Thiel/Crutchfield

It seems an odd pairing. From what I can tell Thiel attracts a pretty limited crowd. I have posted my reactions to Thiels in the past and the fans appear to be mostly from the classiscal music fan base. Not that this is a bad thing at all. But somehow Crutchfield with its emphasis on automobiles, home theater and mid-fi just doesn't seem to be the place to sell this type of speaker. Besides, Thiels are a non-mainstream sounding speaker with treble that many find downright irritable (yes the new models still make me cover my ears) that to sell them without an audition seems to be a mis-service.

Pops, I only based that on the responses I have gotten when commenting on Theils in the past. I only know one person who actually owns them. He is mostly into rock, so go figure.

I always got the impression that people were attracted to them for their very good soundstage and huge amount of detail. Whatever works in this wacky obsession of ours.

The first time I heard Theils was probably in the 80's. It was in a high end store. I had to cover my ears. The salesman was completely baffled by my reaction. What can I say?

Reminds me of a lesson I learned many years ago about equipment. On impulse I went into a high end store in San Francisco. Probably the most elite store I have ever been in. They had what was then B&Ws no-compromise speaker. I can't remember the model. They cost the outrageous amount of $3500 a pair. This was before Wilson and their like started the endlesses upward spiralling of prices for audio gear.

Anyway, I didn't have any records with me (no CDs back then) so from the store selection I put on Rhiannon by Fleetwood Mac. It was awful. The bass was just tubby and muddy and bloated and unlistenable. I had heard that song many many times on many systems and never noticed this effect. The salesman asked to play one of his choices. He put on Spyro Gyra. It was sublime. It set a new standard for sound reproduction for me.

The problem is I would never listen to Spryo Gyra by choice but I loved and still very much like Rhiannon. So, was that a good system or a bad system?

By the way, I have used Rhiannon as a test ever since. Even the CD has some of the same poorly recorded bass. You should hear what it does to a Bose automobile sound system. It ain't pretty. So I guess that puts Bose in the same league as Theil and B&W ;-}