To the OP: Its not an audio trend assault with an over emphasis on bass.
Without prejudice to the facts that
(a) room treatments and speaker placement matter, and
(b) personal biased tastes are big influences and
(c) synergy (or lack of it) by speakers with the rest of your system
are all big influences in bass bloat complaint.
there’s a vast plethora of available bookshelf choices in your price point strata.... some that work for you and others that don’t.
You need to audition personally, full stop. Any and all of the buzzilion personal choice faves randomly pushed herein are functionally meaningless because they are heavily biased and purely anecdotal personal fave choices with no assurance that they will work and/or improve audio performance in YOUR bespoke system.
I will borrow a topical speaker review extract (redacted to remove another brand name in favour of posting neutrality ) that summarizes the linchpin best-of-breed audio performance factor that separates the contenders from the pretenders in your journey to OZ....the driver midrange performance, with an emphasis on the last two sentences:
”......Immediate impressions are a clear and transparent portrayal with very high detail retrieval, fast and controlled transient response, and superb musical timing, both in articulating rhythms and tempi, and in placing instruments within the temporal flow and context of the performance. The XXXXX is an outstanding mid/bass driver, sonically and musically right in line with the midrange performance of XXXX’s amplifiers and phono cartridges. Get the midrange right and everything else will fall into place. Get it wrong, and all the king’s horses…”
Without prejudice to the facts that
(a) room treatments and speaker placement matter, and
(b) personal biased tastes are big influences and
(c) synergy (or lack of it) by speakers with the rest of your system
are all big influences in bass bloat complaint.
there’s a vast plethora of available bookshelf choices in your price point strata.... some that work for you and others that don’t.
You need to audition personally, full stop. Any and all of the buzzilion personal choice faves randomly pushed herein are functionally meaningless because they are heavily biased and purely anecdotal personal fave choices with no assurance that they will work and/or improve audio performance in YOUR bespoke system.
I will borrow a topical speaker review extract (redacted to remove another brand name in favour of posting neutrality ) that summarizes the linchpin best-of-breed audio performance factor that separates the contenders from the pretenders in your journey to OZ....the driver midrange performance, with an emphasis on the last two sentences:
”......Immediate impressions are a clear and transparent portrayal with very high detail retrieval, fast and controlled transient response, and superb musical timing, both in articulating rhythms and tempi, and in placing instruments within the temporal flow and context of the performance. The XXXXX is an outstanding mid/bass driver, sonically and musically right in line with the midrange performance of XXXX’s amplifiers and phono cartridges. Get the midrange right and everything else will fall into place. Get it wrong, and all the king’s horses…”