The Back Story

Doug is a pastor, so I think he is more predisposed to interesting background stories than I am. And thus, while going over our finds, likes, and dislikes at CES 2011, Doug mentioned there was a homeless guy here showing off his speakers. Homeless on a top floor of the Venetian, seriously? That sounds compelling. But what do the speakers sound like? Before telling me his impressions about their sound, Doug gave me the back ground story on Kevin. Kevin Nelson is homeless. He makes his way around the San Diego area keeping his gear at a friend’s home. He has been working on speaker designs since getting out of high school year ago, and the current speakers, being shown at CES, are the culmination of about 20 years of dreaming and tweaking. I can see why this grabbed Doug’s attention, but I was waiting for the catch. I don’t think Doug would waste my time if the speakers sounded awful, even though his taste are fairly different than mine, he does have a well trained ear. So, how do they sound, I kept asking. But the story kept getting richer. I think being a pastor teaches one to be a good story teller, because Doug dropped the bomb when he said that each speaker played both channels and they had a huge planar like sound. And they only cost $890. Hook, line, sinker, I was hooked. I had to hear this. So by day four, after finally finding the room in the chaos that is the upper floors of the Venetian Hotel during CES, I sat there with my wife for a couple minutes stunned. Were both speakers really playing both left and right channel, how was this possible, why wasn’t it a big mess of sounds? I quickly made plans to demo these speakers at my place.

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