My last pure class A speaker amplifier was a 1987 Classe Audio DR3 VHC. It was designed by David Reich (hence the DR prefix). The VHC stood for very high current.
The amplifier was a work of art that weighed in at just over 100 pounds. It cost close to $5000 in 1987 dollars and ran extremely hot. You could fry an egg on its dual transformer case. It also sounded great. However, forget about using it during the summertime though, as the heat put out by the DR3 VHC could drive you out of your listening room. I also have a pure class A Schiit Asgard 2 that I use to drive my planar magnetic headphones. While it’s built to a much less expensive standard, it also runs quite hot. It tends to be a finicky amplifier yet, with my inexpensive planars (Fostex T60RP and Hifiman H4XX) it sounds quite good. I do believe that pure class A (as opposed to sliding Class A) does sound better than class AB amplification. Just be aware of the heat put out by these amplifiers as well as their inefficiency. 😀