When I say underground I am talking about companies that fly below the radar. Not much talk about them on audio forums, little if no reviews, no formal advertising, rarely see their gear at shows.
I guess as far as a retailer goes that Deja Vu operation is pretty unique. Not the typical audio boutique. The other company I have never heard of so to me that would be considered very underground. You gave very good answers.
I would love to someday experience a system assembled by Be Yamamura Audio. That designer makes custom speakers, electronics and wire--the whole package. A modest system starts at something like $600,000 and goes way upward from there. I like the approach taken--all compression drivers, low-powered tube electronics, whole system designed from the ground up, including the room itself. That company is so WAY off the map, particularly for those of us living in the USA (most of their customers are in Europe), that I doubt that I will ever see a system.
In my neck of the woods (Washington DC) there is an audio store, Deja Vu Audio, that makes its own electronics and speakers. The amps, preamps and DACs are all tube-based and utilize a lot of vintage parts, particularly Western Electric parts. The speakers also utilize very old, vintage drivers (particularly Western Electric, Jensen, Altec, BTH, etc. drivers). I own a preamp and an amp that was custom-built by them (e.g., I specified the requirement for remote control of volume, ability to adjust channel balance, full transformer coupling of line inputs and between the amp and preamp). I might get them to design and build a crossover for my speakers which do not have a crossover that is specifically designed for the driver swap I did for the midrange horn (they design crossovers by taking measurements of the drivers instead of relying on the nominal specifications).
I bet there are quite a few small cottage operations like this that qualify as pretty far underground.
Electronics: Electrocampionet - I have owned the Nemo's & they were great! Speakers: Voce Audio - One of the very best buys in all of audio - I have owned the V1's (ugly but awesome) & now own the V2;s - Much better looking & sound fantastic
Many very high-end Euro brands fly under the American radar but not so much in Canada. Audio brand obscurity is predominantly myopic on this side of the pond
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