Visit chez Montesquieu

[Non-Smoking Man]

Speedracer and I were invited to hear Tom's new system and, having been once or twice before, we werent going to let the opportunity slip by.
There have been many changes - an Allnic phono stage, Miyajima step ups and Audiopax (Bra.) replace the all in one Esoteric Research pre, and driving the (same speakers) Tannoy Canterburys we have a pair of Silvercore SET monos with a humungous output valve and ss rectification, replacing the 100w Radford. (Plus a Tannoy pair of supertweeters. (The digital side was much as we remembered.)

Tom popped on a CD whilst preparing the leak, potato and pot barley soup (oh yes!) and brook and I looked at each other and new this wasnt a wasted journey!

Tom's front end is basically the same TD124 I possess, with 2 mods that I have had for a couple of years - a replacement mat arrangement (here Cu platter mat) for the aluminium top platter, and the isolation springs for the motor. In addition Tom has acquired the Shopper platter and bearing and a new pukka plinth (details elswhere on this Forum).

Its amazing what this TT is capable of. Tom likes the Ikeda arms and Miyajima carts and they performed really well. (I have come into posession of Tom's old Shilabe vie Petrat and Cliveg. Lucky me.)

We were treated to a variety of great music - both mono and stereo, plus a Count Basie 78. I had to hear the Satchmo 'St James Infirmary' again to gauge the giant stride Tom has made from an already excellent system, and amongst a bunch of good stuff, a Sheffield Lab Wagner and a Dire Straits track from a mofi Brothers in Arms stood out.

Dynamic range, presence and sustained controlled high spl delivery marked this system as one of the best, if not the best, I have heard.
The single ended 20w Silvercores drove the Tannoys to astonishing levels without any sign of letting go. Impressive!
Congates Tom.

Jack NSM

[montesquieu]

Speedracer and I were invited to hear Tom's new system and, having been once or twice before, we werent going to let the opportunity slip by.
There have been many changes - an Allnic phono stage, Miyajima step ups and Audiopax (Bra.) replace the all in one Esoteric Research pre, and driving the (same speakers) Tannoy Canterburys we have a pair of Silvercore SET monos with a humungous output valve and ss rectification, replacing the 100w Radford. (Plus a Tannoy pair of supertweeters. (The digital side was much as we remembered.)

Tom popped on a CD whilst preparing the leak, potato and pot barley soup (oh yes!) and brook and I looked at each other and new this wasnt a wasted journey!

Tom's front end is basically the same TD124 I possess, with 2 mods that I have had for a couple of years - a replacement mat arrangement (here Cu platter mat) for the aluminium top platter, and the isolation springs for the motor. In addition Tom has acquired the Shopper platter and bearing and a new pukka plinth (details elswhere on this Forum).

Its amazing what this TT is capable of. Tom likes the Ikeda arms and Miyajima carts and they performed really well. (I have come into posession of Tom's old Shilabe vie Petrat and Cliveg. Lucky me.)

We were treated to a variety of great music - both mono and stereo, plus a Count Basie 78. I had to hear the Satchmo 'St James Infirmary' again to gauge the giant stride Tom has made from an already excellent system, and amongst a bunch of good stuff, a Sheffield Lab Wagner and a Dire Straits track from a mofi Brothers in Arms stood out.

Dynamic range, presence and sustained controlled high spl delivery marked this system as one of the best, if not the best, I have heard.
The single ended 20w Silvercores drove the Tannoys to astonishing levels without any sign of letting go. Impressive!
Congates Tom.

Jack NSM

Thanks Jack as I said on the other thread, it was a pleasure having your and Brook's company.

[graham67]

Nice write up jack, I am sure it sounded amazing, Tom has a knack of building exquisite sounding systems.

[speedracer]

Sorry it took so long for my impressions of the visit, I was having trouble getting online but am here now.

Jack has already outlined Tom's equipment & I am sure that many members here are familiar with at least some of it, & for myself being able to compare Tom's new set up to how I heard it last time was fascinating. I think the first thing to say was that the flavour of the sound was very similar to last time despite some changes, no doubt in no small part to how big old Tannoy's deliver the sound, it really is a sound of it's own, much like electrostatics are, & very consistent, unlike traditional box speakers that vary enormously between models, never mind manufacturers. It actually takes me a little while to get used to it, but when dialed in then just wow do I get them. One thing they seem to do is acurrately portray the timing of a piece of music so you get a real sense of boogie with jazz for example, & perhaps even more so with classical music so slower quiet passages seem to drift along, yet climatic crescendo's really hit you with great power & leave you breathless.

I had just purchased a couple of LP's on the way over so I was keen to hear a bit of each so I could compare with my own system, & first was the new Beatles anniversary Let It Be release, quickly followed by the original. Well they could hardly have been any different, the remastered one sounded more grown up & modern, with stronger bass & Ringo's kick drum much more prominent. The second was the Mobile Fidelity pressing of Dire Straits Brothers In Arms; I have heard this a few times on good systems so know it pretty well, but the kick drum & bass again was surprising me by the power of the attack on leading edges, & the portrayal of air & space between instruments was breathtaking. Having said that I didn't get the feeling of anything being artificially pushed back or forward in the mix, every instrument had it's own spotlight. Since then I have played these tracks at home on my own system, & was surprised to find that the bass in particular was more dominant & really came at you from the speakers, having thought about it I feel it is partly because my listening position is much closer to the speakers, & being conventional box speakers they don't have the same delivery of the Tannoy's . Well that & the fact that I can only dream of a system like Tom's, don't get me wrong I really like what I have, but Tom's is on a different level.

Now, I have just re read my post & instead of trying to give an impression of the evening it sounds like I am blowing enormous clouds of smoke up Tom's bottom, not my intention at all, but with such quality equipment put together with great thought it was only ever going to go that way.