An alternative
heading could be the Legend Returns. Years ago I had read alluring snippets
about the first APOLYT, a rare monster turntable from the early 1990’s that
eclipsed all else. Last week I finally heard its successor. Over the last few
years I have gradually been wowed and won over by the performance of Acoustical
Systems’ (“AS”) products. First for me came their brilliant alignment tools – I
had spent decades in search of tools that would allow me to precisely align my
cartridge. Then I found for sale on Audiogon the monster double chassis limited
run Omnigon phono preamp which eclipsed all I had listened to before. Then came
the excellent Axiom arm, and finally their all revealing Paladian cartridge. These
products showed me that Dietrich Brakemeier of AS, designs and realizes his
products from a profound understanding of physics and geometry, and a
relentless pursuit of perfection, and that it was this foundation that resulted
in the best sounding analog gear that I have heard and owned.
I was visiting
Germany and Dietrich invited me to visit his demonstration and construction
rooms 45 minutes outside Munich. The equipment in that room were the exact same
that were reported on by @syntax in his thread of May 12 and demoed at the
Munich Show: APOLYT turntable, Axiom arm, Palladian cartridge, Evocator phono
stage, Vitus line stage, Vitus mono block power amps and Soundspace Systems Aidoni
speakers (which I understand Dietrich was instrumental in designing). I spent
hours listening with a variety of discs, some familiar and some not, and most being
excellently recorded musical performances. I have been in this wonderful hobby for
decades and never before have experienced anything approaching the shock and exhilaration
of the performances produced by this system on excellently recorded discs. I
have previously heard systems of this expense and above and sometimes have been
appalled, especially given their cost, but have never preferred a system over
my own. But this time was totally different. The APOLYT is to my experience
like nothing I have heard before, and given the materials, components,
technical understanding involved to produce its design, and the complexity and
exactitude of manufacture, I genuinely doubt that I will hear anything like it
again. There is no component, including others from AS, that I would say this
about, nor would I have ever thought that I would ever say this about.
Let me
quote from my review on Audiogon of the Jay’s Audio CDT-3 transport and
Denafrips Terminator DAC: “Information has great significance for my listening
experience. What does more accurate information actually mean to me? We
euphemistically say that we “see” or “hear”. Do we? My sight is like a digital
camera – I have sensors, my eyes transmit the stimuli they have picked up, to
my brain which then tries to make sense of the stimuli using a database of
previous experiences, and then comes to a conclusion and tells me what I am
seeing. This was demonstrated to me by instances where I was not wearing my distance
glasses. Once I was walking along a track in low morning light and I saw
something on the ground at a reasonable distance such that I could not “see”
exactly what that something was. It was darkish and long and lying on the track
up ahead of me. This was a potentially hazardous situation so the brain started
working quickly. From the raw incomplete data it had it concluded that it was
either a snake or a dead tree branch. I observed that as I walked closer and
closer the sensory-computing system was looping – the eye sensors were picking
up more data and the brain was recomputing it and comparing it to its database
and concluding “inconclusive” and the process happened again and again until
finally it had enough data and concluded it was a dried tree branch blown onto
the path by the wind. And I observed another aspect of this process “filling in
the blanks”. I had lost my glasses and had to drive to a location. I wondered
how I could do that and found that since I had driven that road so many times
in the past, what I could not actually see the brain was part filling in from
memory. But this was a strain, a lot of work. My ear system works similarly
transmitting sound stimuli it has picked up to my brain to make sense of it
from its database of experiences. So the more information my hi-fi information
produces and the more accurate that information is, the more easily and quickly
I “hear” the music and the more believable and enjoyable becomes my listening
experience.
The APOLYT provides
so so so much more information than any frontend that I have ever heard and
this information is real and across the whole audio spectrum. Pick whatever you
like: ambient detail, instrument definition, macro and micro dynamics, the
modulation of voice, etc etc there is so much more information presented. To
take one example, I have listened to Paul Simon’s Gracelands how many times
since its release and it was as if presented anew with so much more detail and
delineation of every instrument and voice – it shocked me – I just could not
believe what I had just heard. It was like one of those rare situations in life
where you experience something that is so far different from your recollection
of what this thing should be that you feel uneasy. In all my long hi-fi life I
have never heard such a disparity from what I had heard before. And the
information is provided without a variety of distortions that plague mere
mortal turntables.
The result
of all this naturally and beautifully presented information was that with music
that I knew and that was new to me, on a number of occasions I became so
emotionally involved. Time after time I was completely immersed in the
performance be it jazz, classical or pop. It was not that the performers were
in the room but I was at the performance! This has been without question the
most exciting, emotional and complete hi-fi experience of my life. I wish I was
one of the lucky few that will be able to buy this turntable. It is seriously
expensive but comparable with a number of top turntables, but when you see and
hear the APOLYT you will know why. The materials and components that go into
its design are way and beyond its competitors. It is also logistically very big
as is the necessary hospital/dental compressor required for its air bearing and
air suspension. Living in a small apartment with She Who Must Be Obeyed leaves
me most likely not enough room (even as I write this I refuse to rule out its
possibility given what I heard and the profound impression it made on me). I eagerly
look forward to hearing it again with the full titanium version of the Axiom arm
(the “standard” Axiom was being used for the demo) which I understand will only
be offered to those lucky few who buy the APOLYT.
I would
like to thank Dietrich of AS for his hospitality and professionalism in demonstrating
the APOLYT to me.
In closing,
this monster of perfection and performance, possessed me to go on a buying
spree for a whole lot of vinyl resulting in some serious damage to my bank
balance. I know of no better recommendation than that. As Dietrich said to me, it
is for him primarily about the music and the records, and the equipment is but
a means to an end. And it is this, together with his phenomenal ability as a
designer and his perfectionist character, that have produced the AS products
culminating in the wonder that is the APOLYT. I know it sounds over-the-top and
unbelievable especially given the constant false hype that spews from many a hi-fi
mag that we are now so used to, but I must thank Dietrich Brakemeier and AS for
the hi-fi experience of my life, and the Internet and Audiogon without which I
would never have found him and his outstanding equipment. Thank you for reading.
