The London Audio Show 2O24 Report
It's been a long time since there was an audio show in London, well it certainly feels like a long time and IIRC the last time I visited one was at the Novotel hotel back in 2017, fast forward to 2024 and the Chestergroup in partnership with Stereonet have done the decent thing and brought us the goods with a show that us Londoners don't have to spend half the day travelling to, to visit and get to hear the delights of high end audio.
Situated near Heathrow airport the Radisson Red hotel was the venue and was the perfect size to host a show of this nature with good size rooms and plenty of on site parking allocated for visitors. Spread over one level with 3 areas marked as Syndicates 1 & 2 hosting 22 rooms and then one whole area with refreshments and named suites with 9 rooms hosting systems, if I'm honest this was good size show as it was not too big and not too small so that the brands and the associated retailers could present to the public the great HiFi they have to offer.
Russell K Speakers
One of the first rooms I visited was Russell K Speakers who were demoing their RED 50Se and RED 100Se speakers partnered with Rega electronics and Melco Audio, the smaller RED 50Se speakers were playing when I visited and the sounds from these compact speakers was just so natural with excellent dynamics and managed to fill the room with such good music, this was one of my favourite rooms of the show. Russell K even had a lovely tribute to the late Paul Messenger who had reviewed his speakers and had great things to say about them and it was a lovely gesture to say the least.
Bayz Audio Speakers
Now this was a first for me and presented by the hifiguy these incredible looking speakers sounded stunning and were partnered with MSB, Pilium and Pink Faun these speakers cost a cool £35,000 but the sound that they created was quite special and certainly drew in the crowds just by looks alone but once you got to listen to the music it was clear how good they were. I managed to go back quite a few times to this room and get plenty of content for my social media channels, bass from the Bayz speakers had real punch and depth and it was great as the drivers are inverted so you can see them moving which alone is mesmerising, the unique tweeter which is in between the two drivers is a spherical design but blended seamlessly with the lower frequencies.
Tannoy Speakers
My next visit was to see the beautiful British made Tannoy Stirling III LZ Special Edition speakers hosted by Symphony Distribution and Audio Lounge London who had one of the most enjoyable rooms of the show and most importantly the sound from the big Tannoy's filled the room with great music, partnered with Sugden Audio for Preamplifier and Power Amplifier this pairing was a great match and for source components you had the Naim Audio NDX streamer and for vinyl duties was a stunning SME turntable, Dan from Symphony played quite a few tracks that I knew and loved for testing speakers and they absolutely rocked playing the DubXanne track Roxanne, copious amounts of bass and natural sounding vocals with excellent imaging and were an absolute delight to listen to, could of sat there all day but I wanted to get more of show in before I left.
The MAD Room
Vertere Acoustics were playing their beautiful turntables partnered with FM Acoustics and My Audio Design (MAD) speakers which sounded superb with stunning clarity and resolution of the music from the beautiful Vertere turntable spinning the vinyl, whenever I get to hear their turntables in action they always manage to impress and I loved the sound from the MAD speakers which were stand mount design and another new speaker that I have been introduced to which was great to see and hear at the show.
Onkk Products room with Vivid Audio Speakers
The onkk products room were showing off their new turntable and this room had some great music being played courtesy of the Vivid Audio Giya speakers, the sounds that this turnable created was just stunning and I loved the design of the TT from what is another new brand and product that this show introduced me to, the Vivid Audio speakers managed to project beautiful music with lots of dynamics and energy from the vinyl being played, bass as always from these speakers was rich and deep, having heard them quite a few times now they always manage to impress me with how they present the music.
Cadnam Audio Speakers
Cadnam Audio speakers room were showing off their range of new speakers that are launching and this was a great sounding room with the M10's playing when I visited but they also had the M8's sat next to them and both speakers looked superb and the sound from the M10's was excellent with the M10's having the big bass drive units from Volt and looked menacing but from what I listened to this was an impressive sounding speaker.
Connecting Music Distribution Room
Connecting Music Distribution had the impressive Sonus faber Maxima Amator speakers playing partnered with Bricasti electronics, this room sounded superb with beautiful music and was in one of the bigger rooms so had plenty of space to fill and the Sonus faber speakers did not disappoint with a beautiful track from Goldfrapp who I have been listening to a lot lately and these gorgeous Italian speakers sounded natural dynamic and full of resolution projecting a beautiful image of the music being played.
There was plenty of music to be heard but these are a few of my favourite rooms with fantastic products to be seen and heard which I thoroughly enjoyed and there was also a few new brands which I have never heard or seen before so got to taste some of their delights and it was a great day of music and HiFi and the venue was busy, massive thanks to the Chestergroup and Stereonet for putting on a great show and look forward to next year's show !
Make sure you check out my social media channel for lots more of the content and thanks for taking the time to have a look at my report of the show.
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