Rocky Mountain Audio Fest: The Best of the Best

Like most audio events, there simply isn’t enough time for one person to spend quality time in every room in the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest. So, we split the task of finding the best sounds among team member who were at the event. There are regular recipients of ‘good sound’ plaudits from pundits; almost irrespective of equipment, these exhibitors do well in the shows year in, year out. This suggests the products offered by these exhibitors are consistent and good, especially when they are liked universally.

So, although you can almost second-guess what is going to sound good from the manufacturers, distributors, and dealers in the room, there are still points where long-standing brands get it wrong, and newcomers get it very, very right. 

Here is our list of some of the best.

For many years the VTL room has vied with the ARC/Vandersteen room for top honours at RMAF. In many ways, this year was no different – but in at least one way it was very different indeed: both systems were downsized considerably over recent years. VTL ran a Brinkmann Spider/Lyra Etna turntable and dCS Rossini player and clock, feeding their own TP6.5 phono-stage, TL6.5 line-stage, MB-185 mono-blocs and Wilson’s new Sabrina loudspeakers. The sound was fluid and intimate, warm and natural, but what really impressed was the sheer presence and scale generated by Wilson’s diminutive new floorstander. This is a speaker that should find considerable favour in UK homes and UK systems.

Whether it is coincidence or a sign of the times, Vandersteen had opted to run their Quatro Wood CT, in a smaller room and driven by ARC G-Series electronics and an AMG turntable. The sound, doubtless helped by the tuneable, active bass was big, bold and solid, with impressive dynamics combined with subtlety, tone and texture that delivered the requisite warmth and musical intimacy. Wonderfully capable on jazz and pop, this system really hit its stride with classical and rock recordings, test pressings of the new Joe Jackson re-issues from Intervention Records displaying all of the attitude, punch and power that made the originals so compelling, but way more bandwidth, layering, detail and much more natural tonality. Is She Really Going Out With Him? Perhaps he’s got a system like this at home!

Meanwhile, reminding us that big systems are something of a company forté, Dan D’Agostino combined his Momentum mono-blocs, pre-amp and phono-stage with a Classic stereo amp, driving Alexias underpinned by a pair of Watchdog subs. Source was a Brinkmann Balance and the performance was tight, stable, driven and authoritative. This was one system that could rock – and it did.

Nola stepped up to the plate and came out swinging with their new $12,000 KO2 floorstander, which delivered a huge acoustic space and serious dynamic impact, driven by an ARC Ref 8 Cd player and VAC Sigma 160i integrated amp.

VANA also served up the expected musical treat, pairing Primare electronics with Audio Physic Avanti speakers. But where they really scored was in the choice of records played on the Dr Feickert ‘table: Thomas Dolby certainly scared himself and Van was definitely The Man.

Special mention too for Musical surroundings who used the latest Aesthetix Atlas Eclipse stereo amplifier to pound the Focal Sopra 2s within millimetres of their life – a situation the speakers accepted with typically Gallic aplomb. They may be smaller than last year’s Scala V2s, but it was still a case of, “Metallica? Mais oui!”

Talking of seriously orange speakers, you don’t get much more orange than the Magico S5s deployed by Nordost. We were expecting good sound in the Nordost room: I wasn’t expecting the best sound they’ve ever made at RMAF. Okay, so they deployed a seriously heavyweight system to achieve it, but the Rowland Chorus, Aeris and massive 925 twin-chassis mono-blocs didn’t disappoint. Best of all, they were using a twin-arm VPI Avenger up front (along with a prototype Rowland phono-stage) to demonstrate their new internal arm cable against the standard VPI option. Results on this (and the power cord demos they were also running) left us with new-found respect for the S5 and underlined the potent capabilities of the new Odin 2, a cable that was everywhere at RMAF and seems to have even the sceptics wavering.

AudioQuest dodged the whole room acoustics issue by operating the ultimate downsizing policy and going all table-top on us. That didn’t stop their array of demonstrations featuring the new $200 Beetle DAC, the brilliant $50 Jitterbug USB jitter reduction device and the Nighthawk headphones delivering spectacularly good (and remarkably comfortable) musical results. There’s more than one way to bang the audio drum and Audioquest are especially inventive – and successful – in this regard.

RATA are another iconoclastic company that can be counted on to deliver. Their five-minute, $500 second-hand system/$1,000 cable upgrade demo might be familiar to UK show-goers but it left plenty of US citizens in a state of shock. Bewildered audiophiles were seen, weaving unsteadily out of the RATA room, clutching on to literature and the last vestiges of their shattered reality. Good stuff that should (but never seems to) be a lesson to both the audiophile community and exhibitors in particular…

The combination of Border Patrol electronics and the Volti horn speakers have been a highlight at RMAF for a few years now, to the extent that stepping into their room has an almost déjà vu/time slip feeling to it – like they just kept the room on from last year, preferring to pay for the space rather than remove, ship, re-ship and re-install the seriously heavy and cumbersome equipment involved. Even on the first day the mighty Vittora horns and the BP amp delivered a settled, relaxed sound that had all the familiar dynamics and impact but a significant extra slice of textural resolution and intimacy. Closer examination revealed a volume control on the front of the S20 EXD EXS amplifier, backed up by an extra gain stage, creating a true single input integrated amp. Adding a CEC TL-3N transport won’t have done any harm either and one of our few regrets from the 2015 RMAF experience was that we didn’t get to spend more time enjoying this brilliantly engaging and communicative set up.

Which brings us, finally, to two serious surprises. Finding great sound in the Wavelength room is hardly a shock. Finding it delivered by a pair of Vaughn Plasma II loudspeakers, sporting newly manufactured versions of the Dukane Ionovac plasma tweeter – better known as the Ionofane in the UK – now that’s a surprise. The high-efficiency speakers, sporting a Fostex driver array and bamboo cabinets offered a perfect match to Gordon Rankin’s superb single-ended tube amps. But what really impressed was the sheer musical integrity of this system. Listening gave no hint as to the nature of the source: analogue, CD or file replay. The fact that it was being fed by computer is a stunning testament to Rankin’s acknowledged position at the forefront of computer audio thinking and execution. This is another system we re-visited on multiple occasions, but still wanted more.

Our final (very nice) surprise was delivered in the Alta Audio room. Alta’s own modest yet attractive two-way floor-standers (the Rhea, $4495) were paired with the Nuprime DAC-10 pre-amp ($1500) and REF20 mono-blocks ($7600). If the electronics and speakers were definitely approachable, the source wasn’t: the Grand Prix Monaco v1.5, Triplanar Ultimate 12” tonearm, Lyra Scala cartridge and the latest Tom Evans Groove+ phono-stage. Roll that lot together and it adds up to around three times the rest of the chain, but you couldn’t argue with the musical results. Relaxed but clearly structured, with the explicit tempi and explosive dynamics that characterize the GPA ‘table, this system was both extremely engaging and expressive. Rhythmically secure and musically articulate, capable of great delicacy and fluid phrasing, this set up made the Alta Audio room a welcome oasis of musical calm amidst the hustle and bustle of the show.