Montreal Audiofest 2024

Technics was showing some delightfully high-end stuff. The turntables were more alike sonically than different, revealing a house sound marked by clarity, explicitness, transient speed, ambient cues, and vivid pictures.

You want chunky sounds, vivid tone, socking bass, and a globe-like soundstage with notes that appear so solid and dimensional you might be tempted to try to pick them like an apple from an apple tree? If so, then step right up into the Altitudo room, which may look a little small for the amount of gear present and the size of the speakers I listened to, but make no mistake, the sound I heard from FLAC files streamed from a hard drive was clean, muscular, and colorfully diverse.

ArtistCloner is one of those audio manufacturers, like Audio Note, making complete systems from cabling to speakers to power conditioners. Its designs stem from one person's singular vision.

Atelier Audio's room was buzzing the couple of times I'd passed by to peer inside, and I don't mean some sort of transformer noise. I mean with people. It was consistently abuzz with visitors. Luckily, I was eventually able to snatch a seat during an Atelier Audio demo; then I understood why this room was so popular.

Saying Audio Group Denmark/Wynn Audio impressed at this year's Montreal Audiofest is an understatement. They brought the goods and then some. That "some" is what I perceived as the quality of the merchandise and its performance in relation to its price.

It's always a pleasure to visit an exhibit room put together by Audiophile Experts because the retailer's setups and recordings tend to sound top notch, and you won’t hear these recordings elsewhere at a show.

"I'm back, back in the saddle again"—actually, I'm back at the Montreal Audiofest, held March 22–24 at its usual grand locale, the Bonaventure Hotel.