Analytical or Musical Which way to go?

I agree with Philjolet, I'll take musical any day.I want to enjoy the music not have listening fatigue.

I'm having pair of speakers built using the same drivers as the first generation Usher 8571. The cross overs are of the same Usher design but use higher quality caps, resistors. I had several discussions regarding type of music, room dimensions and contents....., audio components - amps, preamp...
The builder then asked me if I was striving for ultimate detail versus a musical approach. I opted for musical.
He suggested using the older Usher silk dome which according to the builder is more musical versus the more current Diamond, Bery., Usher tweeters. There's no right or wrong here. It boils down to personal preference.

After owning speakers of many different designs and flavors, I'll take musical. The speakers I use don't look nearly as good on paper as some of the others but they sound much better to my ear. Actually, instead of the term musical, I describe them as more fun to listen to. I can totally relax into the music.

The Op trust his ears

I don't disagree with you that the consumer loudspeaker market is fragmented in term of what they consider quality. We all seem to agree that amplifiers, and BLU-Ray players should be +- 0.25 dB but with loudspeakers, all sense of rational thinking seems to go out the door. I think this has to do with poorly controlled listening evaluations and poor objective measurements because when you have good subjective and objective measurements , consensus is usually reached.

That said, I think there is convergence over the last few years among the larger, more successful audio manufacturers in terms of what they believe the optimal target should be. I know this to be true because I do a lot of competitive benchmarking of loudspeakers, and the differences among competitors have shrunk. They are reading the available scientific literature and the measurement equipment, design tools,etc have come down in cost. Some even have anechoic chambers for doing accurate measurements but they don't always calibrate them or use them to their advantage.

There are still cases, where marketing/sales are clearly voicing the speaker to sound hyped in the bass and treble (Speaker B) and not natural, or they are going for high midrange sensitivity at the expense of bass in order to be the loudest speaker (Speaker C) on the floor at Best Buy. Or in the case of Loudspeaker D they clearly don't have any serious subjective/objective measurement capability or truly believe that coloring/distorting the music differentiates them from the pack. I've argued with misguided marketing people who think accurate sound is boring and not sellable, but fortunately they are long gone, and I am still here.

But on average, the design target for the majority of companies is flat, extended frequency response. The better ones get it right off-axis as well. The differences are how well they achieve their target and the devil is in the details. " Sean Olive Harman international