OK so Sue and I had to give up our fabulous rented detached place and move in to a tiny cottage in a rural Lincolnshire village. The owners of the big place wanted it back and so you know, we got the boot. Along with many things, my B&W CM8 S2's had to go because the new room is 14 feet by 11 and the hi-fi now has to fire across the room not down it. Remembering my time back in 1995 with a pair of Rogers LS3/5a's I decided I would get S3/5R2's by Spendor which should be a good match with a valve pre/power setup. The only place to have them was Harrow Audio so I went online and ordered them in cherry wood finish and paid through Paypal. Within the hour I got a call letting me know they only had black finish so I instructed them to cancel the order and I would have a rethink. A few days later they called again saying that they had located a pair in cherry wood finish at Spendor so I paid again and all was well. They arrived, we moved and a week later I got to listen to them. Sue and I were slightly bemused when we took off the grilles to find a slightly dark line around the outside of the front baffle which matched the cabinet but not the lighter front baffle. To us, this indicates a factory recon pair but they were sold to us as brand new.

Anyway, last night, Organika by the Peaking Goddess Collective on CD. Yes, no real low frequencies when compared to a room 22 feet long and floorstanders but Jesus, the detail in the midband..! On one track there appeared a nice little bit of guitar trickery. Sue says "Where the fuck did that come from..?" Clearly we have never heard it before. There is just so much information being brought forward but then there is a generally forward presentation anyway compared to the B&W's. The other thing of note is the precision of the stereo image. Bloody amazing.

All of our listening so far was done in ultralinear mode using eight Ohm taps.