I'm confused - Different music...different speakers?

Perhaps it's the 1″ / 2.54 cm alloy dome metal tweeter.

every demo in every shop of every metal dome tweetered speaker i ever heard - this is what i recall when i read OP

wonder why audiophile recordings tend to be either trad jazz or small scale classical almost exclusively? (a few jazz rock coryell ones on chesky notwithstanding)?

they sound airy, extended, etc with metal tweets

think thiels.

playing nirvana.

driven by krells.

I’ve owned the Hawks, Forests and Model 1’s and never found them bright. I think the "metal tweeter = harsh" thing that so many throw around is not always true. Harbeth, Spendor and Chartwell all use metal tweeters and are not harsh. I think it has more to do with the crossover level and frequency than the material itself. That said, I think the trouble you are having is due to a lack of impact in the midbass, where most of the "slam" frequencies in rock reside. IMO, real low bass is found in organ or orchestral work, as well as some synth stuff with sub-bass frequencies. You are probably cranking the speaker up to generate midbass impact, which overloads the drivers and stresses your amplifier, leading to an unpleasant sound. If you like the Hawks for acoustic music, I would leave them and add a sub to fill out the midbass and give you more fullness at lower volumes. There are several companies now putting out high-quality compact subs that I think would mate well with the Hawks. Take a look at SVS for one.

It's always tricky to pin things on one factor, such as a tweeter. But different tweeters do have different characters, at least for me. I've moved toward ribbons over metal tweeters. Focal 936s were too bright for me, and Dyn Evoke 30 soft domes were too rolled off. If you ever get a chance to hear a well implemented Beyma AMT, tweeter, well, that's both good with rock and with audiophile jazz and classical.

As a prior owner of Totems with that exact same tweeter for many years, and going through a few different higher current amplifiers, and cables, I had to kinda beat them into submission to get them to sound reasonable to my ears across different types and generations of music and recordings of varying quality. These speakers caused me to move to monoblock tube amplifiers, and ultimately to different and more sensitive custom built speakers with different type tweeters and crossovers..

@smaarch1 fwiw, if you must keep the Totem Hawks, there are a few different things you might try to help curve the alloy dome tweeter "aggravation" some, if you have not already attempted these band-aids. 1. try changing the front center 12AU7 preamp tube in the Rogue to a softer tube to take a little edge off. 2. good quality copper multi-strand speaker cables can help a little; tried several types with my former Totems with varying results. 3. Research and check capacitance pf/ft of your existing interconnect cables between the source and preamplifier. Ask Rogue what the acceptable limits are pf/ft, it matters with some tube amps too. Sometimes other/softer sounding copper interconnects can help a little. Your results may vary. Best of luck.