The Duo GT’s Achilles Heal is its bass integration. With two sizable bass drivers in a large volume cabinet, driven actively and equalised, it’s no real surprise that the AvantGarde speaker produces greater bass weight and depth than the AXjets. But trying to mate that bottom-end to the spherical horn mid and treble is a challenge, a task made no easier by the conventional amp driving the bass and the super-fast, active current drive amplification on the upper ranges. It’s a flaw that the seamless continuity of the AXjets exposes with a ruthless clarity. Playing piano on the AXjet Pros, the relationship between left and right hands is perfectly balanced, with no bottom-end clumsiness. Musical contrasts are laid bare. Compare the benchmark Benedetti Michelangeli/Giulini Beethoven 1st Piano Concerto (DGG 419 248-2) with Jan Lisecki’s much more recent recording (DGG 0289483 7637) and you can readily appreciate ABM’s fluidity, articulation and the clarity of his lines, while Lisecki’s more propulsive, driven and dynamic playing is equally apparent. There’s an unobstructed, uncompressed quality to the presentation that effortlessly captures the attack and timing in the playing, the weight and spacing of notes. At the same time the speakers leave you in no doubt as to the very real differences between the two performances: the full-on Wiener Symphoniker under Giulini’s baton, the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields directed from the keyboard. These are both wonderful performances, wonderfully different to each other – and the AXjets really celebrate those differences.
“Different is as different does…”
One of those differences is down to sheer scale. The AXjets leave you in no doubt as to the fact that the Wiener band dwarfs the ASMF – or that it is captured in a live concert recording. It’s a reflection of the speakers’ dynamic capabilities, but also their spatial coherence. ‘True Love Ways’ (from Buddy Holly From The Original Master Tapes, MCA MCLD 19186) is reproduced with all the presence, body and immediacy that you’d expect from a full-range horn. Holly is a near-physical presence, his vocal inflections perfectly projected, but the AXjets capture the space and air inside the studio, the dispersed Crickets, strings, harp and saxophone. Yes, I’ve heard the side and rear walls more precisely defined, but the sense of human and instrumental presence, the air that carries and binds the performance together, has only ever been bettered by speaker systems that offer near AXjet sensitivity and considerably more bandwidth – the Vox Palladian or Trio G3, both with their matching subs (and price-tags)…
When it comes to scale, few musical genres can match a serious soundtrack. The Blackhawk Down OST (Decca 440 017 012-2) manages to combine action movie crash/bang/wallop with a sense of space, subtlety and varied musical texture. It consciously juxtaposes ethnic Somali instruments with hard-edged techno sounds in a heavily layered, almost schizophrenic, soundscape. The AXjets drive deep bass beats into the room with a real sense of motive purpose, an energy that makes it almost impossible to sit still. At the same tame, the slashing guitar riff of ‘Barra Barra’, the core lyric and almost shrieked backing vocals are layered and separated, building density and intensity. When the track winds down to the spacey, atmospheric wash of ‘Vale Of Plenty’, the shift in air pressure, the atmosphere in the room is a tangible thing. The vocal contributions of singers as diverse as Baaba Maal, Joe Strummer and Lisa Gerrard are unmistakable. But what’s really special about this music on this system is just how directly it connects and communicates. Atmospheres are palpable, while the ‘action’ tracks are laden with tension and adrenaline, making for an irresistible motive force to the emotional and dramatic events that drive them, either in the movie or the wider context. It’s an expressive tour de force, both by composer Hans Zimmer and the system/speakers reproducing it.
