Do you need high end speakers for rock and heavy metal?

[Sokel]

Perhaps good PA will make it?

Make that control room's main monitors and you're close.
Put a nice finish to them or, put a REALLY nice finish to them and you're there.

Plenty around, it's only real estate.

 

[Old_School_Brad]

Get the Klipsch the Nines and shut up my dear ; )

Kidding but näeh, no so callled high end speaker can. Particularly when it comes to high, clean and uncompressed SPL. Perhaps you can specify a bit
more what your understanding of "high, clean, and uncompressed SPL" is. Perhaps good PA will make it?

To me, metal needs, as every genre, an "uncoulored" speaker, a bit of room treatment and a bite of DSP to fit taste.

I’m not familiar with the Klipsch Nines specifically, but I doubt they exhibit anything close to a neutral response.

When I said high-end, I meant it in the truest sense of the word -as in, uncolored and accurate, not the typical “audiophile” interpretation you might be thinking of.

And yes, some PA speakers could definitely fit the bill for what I’m after. But those capabilities aren’t exclusive to the PA world -there are non-PA designs out there that can deliver similar performance. A common characteristic among them is the use of large bass and midrange drivers.

 

[Mart68]

I’m not familiar with the Klipsch Nines specifically, but I doubt they exhibit anything close to a neutral response.

Actually they do - although low bass is overdamped:

Klipsch The Nines integrated loudspeaker system Measurements | Stereophile.com

Sidebar 3: Measurements I performed the measurements with the Klipsch The Nines Primary speaker (serial number 107128623160250). Before I started the testing, I installed the Klipsch Connect app on my iPad mini and paired it with the speaker with Bluetooth. I used the app to set the equalizer...

www.stereophile.com

 

[kyuu]

Actually they do - although low bass is overdamped:

Klipsch The Nines integrated loudspeaker system Measurements | Stereophile.com

Sidebar 3: Measurements I performed the measurements with the Klipsch The Nines Primary speaker (serial number 107128623160250). Before I started the testing, I installed the Klipsch Connect app on my iPad mini and paired it with the speaker with Bluetooth. I used the app to set the equalizer...

www.stereophile.com

Why use Stereophile measurements when we have Klippel via Erin?

Klipsch The Nines Speaker Review

Klipsch In-Room Gold LCR Review

www.erinsaudiocorner.com

(I have no idea why that's getting a "Klipsch In-Room Gold LCR Review" subheading, guessing that's an error on Erin's end.)

TL;DR: They're actually quite good. Shelf the treble down a couple DB and they're quite accurate. Good bass extension too. Only real issues are that they will employ limiting when you get past 90dB/1m, and rather narrow horizontal dispersion (though I hear some people actually like that).

 

[SigbergAudio]

I wrote a follow-up piece to the original article (that was posted in the initial post of this thread) today. Below is the ingress of the article.

Killing in the Name by Rage Against The Machine.
Paranoid by Black Sabbath.
Sehnsucht by Rammstein.

Epic tracks that beg to be turned up to 11. But when you do, your ears beg you to turn it down again. I guess the recording isn't that good. And my room can't handle loud music anyway.

Sound familiar?

Is music supposed to turn to mush when you crank the volume?

It's not the room. It's not the recording. It's your speakers. Killing in the Name by Rage Against The Machine.Paranoid by Black Sabbath.Sehnsucht by Rammstein. Epic tracks that beg to be turned up to 11. But when you do, your ears beg you to turn it back down. I guess the recording isn't that...

www.sigbergaudio.com

 

[Audionaut]

Epic tracks that beg to be turned up to 11. But when you do, your ears beg you to turn it down again. I guess the recording isn't that good. And my room can't handle loud music anyway.

Sound familiar?

Hi Thorbjørn,
I think you're trying to encourage people to read the article, but when you post it like that in the thread, it sounds like your speakers aren't capable of playing those three tracks properly.

 

[SigbergAudio]

Hi Thorbjørn,
I think you're trying to encourage people to read the article, but when you post it like that in the thread, it sounds like your speakers aren't capable of playing those three tracks properly.

Why would I post it if that were the case? Sounds like a strange interpretation, but I can edit the post to explicitly state that it's the ingress of the article. Perhaps not so easy to remember that this thread was initially about another article, so I edited the post a bit more to remind of that.

 

[rf1938]

Much of the music I really like was recorded in the '70s - Clapton, Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn, etc. These recording lacked dynamic range in most cases, especially noticeable in the low end, much of it missing. Remastered releases are often an improvement, but when compared to contemporary release, like London Grammar, the differences are profound. I think none of this is on the speakers and all of it a reflection of recording technology of the.time. I was involved in many film projects during the late '70s and on and recall everything sounding pretty good in the studios with massive boards and 32 track recorders. With today's tech, a far smaller digital rig played back through Genelecs (where I work) and no subs results in a significantly better sound. I don't think there is a speaker on the planet that will make the original Wheels of Fire sound any better, but the good news is the recent remastered version with phase corrected tracks, sounds greatly improved. As far as Sigberg goes, the bad news is what I miss most in those early recordings is bass! Just not much there. Listen to Norwegian singer Sinne Eeg to hear some beautiful bass reproduced beautifully through Sigberg subs! Not recorded 50 years ago...

 

[SigbergAudio]

Much of the music I really like was recorded in the '70s - Clapton, Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn, etc. These recording lacked dynamic range in most cases, especially noticeable in the low end, much of it missing. Remastered releases are often an improvement, but when compared to contemporary release, like London Grammar, the differences are profound. I think none of this is on the speakers and all of it a reflection of recording technology of the.time. I was involved in many film projects during the late '70s and on and recall everything sounding pretty good in the studios with massive boards and 32 track recorders. With today's tech, a far smaller digital rig played back through Genelecs (where I work) and no subs results in a significantly better sound. I don't think there is a speaker on the planet that will make the original Wheels of Fire sound any better, but the good news is the recent remastered version with phase corrected tracks, sounds greatly improved. As far as Sigberg goes, the bad news is what I miss most in those early recordings is bass! Just not much there. Listen to Norwegian singer Sinne Eeg to hear some beautiful bass reproduced beautifully through Sigberg subs! Not recorded 50 years ago...

If you listen a lot to that era, with an active system you can at least adjust the bass.

Beyond that, I don't really think the recording technology was lacking. Listen to something like the first, self titled Dire Straits album from 1978, it sounds great - both regards to sound quality and tonal balance. There's no need to adjust anything to get full, great sounding bass.

If you're referring to Wheels of Fire by Cream (1968), we're a decade earlier in the late 60s, that's a slightly different sound - but still actually a pretty good recording. Enjoying it on the Sarannas there's a decently wide soundstage and clean sound with good detail. The bass is a bit muddy, lacking the punch and impact of modern recordings, but it's there.

There's One in Every Crowd by Clapton (1975) sounds completely decent, again a bit lean on the bass compared to modern recordings, but not too bad.

On to Hendrix, early stuff from the 60s aren't awesome, but okay. The Cry of Love (1971) is pretty decent and also decent tonality (present bass).

Stevie Ray Vaughn of the early 80s generally sound pretty good.

None of this (maybe with Dire Straits as the exception) sounds as good or as rich in the bass as some well recorded modern recordings, but it definitely sounds more than okay through good speakers. Some seem to imply that these older recordings sound even worse on good speakers, that is definitely not the case.

 

[rf1938]

I was shooting music videos back then, and was scheduled to shoot and direct one with Stevie Ray Vaughn, long delayed as he was in rehab. Then shortly before the shoot date, Vaughn died in a helicopter accident. Great loss all around.

 

[Matt_Holland]

How did they make Dire Straits’ first album sound so good? It’s one of my all time favourites for both the music and the sound quality.

 

[SigbergAudio]

How did they make Dire Straits’ first album sound so good? It’s one of my all time favourites for both the music and the sound quality.

Good question. And I wish they told everyone else at the time, so that everything released in the late 70s and throughout the 80s sounded equally good.

 

[GD Fan]

How did they make Dire Straits’ first album sound so good? It’s one of my all time favourites for both the music and the sound quality.

Dire Straits, and Knopfler as a solo act, always cared about good sound. Many of his / their recordings were made available on SACD, for instance.

If you're truly curious about the first record you might consider posing the question on Guy Fletcher's web site (https://www.guyfletcher.com/dr-fletch-questions/). Although he wasn't in Knopfler-land until a little later he maintains an open dialogue with fans and seems to like technical talk.

 

[TheWoolyBully]

Good recordings sound good on any good playback system. That's why we are here on ASR. There is actually very little mystique involved in this. Sadly rock and metal is often recorded or mixed in a lackluster way, and that's where things get complicated.

 

[SigbergAudio]

Good recordings sound good on any good playback system. That's why we are here on ASR. There is actually very little mystique involved in this. Sadly rock and metal is often recorded or mixed in a lackluster way, and that's where things get complicated.

Not sure what your point is here. Good recordings sound good and bad recordings sound bad?

 

[MattHooper]

I think asking questions like “What makes a speaker work well with rock and metal?” ultimately suffers from the fact that “ works well” is a subjective assessment.

Not that of course technical discussions about the distortion character of certain music like metal and reproducing it have no place. And I suppose you could say that, if you have speakers at home that are exactly as capable as those monitors used to produce the music, then you have done that music justice. So there’s that aspect.
On the other hand, maybe somebody wouldn’t even be satisfied with that I may want to even more. There are audiophiles who own really big loudspeaker systems that provide more scale and SPL and slam then no doubt plenty of the monitors used for lots of recorded rock music. (not to mention lots of rock musicians like so many others would evaluate how their stuff sounded on their car stereo.)

But in the end, it’s a subjective call as to whether one is satisfied with the reproduction of any particular type of music from a loudspeaker.

Harbeth speakers, for instance, somewhat divide people. On what hand you have people who view them as a soft, comfy “ pipe, and slip slippers” speaker that is fine for reproducing voices and acoustic instruments… jazz folk, and all that. But not suitable or not capable of doing justice to more dynamic music like EDM or rock or metal.

On the other hand, you’ve got people who like Harbeth speakers because they feel they are so evenly balanced, and even-handed they do all genres well.

I’m in the latter camp - when I owned Harbeth speakers I could enjoy any music genre on them, including funk and EDM and rock.

So who’s right?

Reminds me of a similar scenario when my friend owned some Martin Logan hybrid speakers - tall, electrostatic panel attached to dynamic woofers at the bottom.

To me, there is always a discontinuity - whatever frequency ranches were covered by the panel had that ghostly electrostatic “ lack of density and air moving punch” whereas the frequencies covered by the dynamic woofers sounded more solid and convincing. But especially when we played rock or other dynamic music, I tended to zero in on how unconvincing the panel part was in doing his job. I asked my friend if he felt the music sounded suitably, punchy, and dynamic for him. He was like “ totally.” And my hunch is that he was throwing on the area of bass punch and room field provided by the woofers, and that was satisfying enough for him.

But I wouldn’t have been satisfied with those speakers at all for dynamic music.

So again, who’s right? As long as you’re satisfied with the music you like on your speakers, one could say they are passing that test.

I listen to a lot of funk, Rock, Prog, EDM/Electronic music, as well as heavy dynamic orchestral music (especially orchestral based soundtracks).

When I was looking for new speakers several years ago along with acoustic music I tested every speaker with selection of that type of music.

I remember listening to Rush’s 2112 on the wide-baffle Devore O/96 and O/93 speakers with a silly grin on my face. They presented the music as a sort of wall of sound - thick, rich and punchy. I felt the bass and kick drums, Alex’s guitarist were thick and substantial - it just sounded really “ right” for that type of music to my ears.

But I had narrowed down my choice between those speakers and Joseph Audio Perspective speakers - a fairly small, slim floor standing speaker with two 5.5” woofers. They were renowned for getting plenty of bass depth and punch out of that design, but you still might expect such small slim speakers to sound a bit too precious and delicate for rock music.

It was a fascinating difference. The Joseph speakers just spun this huge, extended sound stage, with amazingly, clean and precise image placement. The clarity in how I could listen into the sound stage and mix and hear every single element, and distinguish all the tonal characteristics, was really fascinating. No matter how loud it went, it kept total composure with this clarity and ease. But that’s also the type of thing that threatens to be too audiophile - separating all the strands of a mix into a visual event and a less visceral one. Fortunately, the speaker is also delivered the required elements with a great sense of punch and room feel - the kick drum hit me in the chest, Geddy’s bass growled and rolled across the room in a satisfying way, the snare cut through with great clarity and snap and impact. Lifeson’s guitars had less body and density. That definitely went to the Devore speakers. But I found the reproduction quite satisfying all things considered.

And now that I live with those speakers as well as well my Thiels, they play louder than I personally want to listen, and for me they really “slam” whether I’m listening to old school Kiss, Van Halen or Rush records (Hemisphere is totally enveloping), or a newer acts like Animals As Leaders, Porphyria, Leprous or whatever.

Would anybody else here, be satisfied with their death, metal or whatever on these speakers?

I dunno. But again that’s why this can be highly subjective.

 

[SigbergAudio]

I think asking questions like “What makes a speaker work well with rock and metal?” ultimately suffers from the fact that “ works well” is a subjective assessment.

Not that of course technical discussions about the distortion character of certain music like metal and reproducing it have no place. And I suppose you could say that, if you have speakers at home that are exactly as capable as those monitors used to produce the music, then you have done that music justice. So there’s that aspect.
On the other hand, maybe somebody wouldn’t even be satisfied with that I may want to even more. There are audiophiles who own really big loudspeaker systems that provide more scale and SPL and slam then no doubt plenty of the monitors used for lots of recorded rock music. (not to mention lots of rock musicians like so many others would evaluate how their stuff sounded on their car stereo.)

I think there is a fallacy in expecting (or even wanting) to reproduce the music like it was heard in the studio, and the music quality also isn't limited by that. I know that you know this, but just to make the point: The music that end up on the record doesn't go THROUGH the studio monitors. And studio engineers with long experience can make great mixes on pretty poor monitors (as evidenced by the infamous Yamaha NS-10).

So it's perfectly viable to reproduce music at home with significantly higher quality than what was heard by the recording, mixing or mastering engineer (to some extent depending on what they have in the studio of course).

But in the end, it’s a subjective call as to whether one is satisfied with the reproduction of any particular type of music from a loudspeaker.

Harbeth speakers, for instance, somewhat divide people. On what hand you have people who view them as a soft, comfy “ pipe, and slip slippers” speaker that is fine for reproducing voices and acoustic instruments… jazz folk, and all that. But not suitable or not capable of doing justice to more dynamic music like EDM or rock or metal.

On the other hand, you’ve got people who like Harbeth speakers because they feel they are so evenly balanced, and even-handed they do all genres well.

I’m in the latter camp - when I owned Harbeth speakers I could enjoy any music genre on them, including funk and EDM and rock.

So who’s right?

Reminds me of a similar scenario when my friend owned some Martin Logan hybrid speakers - tall, electrostatic panel attached to dynamic woofers at the bottom.

To me, there is always a discontinuity - whatever frequency ranches were covered by the panel had that ghostly electrostatic “ lack of density and air moving punch” whereas the frequencies covered by the dynamic woofers sounded more solid and convincing. But especially when we played rock or other dynamic music, I tended to zero in on how unconvincing the panel part was in doing his job. I asked my friend if he felt the music sounded suitably, punchy, and dynamic for him. He was like “ totally.” And my hunch is that he was throwing on the area of bass punch and room field provided by the woofers, and that was satisfying enough for him.

But I wouldn’t have been satisfied with those speakers at all for dynamic music.

So again, who’s right? As long as you’re satisfied with the music you like on your speakers, one could say they are passing that test.

The most important thing for any customer is of course whether she is happy or not with the sound, and no one has any right to disagree with that. And as we know, what we hear, or what our brain processes as what we hear, is a pretty complicated process. And the experience isn't just a result of the sound that comes out of the speakers.

While there are certainly some subjectivity involved, as well as our crazy brain pulling tricks, I think there are a few things going on that means we can make a case for "good sound" being more universal than it seems. Probably other aspects than the list below too, but from the top of my head:

1. An industry colleague has a theory that we don't really value different qualities, rather there's a difference in which flaws we accept. To any person bass, midrange, treble, voice reproduction, soundstage, clarity, imaging, separation, loudness capacity, overall tonality, distortion, etc etc etc can be more or less important in their evaluation of sound, making them more or less accepting of a problem in the reproduction of any of the above. But assuming a theoretically perfect speaker with no flaws present, those differences will to a great extent go away, as there is no longer any flaws to disagree upon. I think there is indeed something to this theory. So a speaker can have one or more flaws, but different persons will disagree upon whether those flaws are a problem or not. Present a speaker with no flaws, most people will agree it's indeed great.
2. Your experience (or lack thereof) with different sounding speakers and sound qualities, can influence or even limit your evaluation of sound quality. That you listen to something and find it to sound great, doesn't mean there's nothing out there can sound better. You just haven't heard it yet.
3. You are used to non-neutral tonality due to your own system being either bass bloated or lean, either due to the speakers themselves or problems in the room, which will make tonally neutral speakers initially sound wrong to you.

I listen to a lot of funk, Rock, Prog, EDM/Electronic music, as well as heavy dynamic orchestral music (especially orchestral based soundtracks).

When I was looking for new speakers several years ago along with acoustic music I tested every speaker with selection of that type of music.

I remember listening to Rush’s 2112 on the wide-baffle Devore O/96 and O/93 speakers with a silly grin on my face. They presented the music as a sort of wall of sound - thick, rich and punchy. I felt the bass and kick drums, Alex’s guitarist were thick and substantial - it just sounded really “ right” for that type of music to my ears.

But I had narrowed down my choice between those speakers and Joseph Audio Perspective speakers - a fairly small, slim floor standing speaker with two 5.5” woofers. They were renowned for getting plenty of bass depth and punch out of that design, but you still might expect such small slim speakers to sound a bit too precious and delicate for rock music.

It was a fascinating difference. The Joseph speakers just spun this huge, extended sound stage, with amazingly, clean and precise image placement. The clarity in how I could listen into the sound stage and mix and hear every single element, and distinguish all the tonal characteristics, was really fascinating. No matter how loud it went, it kept total composure with this clarity and ease. But that’s also the type of thing that threatens to be too audiophile - separating all the strands of a mix into a visual event and a less visceral one. Fortunately, the speaker is also delivered the required elements with a great sense of punch and room feel - the kick drum hit me in the chest, Geddy’s bass growled and rolled across the room in a satisfying way, the snare cut through with great clarity and snap and impact. Lifeson’s guitars had less body and density. That definitely went to the Devore speakers. But I found the reproduction quite satisfying all things considered.

And now that I live with those speakers as well as well my Thiels, they play louder than I personally want to listen, and for me they really “slam” whether I’m listening to old school Kiss, Van Halen or Rush records (Hemisphere is totally enveloping), or a newer acts like Animals As Leaders, Porphyria, Leprous or whatever.

Would anybody else here, be satisfied with their death, metal or whatever on these speakers?

I dunno. But again that’s why this can be highly subjective.

It seems to me this story further supports the idea that a speaker can do everything well, you don't have to choose a "rock speaker" that can't do other things well. And also, there's more to reproducing rock than playing loud and impactful. A regular experience to me throughout the development of my speakers (that I would humbly describe as pretty decent), has been that rock tracks that I have considered to be average recordings at best, sounded pretty darn good with way more details, instrument separation and soundstage than what was presented by lesser speakers.

A speaker can be loud, punchy and full range without losing the ability to present detail and nuance when required.

 

[MattHooper]

So it's perfectly viable to reproduce music at home with significantly higher quality than what was heard by the recording, mixing or mastering engineer (to some extent depending on what they have in the studio of course).

Yes, and another thing to consider is how much music these days is “ produced in the bedroom” in the sense of Home Studios.

My brother is an Indie musician. He records and mixes all of his own stuff in his basement. And it’s quite complex stuff: imagine beach boys, Beatles and Prince Combined with Stravinsky and other classical music influences - so really dense pop music with many layers of vocals, combined with all sorts of symphonic instruments (he actually hires musicians from the local Toronto Symphony). And he’s become amazingly good at producing this music. It sounds fantastic.

Anyway, for years, he has been bringing various versions of his tracks and albums to my house to listen on my system - from early mix downs, to various mastering options, to finish product.

He’s got a decent pair of speakers he’s working with, but he loves to hear it on mine because he feels everything sounds even better and he gets insights into the recording or different mastering choices that he doesn’t even necessarily get in his studio.

 

[krabapple]

I'm not sure I have a perfect answer to that, but personally I've found rock/metal to be among the genres that most often fail to work on especially higher-end speakers. It may be as simple as wrong tonal balance in the bass/midbass combined with too elevated highs to get all that "sparkle" and "resolution". Many simply don't have enough dynamic range / capacity to reproduce it realistically either. Lack of dynamic range may be problematic for a lot of classical music too of course.

How much dynamic range do metal recordings possess in the first place? C'mon.

 

[whereisbrian]

How much dynamic range do metal recordings possess in the first place? C'mon.

For example, you could take Slomosa's first album, DR11, or Opeth Damnation DR12.
Many metal or stoner albums have decent, even excellent, dynamics.
To get back to the question, any speaker with good specifications will handle rock music well.