I haven't had much critical listening time. Lots o' kidlets at home, ya know. My room sucks, but not nearly as bad as I would have guessed. I need to play with placement a bit, but keeping the towers away from the walls seems to be the right thing.
I had two vocal musician friends over on Sunday for my baby's first birthday (I don't sing, btw). I put on the following (after we ditched our wives):
Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody: This was the first thing my buddies heard. They mostly just sat there silent. We were very impressed with the clarity and dynamics of the recording. This is a song we all know pretty well. One of my friends commented, "You can hear imperfections in the recording" and "Oh! That's where the bass comes in. Nice!" Then we had a nice conversation about how revealing my HT2-TLs are.
Norah Jones - Don't Know Why: We really enjoyed the vocals here. One comment heard afterwards, "Really impressed with the midrange." And, no, my friend doesn't hang out here nor at AVS. We were all just that happy with what we heard.
S.M.V. - Lil' Victa: This is not a piece we all know, but it was a good way to show of how fast/tight/deep the bass is. I thought this was a very good recording. Friend commented, "I'm having speaker envy!" (and I happily didn't hear any room nodes.)
It was good to get a few more (musically trained) ears to listen and comment. Just on my own, I've had little time to listen at reasonable enough volume to really pick out details.
I can say that I was very impressed with the 2-channel layer of the SACD version of Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. It almost seemed like I had on a vinyl LP, minus the dust and scratches. I was really happy with the level of detail I could pick out here.
Charles Mingus - Mingus Ah Um. A jazz album I've heard many times. Now I'm thinking I need a better recording, if one exists. I could distinctly hear tape hiss. Are these towers going to turn me into a snobby audiophile? Hope not.
That's all for now,
Kevin
