RMAF 2012

Rogers—Totem—Bel Canto—Well Tempered—Kimber

Stephen Mejias  |  Oct 13, 2012  |  First Published: Oct 14, 2012

“These blood-red eyes don’t see so good / But what’s worse is, if they could / Would I change my ways?”

So sings Dan Auerbach on “These Days,” the closing track from the Black Keys’ excellent 2010 album, Brothers. As Auerbach sings, achingly, slide guitar weeps, bells chime, bass guitar thumps along woefully, cymbals splash, and floor toms rumble. It’s a beautiful few moments of R&B-inspired pop music, flooded with heartache.

I’ve never heard it sound as good—dynamic, detailed, present, and powerful—as it sounded yesterday, through Totem Wind Design loudspeakers driven by a Rogers High Fidelity EHF-200 integrated amplifier (in fat, forward ultralinear mode), with a Bel Canto front end (e.One DAC3.5VB and CD3 transport) and Kimber BiFocal XL speaker cables and Hero interconnects.

Sounding equally captivating was the Well Tempered Amadeus turntable, spinning “Angels” from the XX’s new album, Coexist, the system communicating every drop of truth and longing in Romy Madley Croft’s voice.

COMMENTS
JohnnyR's picture
Submitted by JohnnyR on October 14, 2012 - 4:13am

Why do all these "reviews" have to be chock full of superlatives drawn from the hat at random? "I've never heard it sound so good"........until the NEXT report that is. Are there any rooms or equipment that don't sound good and will be reported as being so? Hmmmmm I'm guessing that if the sound seems bad then it will be blamed upon the room acoustics and NOT any of the hardware no doubt. Let's wait and see!

volvic's picture
Submitted by volvic on October 15, 2012 - 6:49am

Good coverage so far guys - keep em coming.

Nick

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