Goin' Back to Indiana
A few weeks ago, I boarded from Orlando a packed United Airlines flight bound for Chicago's O'Hare Airport, the first leg in a trip that would take me to Goshen, Indiana, the home of my good friend Greg Weaver. Many of you will know Greg through his work here at PF, his reviews for Enjoy the Music, and more recently, as a Senior Writer for The Absolute Sound. Greg had earlier invited me to hear the superb Vivid Audio Giya G1 Spirit reference loudspeakers ($93,000/pair) he was slated to review for TAS, but my late summer/early fall schedule didn’t cooperate. When Greg extended the welcome mat once again, this time with the promise of giving me some priceless face time with Audionet's Max monoblock amps, the stunning GamuT Zodiac loudspeakers, Greg's stellar Kronos Sparta turntable, and a gaggle of other goodies, I resolved to take him up on his kind offer.
As Greg and I left South Bend International Airport to face the crisp December evening air, I was overcome with a bit of nostalgia. You see, I grew in Mt. Healthy, Ohio, a small suburban Hamlet about 30 minutes outside of Cincinnati, Ohio, and worked for many years in Dekalb, Illinois, another small Midwest town that seemed, at least to me, to possess much of the look, feel, and texture of Goshen. Arriving in South Bend, and later Goshen, felt a little like coming home for this mid-westerner transplanted in his teens to the New South.
The weekend began with dinner at the lovely Italian eatery Lucchese's, where Greg and I feasted on fine fare, sipped some great wine, and congenially swapped audio tales before heading back to his place (which he shares with his wife Kim and three "ginormous" dogs, two pure-bred Great Danes, the other a mix of Great Dane and some other big breed). As I am a dog person, I didn’t mind the "kids" hanging around. They provided great, if at times sloppily moist, fun. For her part, Kim had the good sense to leave the boys, their pricey toys, and the dogs (not to mention some damn good single-malt scotch), to their own devices.
Greg's Set-up
The main system includes several reference-level stunners. Of course, the big GamuT Zodiac loudspeakers take center stage. Standing almost 6-feet high, tipping the scales at a back-breaking 450+ pounds each, and costing a budget-busting $150K/per pair, the Zodiacs (tricked out in GW's system in a lovely rosenut wood veneered and hand-buffed finish) demand/command your attention. None other than our own David Robinson waxed enthusiastic in his summer 2017 assessment of the mighty Zodiacs, a write-up that you can find HERE. Next to the Zodiacs, the 80+ pound Audionet Max monoblocks ($30,500/pair) look positively demure. The Kronos Sparta turntable ($21,500), matching Helena tonearm ($6500), and Air Tight PC-1 MC cartridge ($10,999) delivered the analog goods all weekend. For a complete inventory of Greg's reference system, please check out his Audio Analyst website at http://www.theaudioanalyst.com/.
The opportunity to calibrate (or recalibrate) one's personal listening perspectives (and biases) against a true reference standard is one of the key benefits to visiting a friend and/or colleague with top flight gear driving a dedicated listening room. As good as my home system is, and it is to my ears quite good, Greg's system plays on a totally different level. His main rig delivers a sense of scaling, drama, dynamic ease, and sheer power that I can only dream of. Part of this owes to Mr. Weaver's cavernous and optimally-treated listening room, one that dwarfs mine. This allows him to entertain full-range speakers that would overwhelm my modestly sized space (and many others, I suspect), not to mention dedicated monoblock amps and massive turntables.
The Music
As one would expect, Greg's system delivers dynamic scaling and gut-churning bass about as well as anything on the planet. In my experience, only the big Wilsons, Magicos, YGs, and Von Schweikert Audio full-range speakers better the Audionet/GamuT Zodiac combo in terms of bass power, weight, and sheer musical presence. So, during the climatic 4th Movement of MoFi’s stunning London/Decca reissue of Beethoven's 9th (MFSL 2-516), a true reference featuring conductor George Solti leading the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, one both hears and feels the full power of the strings, and then the brass, and then the entire orchestra, as they melodically herald the main "Gloria in excelsis Deo" theme that is to follow. By the same token, during the plaintive and introspective opening bars of the 3rd Movement, the system captures the full weight, body, and sheen of the strings, with no apparent diminution in air, openness, and tonal richness.
In this regard, the system delivers the ineffable sense of ease, naturalness, and tonal warmth that one typically associates with tube-powered systems. Surprisingly, the only tubed component in Greg's current set-up, ModWright's superb PH-150 phono preamp, never made an appearance during my three-day visit.
The Audionet Max amps and Zodiac speakers, while perhaps lacking the ability to exhume the tiniest recorded details compared to a few other top-notch systems, nevertheless exhume recorded details remarkably well. Component and cable changes stood out with stark clarity. When Greg replaced a well-respected loom of reference-level wires with a loom of the stunning STEALTH Śakras, the improvements I heard in coherence, naturalness, and articulation (independent of any prior hints from Greg) were neither subtle nor musically insignificant. Serguei Timachev, STEALTH's owner and director of engineering, is a bloody genius!
Power rock, acoustic and electric jazz, and well-recorded pop were all equally well served. The Weaver’s celebrated rendition of "Guantanamera" (The Weavers, Reunion at Carnegie Hall, Analogue Productions, APF 005) positively illuminated the listening room. The system faithfully captured all the midrange immediacy, transparency, and naturalness that makes this one of audio’s most celebrated pop recordings. This surprised me a bit. I didn’t expect the system to capture and convey the intimate immediacy of the Weavers, or Hugh Masekela, or Weather Report, for that matter, with quite the verisimilitude, naturalness, and reach-out-and touch it believability that I/we experienced with the MFSL Beethoven LP. But the system did just that, speaking with the kind of coherence and intelligibility that one typically associates with small two-ways on "Guantanamera", and proverbial "burning down the house" dynamic clout on symphonic blockbusters and vintage Santana.
Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, Greg's system performed that most difficult of high-wire balancing acts, deftly mediating the extremes of delicate detail retrieval and tonal naturalness, dynamic slam and micro-dynamic nuance, and large-scale openness versus intimate introspection, again to stunningly believable effect.
Parting thoughts
All in all, this was a great weekend, one where I learned as much about the fine art of listening as I have at any high-end audio show (and about how to archive properly my growing body of reviews, review-related research, and manufacturer and distributor contact information).
Many thanks to my good friend Greg Weaver and his wife Kim for their first-rate hospitality, and to Greg for his endless patience, damn fine taste in music and single malt scotches, and refined sense of humor. And for any Goshen residents and South Benders reading this, yes, Greg and I did sneak out to Culver’s Sunday afternoon for one of the best burgers I have ever eaten. The burgers come as highly recommended as a visit to your local GamuT, Kronos, or Audionet dealer. Well, almost!
Good listening!
All images by Maurice Jeffries
