Audiophilepure

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“Last, let me reference the track ‘The Town Burns’ from John Williams’ original soundtrack for the film Rosewood [Sony Masterworks, 16/44.1]. ‘The Town Burns’ conveys a dark sense of foreboding conveyed in no small part by deep, very low-pitched percussion that seems, at times, to arise out of nowhere. Here, the powerful, but also tautly controlled and sharply focussed, bass of the Vantages comes into play. One moment the listener is following the track’s vocals and melodic lines and the next one is aware of the deep, potent, but never overblown or boomy, presence of very low-pitched percussion instruments that fairly bristle with ominous portent. Then, just as suddenly as they appeared, the low percussion sounds decay and vanish—as if inviting the listener to wonder is s/he even heard them at all. Great low bass is often this way; it’s not present until the music calls for it, and it doesn’t linger around once its impact has been heard and felt. The Vantages are great low-frequency performers.”

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“No matter how you cut it, $16,990 is a lot of money for a pair of minimonitors. Throw in the matching, semi-obligatory stands and you’re looking at an investment of $19,970 to coax Focal’s Diablo Utopia Colour Evos into your life. Yet there’s no denying that, 12 years after the launch of the original Utopia platform, it remains a hugely competent and satisfying communicator of music. Its fantastic tweeter boasts all the extension and refinement you could ever want, and Focal has voiced the all-important midrange to perfection: it’s vivacious and lifelike, and the speaker imposes on it no colorations of its own. You also get healthy servings of Focal’s signature industrial design and excellent build quality. And while it doesn’t provide much in the way of weight and slam at the lower limits of the audioband, the Diablo Utopia Colour Evo’s frequency response remains linear and composed even at unreasonably high volumes — across the board, this speaker is unflappable.”

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One other forgotten aspect is the ability to play at a reasonably convincing level. When the other speakers have long run out of dynamic capability, the L-100 Classics still have plenty of headroom left. Oddly, while they are slightly grainy in comparison to a few other speakers, this does not increase at higher levels. I’d venture to guess that some of the insight gained in studio monitor and sound reinforcement has trickled down to these speakers. If you want a pair of real rock and roll speakers, these will do quite nicely.

At the end of the day, the JBL L-100 Classics remind me a lot of that great American amplifier, the McIntosh MC275. It’s not the last word in any of the standard audiophile qualifiers, but I dare you to have a bad day listening to one. The same goes for the L-100 Classics. I dare you to have a bad time listening to your favorite music, no matter what generation it’s from when you’re rocking a pair of L-100 Classics.”