MBL had some great sound in their room. Jeff Buckley's "Hallelujah" left me with goose bumps and Leonard Cohen's baritone vibrated through my being. While a playing of the "1812 Overture" was meant to highlight the dynamic abilities of the system (the demonstration only partially succeeded in this), I still find that these big speakers are at their best with more minimalist music, imparting the human voice, that violin of the gods, with a sweetness and believability that is rarely captured.

The system, composed of the MBL Reference line speakers mbl 101E ($46,900 / pr) and monoblock mbls 9011 amps ($73,200 / pr), mbl 6010 preamp ($19,000), mbl 1621 transport ($19,000) and mbl 1611 dac ($21,000), all run with Tara Omega speaker cables ($10K/pr) and Tara Zero digital cable ($6,000) and Zero interconnects ($14,000 / pair). And you need a couple of pair of interconnects too, so this stuff starts to add up big time. You do the math. If I had this kind of money, I'd pay off my mortgage first.

At the Classic press event, Michael Fremer correctly identified "Leeds" as the venue where the jam from the side long version of "My Generation," from the album "Live at Leeds" was played thus winning the test pressing. There was one guy from Italy there that might not have been able to guess that. However, Michael managed to guess before the needle hit the mystery groove. A clear case of "I can name that tune in no notes" if I ever saw one.

It's not often I get a chance to have Dave Wilson himself conduct a demonstration of his latest creation. In this case, it's the Wilson Watt Puppy VIII. That's more incarnations than a Rocky movie, but after 14,000 pairs sold, the Watt Puppy is an icon that some love and some don't. I found the pair I heard many generations ago (I want to say 1998) too incisive and too insistent. The new VIII are much more inviting without losing a bit of the detail I remember as that speaker's forte. Dave himself seems to have mellowed. With top of the line Audio Research electronics, he kept the music down to realistic – not bombastic – levels. New are the tweeter, taken from their much larger Maxx speakers, new M3 cabinet material (a carefully prepared laminate product more than 10 times the cost of more typical MDF) and a 20 lb weight reduction (which of course translates to better gas mileage). A five song demo, starting with the a cappella group Ladysmith Black Mambazo and culminating in Art Garfunkle syrupy version of the song made famous by Johnny Mathis, "I've only got eyes for you," left me wishing we could practically review the speakers in a home theater environment. Better yet, seek them out and have a listen for yourself. They were simply wonderful.