Vandersteen 1C to 3A Signature

The Sound In Itself
All this detail about exactly what happens and why does not really get across the remarkable impression these speakers create. If one forgets about audio categories, turns one’s mind away from a checklist of what speakers are supposed to do, and turns one’s mind away from what most speakers do do, and thinks instead of what music sounds like in reality, these speakers are hugely intriguing. Once one gets used to the fact that they are different from free-space floorstanders; indeed, one can become positively addicted to their sound. In a certain sense, the Model 8s are something of a road not taken in audio. But one cannot help wondering if this is not perhaps because audio took a wrong turn somewhere to some extent if the goal is to sound like real music, especially in terms of reproducing the lower midrange on down.

Large-scaled music, where the match between room sound and direct sound is a vital matter, especially illustrates the virtues of the Model 8s. Orchestras sound surprisingly like orchestras, with a transparency that goes not just down into the midrange but all the way down. If you wanted to write down the bass and cello parts of a symphonic composition from listening, these speakers would make it easy.

At the same time, the human voice is also very convincing. A good recording of a person speaking sounds startlingly like a real person, something that often escapes speakers that change directivity in the midrange on account of the baffle step. And instruments with serious lower-midrange content sound unusually convincing, as noted.

The Larsen Model 8 is to my mind a speaker that everyone seriously interested in audio ought to listen to and at as much length as possible, since one needs to adjust to its quite different approach to reproducing sound in rooms. There are things it does, and important things at that, that to my mind lie at the heart of actually sounding like live music. The approach is entirely different from the near-field, directional speakers that can also claim a really accurate reproduction of what is on the recordings, albeit in a different way. But the approach of the Larsen Model 8s has validity of its own. How speakers should work in rooms is not a very standardized matter. But the way of the Larsens is one of the ways that works. The Larsens, most impressively, really sound the way music actually does sound. The Model 8s are not just another try at making a speaker like all the rest except better, as so many high-end speakers are. Rather, the Larsen Model 8s are something special in their own right.