We recently shipped a pair of Marlow CE loudspeakers to a customer in San Francisco, USA. He has a very carefully constructed system and has previously used some excellent loudspeakers, including the reference grade QUAD ESLs.
Here are his comments on listening to the Marlows:
It’s been one week since I had a chance to set up and give a listen to my new Marlows. Incidentally, shipping was perfect and in itself represents an amazing achievement.
I’ve always been a fan of full-range designs but must say the musical detail these special drivers reproduce in your cabinets has exceeded my expectations.
I am reminded no less of my Quad 2805s or more precisely, the original ESL 57 that I also once owned. It is a rare speaker that fetches this degree of acoustic information without sounding etched. Electrostatic detail, yes, but without acoustic compression within their dynamic range. This is a recipe for aural delight. Listening leads to the rare event of relaxed ear canals when the ear opens, thirsting for more and more detail.
If the Greenwich is as good and yet delivers an even wider dynamic range, well then, you have an ESL-beater on hand.
In the photo I’ve attached, the speakers’ placement looks casual and effortless.
I achieved lifelike centre-fill and dimensional staging, simply by placing the Marlows where my beloved JM Reynard Bliss loudspeakers had been sited. No cable changes were necessary in this carefully assembled system, which resides on a loft floor that has exceptional acoustics thanks to the slanted wood ceiling and open space to the rear of the loft, not visible in the photo.
In between the speakers of this little Innuos-streaming system, sits a Border Patrol DAC SEi (from the fertile mind of veteran Gary Dews) and my prized Paul Gryzbek designed TAD (Busybee) TADAC preamp fitted with early ‘60s Mazda ECC82 small signal tubes.
The amp is the well-regarded AudioSector Patek SE, which outputs a very pure 50 watts into 8 ohms from its Gainclone chips. All cables were selected to optimize musical detail and deliver a relaxed sound that is not lacking in proper bass weight and speed.
The cabling of systems is something I usually take care to optimize by accessing a small arsenal of collected ICs, S/Cs, digital cables (Snake River Boomslang AES in this case), and, naturally, power cords! However, in this case, the Marlows simply dropped in and delivered the goods!
All of this is to say, that this ease of installation rarely happens in my experience.
These Marlows have brightened my days from the get-go.
For more details about the Jordan Marlow, Greenwich and our new Marlow EV, click here.