Conrats to Peter Breuninger on a sublime review of the MBL speakers in the latest TAS. The review is very atypical. Here how most reviews go: got a package… it was heavy… I plugged it in for break-in…sounded like crap… I let it cook a bit more… it still sounded like crap…Ooops! I plugged something in wrong – I am SUCH a PUTZ! But I figured out how to plug it in the right way (I am such a cool nerd!), and Voilla!!! It now it sounds great!! … Now let’s talk about the sonic attributes…Bass.. midbass.. coherence and crossovers, image accuracy… highly resolving…But need great associated gear to tell how great this is… need those good recordings to reveal these attributes… Ahh she’s just in the room with me – how wonderful….Give these speakers an audition… expensive, but the Best I have ever heard (Pick one: in my system or in my friends studio or at the audio show). (All of you aspiring reviewers, who want to write sucky reviews, use this template.)
These reviewers are all arguing form the rational instead of the emotional space. But how much passion can one have about transparency, neutrality, better parts, or hearing a different layer of the mastering tape. Yet the products that are called “The Best” and “Product of the Year” are usually emotionally-challenged speakers. The Q5 should be relegated to the equivalent sitting in an expensive restaurant near the bathroom, with the door cracked, but because it scores so well on these individual audiophile attributes, it is revered by the audiophile press. The reviews and the speakers are equally dull. What the reviewers – be it Fremer, Valin, Harley, and pretty much most others - don’t get is: Who Cares about these audiophile attributes? They get the individual components but miss they whole. They have forgotten why we are in the hobby.
They talk of “beguiling-sounding gear” in the conclusion of the review, but talk of beguiling and exciting sound is just talk. Telling a story about great sound, on the other hand, helps us feel it.
Breuninger does it superbly. He takes off the rational/ analytical hat right away. He draws us right into his world of attending concerts. He also gets us to conceive the experience in our minds –“Imagine sitting in a concert…you easily get lost in the music within seconds… “. Powerful!
This is a brilliant appeal to the crux of the audiophile self-interest. Most of us know that our system doesn’t sound like a real show, or even realistic - save for the smallest scale stuff. But for most us, re-creating the emotions of a live show at home is the purpose of the hobby. We want to forget that we are listening to a hifi system, and our system can’t do it. But MBL can, according to Breuninger…
Once he sets the emotional context, he focuses on the analytical components. Amplifier pairing discussion is interesting and comparison to a previous version is of the speaker is invaluable, as many of us are always wondering about the next upgrade.
As great as it is, the review is not perfect. Those that don’t care about being at a live show will stop reading right away and run to buy their Q5 so they can hear more details and mastering layers. And those that are interested in the speaker would like to know how some attributes compare to similarly priced speakers that are after the same thing.
But what Breuninger does is gets to the audiophile purpose and the audiophile identity: audiophiles would really love to be able to reproduce the live show in their home. As a result, the review will live as long as MBL speakers are around.
To those who are very familiar with the MBLs, is the speaker as good as the review?
These reviewers are all arguing form the rational instead of the emotional space. But how much passion can one have about transparency, neutrality, better parts, or hearing a different layer of the mastering tape. Yet the products that are called “The Best” and “Product of the Year” are usually emotionally-challenged speakers. The Q5 should be relegated to the equivalent sitting in an expensive restaurant near the bathroom, with the door cracked, but because it scores so well on these individual audiophile attributes, it is revered by the audiophile press. The reviews and the speakers are equally dull. What the reviewers – be it Fremer, Valin, Harley, and pretty much most others - don’t get is: Who Cares about these audiophile attributes? They get the individual components but miss they whole. They have forgotten why we are in the hobby.
They talk of “beguiling-sounding gear” in the conclusion of the review, but talk of beguiling and exciting sound is just talk. Telling a story about great sound, on the other hand, helps us feel it.
Breuninger does it superbly. He takes off the rational/ analytical hat right away. He draws us right into his world of attending concerts. He also gets us to conceive the experience in our minds –“Imagine sitting in a concert…you easily get lost in the music within seconds… “. Powerful!
This is a brilliant appeal to the crux of the audiophile self-interest. Most of us know that our system doesn’t sound like a real show, or even realistic - save for the smallest scale stuff. But for most us, re-creating the emotions of a live show at home is the purpose of the hobby. We want to forget that we are listening to a hifi system, and our system can’t do it. But MBL can, according to Breuninger…
Once he sets the emotional context, he focuses on the analytical components. Amplifier pairing discussion is interesting and comparison to a previous version is of the speaker is invaluable, as many of us are always wondering about the next upgrade.
As great as it is, the review is not perfect. Those that don’t care about being at a live show will stop reading right away and run to buy their Q5 so they can hear more details and mastering layers. And those that are interested in the speaker would like to know how some attributes compare to similarly priced speakers that are after the same thing.
But what Breuninger does is gets to the audiophile purpose and the audiophile identity: audiophiles would really love to be able to reproduce the live show in their home. As a result, the review will live as long as MBL speakers are around.
To those who are very familiar with the MBLs, is the speaker as good as the review?