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I think that "what people expect and enjoy" corresponds to my personal experience - both from recordings and loudspeakers.

My earliest ventures into music included The Who (on vinyl). Much later I bought some of their live albums on CD and these were quite different. Initially I was rather disappointed but later came to appreciate them a lot.

I think I just got used to the studio versions and these became my references; with wider experience my tastes adapted to enjoy the live performances just as much.

On topic I think the same human adaptation happens with loudspeakers. Ones I thought of as "the best" in the past have been mostly superseded by ones I appreciate today as "the best". Part of that is learning what to listen for plus technical product improvements; but part of that is my changing taste for what I like.
 
WE horns and Living Voice Olympians are amazing at what they do well - making simple music sound huge.
I've never heard anyone play "normal" music on them. Maybe there's a reason for that?

Kudos Titans are much more my cup of tea.
 
Like many all about the room and budget. On the stand mount front (small / medium rooms) always thought the KEF LS50 is brilliant at its money and probably the best VFM speaker I can think off. Moving into bigger budgets then Dynaudio Confidence C1 is a brilliant speaker, the Focal Utopia Diablo III are even better and the best standmounts i’ve personally heard are the TAD CR1. To clarify all speakers were on expensive systems geared to hear the best out of the speakers.

I struggle far more with floorstanders as I rate different speakers for differing application. Assuming that room and budget are no object then I've always been keen on Vivid Audio's, Dynaudio, TAD, Magico, MBL, Wilson Audio; as well many other brands.
 
Tony L said:
I’m not saying they are “shocking” (not my word, I was just trying to explain a little studio technology), just that they have next to zero to do with live music. The post above written whilst you were writing makes the point better.

As an example just think about a drum kit. In what real-world scenario aside from sitting on the drum stool would you get the cymbals and hi-hats panned hard left right, the toms flying between the speakers etc? That’s before we factor the kick drum being recorded absolutely dry likely with a noise-gate, the snare having added reverb etc etc. This is absolutely not what a drum kit sounds like. It is one reason jazz sounds so, so much more real as chances are the kit was mic’d up with just a couple of mics and behaves as the ensemble instrument it is in real life with the acoustic space it was recorded in preserved. It sounds familiar to us, whereas most rock/pop drums sound entirely artificial.
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An image to further illustrate your point:

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Darren L said:
What about earlier studio recordings of rock and pop bands where the equipment was all analogue and less complex or the infamous 'one take' songs that make it onto albums, perhaps records that were recorded around the same time as Kind of Blue, would the studios have used a different practice for recording a Jazz band as opposed to a Rock n roll or country band?
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"Real" stereo is achieve by using one mic per channel. Anything else is a stereo mix.
Stereo mixes are the result of a combination of tracks, usually mono and electric or electronic instruments are often plugged straight into the mixing desk. The musicians aren't always playing together and they usually listen to each other over headphones. Sometimes one or several of the musicians are recorded in another studio in another town, country or continent.

"Real" stereo rock and pop is as rare as hen's teeth...
One example is Cowboy Junkies' Trinity Sessions. The instruments sounded a lot louder than Margot's voice so she had to sing into a mic which was then PA'ed (Klipsch Heresy IIRC) into the chuch hall.

"Real" stereo jazz is almost as rare.

Even classical music, particularly orchestral, is now commonly multi-mic'ed, not just 2 main + 2 ambience + the odd spot.
 
Best speakers I ever heard?

Perhaps the TAD Reference Ones

also

Bowers & Wilkins 801Fs
Bowers & Wilkins Nautilus
Vivid G1s
Quad ESL-63s with Gradient subs
Revel Salon2s
Sonus Faber Stradivari
 
ex brickie said:
The speakers that staggered me most were Boenicke W8SE in a largish demo room with lots of people in it (hifi show). The dealer was a distributor with several pairs of speakers in the room so I was convinced one of the large pairs was playing. I was astonished at the sound quality and soundstage from such small cabinets. Love ‘em
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I too heard these speakers at a recent audio show but reacted differently. I noticed in the PFM thread on the show that others had also responded in a strong positive manner to this speaker. The one I thought performed about the best didn't even get mentioned either positively or negatively by anybody. People seem to want quite different things from their speakers.
 
Re live sound vs recorded: One of my favourite live albums is Get Yer Ya Ya’s Out (sic), which reportedly has loads of studio overdubs. Doesn’t stop it sounding like an incredibly vibrant live performance.

And whilst on the subject of live music, the best live bands take their studio material to an entirely different level. Outstanding examples based on personal experience included The White Stripes, Little Feat (with Lowell), The Who (with Keith) and the best live band there has ever been by a country mile - Led Zep.
 
iansr said:
And whilst on the subject of live music, the best live bands take their studio material to an entirely different level. Outstanding examples based on personal experience included The White Stripes, Little Feat (with Lowell), The Who (with Keith) and the best live band there has ever been by a country mile - Led Zep.
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+ Faithless.
 
Mullardman said:
Guess you never saw the original Fleetwood Mac live then....
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The original Fleetwood Mac are one of my favourite bands and its one of my biggest regrets that I never saw them play live. The live recordings are testament to how good they were. Good as they were I can’t believe they scaled the heights that Zep could reach. There was something extraordinary going on between those guys. I was lucky enough to see them 7 times.
 
iansr said:
The original Fleetwood Mac are one of my favourite bands and its one of my biggest regrets that I never saw them play live. The live recordings are testament to how good they were. Good as they were I can’t believe they scaled the heights that Zep could reach. There was something extraordinary going on between those guys. I was lucky enough to see them 7 times.
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Firstly.. apologies.. my reply about not seeing Fleetwood Mac was supposed to include a 'Big Grin', but was sent from my phone which is probs why it didn't appear here. IOW, it was meant as a humorous riposte.

That said, I did see the Original Fleetwood Mac at least twice and possibly 3 times at Nottingham Boat Club. It was a long time ago... They played with astounding confidence, authority and skill. They also had a ball and a good laugh.

Around that time I also saw Cream (Nottm Tech) Tull, Jeff Beck with Rod Stewart and Aynsley Dunbar, Georgie Fame, Chris Farlowe, Linda Lewis and many many others.

A little later I saw Floyd (Doncaster Top Rank) and Ten Years After (Liverpool Uni) By coincidence I worked briefly with Alvin Lee's Dad on a tunnelling site in Nottm around 1970.

I didn't see Zep.

I thought their first album was an amazing production. But, for whatever reason I lost interest in the heavier side of rock from then on. I've often said that anybody who heard 'Are You Experienced','Piper at the Gates of Dawn', 'Fresh Cream' and Zeppelin's first... has heard 'rock'. Obviously not true.. but it was enough for me..

I heard Zep on a BBC live concert . Introduced by John Peel I think and for some reason I have it in my head as a 'Penny Concert'. I thought it was dreadful.

But.. I never saw them live and apart from that first album wasn't a fan.. so maybe unfair of me to comment.
 
pocketkitchen said:
Shahinian Diapasons.
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Yes well obviously ☺️

I also heard Diapasons, at Phonography, driven by quite a modest amp , not a sound I will forget .

In a domestic context any of the Shahinian speakers I have owned, previously Arcs and Obs, were blissful and make one forget the gear and just listen to the music . I now have Larcs for domestic reasons and they do just the same, and they are superior to Super Elf’s , as they should be given the price .

In the early 80s I had a couple of listening experiences at Heathrow which were unforgettable . First , early Isobariks on the end of a Naim 6 pack. Couldn’t quite afford it though. Next and more exotic, a pair of large corner horns (Klipsch I think ) driven by a Dynavector valve amp ( not sure it was ever marketed ) all just to demonstrate the early Dynavector cartridges. Unforgettable
 
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