Best all around speakers

It's subjective as Macdadtexas points out. Let me add it's also personal and for me that means small room dependent. Six years ago I moved my system into a small dedicated listening room and started searching for a speaker that worked well there.
After giving up on monitors I purchased a pair of Meadowlark Kestrel Hot Rods. These speakers have been with me since as they produce music in a way that makes me forget I'm listening to my stereo.
Don't get me wrong here, in the five years or so I've owned the Kestrels they have spent a lot of time in the closet as experimentation has been the rule. My room has hosted some exceptional speakers costing many times what I paid for the Kestrels. And yes they wow me for a few months with resolution, deeper bass, more detail or whatever audiophiles listen for. But that eventually wears off and the Kestrels will be returned to make me wonder why I keep searching.
In a larger room some of the speakers I've owned would probably kick the Kestrel's butt. In a small room though I've found them to be the best overall speaker I've heard.

Dcstep: You misconstrued the content of my post by inserting your own thoughts within that post and making connections that were not present but rather were distinguished. The statement regarding sympathy for the devil was a separate and independent statement unrelated to the statement regarding a system purposely chosen for distortion or how distortion affected sound. The statement regarding the song had to do with spl listening levels, described as one factor that would logically influence the choice of one set of speakers over another in that particular application. The sentence specifically referred to volume levels and did not mention live performance or distortion. You drew a link as to distortion and a live performance that was not in the text. I did not say that a distortion based system was in any way connected to reproducing the sound of a live performance of a stones concert - that was your statement, not mine, so I have no idea how distortion would recreate the performance. The second sentence you quoted, about distortion, followed a general statement as to two broad themes in building systems. I stand by both statements. A lot of folks purchase tube systems and speakers that clearly have distortion and clearly are meant to, whether the purchasers know it or even care about why the system has its particular sound. This is particularly true in the single tube amplifier designs. These purchasers want a tube sound. The tube sound primarily comes from the distortion characteristics of tubes. I agree that a better approach to tailoring the sound of a song is to make adjustments with software. I also agree that choosing a system with certain distortion characteristics is a crude way of achieving a particular result for a particular piece of music. The biggest drawback with the distortion based system is that everything pretty much sounds the same. I am not currently a tube enthusiast or an analog source enthusiast, but rather prefer digital sources and solid state because I believe that accuracy is best achieved with those technologies. That being said, the relative merits of a distortion based system, chosen for a certain overall sound, vs a system chosen for accuracy in sound reproduction, and the method of creating or reinterpreting music by using such a system, are separate issues from the broad classifications to which I referred. While these are arbitrary classifications, I believe the classifications are valid (note - a different idea than saying that that the goals and methods of either class are themselves valid -to which I here offer no judgment). Furthermore, I believe considering these classifications may be helpful to the OP in making a speaker selection.

Timrhu,

THe room is one of the BIGGEST factors for sure.

Macdadtexas,

Funny you say that becasue I recall the first really good systems I ever heard that caught my ear was at a dealer circa 1978. The first thing that caught my ear was a pair of Magnepan (Timpani's, I think). The second were Klipschorns.

And so here I am 30 years later...Maggies and Klipschorns still intrigue me. I've owned Maggies + believe I may one day own one of the cornerstones of good sound for, what 50 years or so, the Klipschorn.

The fact that these speakers (Klipschorn) were created for state of the art reproduction of the music of that era alone, which produced some fantastic and distinctive recordings, is justification for entry in my mind. If I do, one of the pair I own (probably the Dynaudios)may go or may stay if I can figure out something useful to do with them because I really like them too and hate to part with good components.

Good and lively discussion here, glad I started this thread, and it's interesting and imformative to learn the various points of view that people have on this subject. One thing I appreciate is that the discussion is getting beyond the "buy this, buy that" and getting more into the "why" some of you have made the choices that you have made. And to me that is more useful information, as it allows me to understand the process of getting ones audio system to place you want it to be.

Once again thanks to all of you, and keep your thoughts coming.

Musicnoise, what you meant to say in your quoted text is muddy, at least. We're talking about home music systems here, not live performance equipment and I still can't see where you made any clear distinction. Sorry for the misinterpretation.

I think we agree, but I'm not sure, that we both think that distorted reproduction systems really make little sense, even though many people choose them. I think this choice is often made because getting the sources right, particularly on a budget, is hard to do, so they buy distorted amplification to smooth over the shortcomings of their frontends.

Dave