The infinite loading surprised me.
For the Herron, I had 220 and 470ohm plugs made for my cartridge as this is what the Gold Note offered and sounded good when using. I initially tried the plugs with the Herron and it sounded excellent. When I removed the plugs and went infinite load, it elevated the subtleties and clarity.
47k Ohm loading on Gold Note for MC cartridges is almost "infinity", did you try that ?
I have another phono stage with plug-in load resisteors (the JLTi) and i like 47k Ohm for some MC cartridges. My JLTi was customized by manufacturer, i have 500k Ohm resistor inside, so i can plug 47k Ohm resistor (rca plugs) from the outside just like in Herron.
I have no problem with clarity using Gold Note, it is crystal clear phono stage, but i feel the obvious lack of deep bass in Gold Note compared to my upgraded WLM Phono stage which is a kind of body and bass compared to all phono stages i have tried. I tried the Gold Note with headamp and with sut, but the low register is still not as good as my WLM Phonata to my surprise.
Maybe Lew is right and i have to look at the output coupling capacitor inside the Gold Note.