I'm a big fan of Arcam recievers, actually all their products, and mine sounds great with my Maggie 1.6s. The Maggies have a reputation of demanding quite a bit of power, but I've heard them sound great on Arcam's 40 watt A-65+. And the AVR300 is definitely a stepup from that. We have similar tastes, with Stevie Ray being my favorite. The Maggies are very open, and will give you a wide and deep soundstage. But they do need to be pulled out about 3 feet from the back wall with a little space from the sidewall to breathe.
If you want more of a box sound I'd recommend ProAc Studio 125s. It was a very close call for me between them and the Maggies. They will give you more kick than the Maggies and sound great for rock music. If you want to stay with stand-mounted speakers, the ProAc Reference 8s for around $1100 new and ProAc Reference 8 sigs, for around $1800 new (the sigs were Hi-Fi+ product of the year for 2004) offer exceptional value. Very natural voices with plenty of air between instruments. I don't know how else to put it, but they just sound right.
My last recommendation would be Wharfedale Evo 30s. They just had a bump up in price to around $999 I think. They present a nice soundstage and definitely will boogie for rock. Good luck.
