What is the best HEAVY METAL speaker?

As some one who has been into this hobby for 20 years and started out listening to metal (still go some times) you need to stay away from razor flat speakers, Revel and Thiel are good examples. They sound good when the music has bass recorded in but button up quick when the recording sucks.

I have always liked Wilson Audio and B&W for metal. Their flaws of over done bass thumb (upper bass 80-100hz) lends itself well to hard rock heavy metal. Older models of both brands can be bright so stick with newer ones (sophia 3,sasha or later, 802diamonds).

You can always add subs and a good digital highpass but that is not cheap if done right.

Wharfedales. even the Diamond series handle metal just fine.

I do not know your Budget, however, you asked what speaker would do what you ask the best, first off, the sensativity needs to be good, and you need alot of air movement for woofer size, here is a speaker that has fast woofers and a 96 sensativity rating, you like double bass, well then here you go, The JBL DD-Everest 67000 speakers, they have 2 15" woofers, do 28hz to 50 khz, they are horn speakers, so you get the the impact of metal music the way it was meant to sound like, ever seen dynamic speakers on stage at a live concert?, of course not!, the metal bands use horn speakers for many reasons, the 2 15" woofers here will provide the seperation of 2 bass drums quite well, this JBL speaker should take you where you want to go, A royal Flush so to speak of, Enjoy fellow metal head, long live Rock-n-Roll!

Lizzard-

you cn do this in 1 of 2 ways;
older speakers - Infinity Crescendo Series (early 1990's).
new speakers - Thiel CS 2.7 or 3.7 depending on your room/space size.

I,too, enjoy Hard Rock/Metal and you are correct, most is very poorly produced/mixed- a real challenge for today's electronics and loudspeakers. Keep me posted & happy headbanging!

Legacy are alright, but not as good as Klipsch Heritage and JBL Synthesis, imo. I heard those old Polks back in '86 playing Deep Purple, I was not impressed. AS far as B&W, I would go with an old pair of 801 Matrixes series 2 or 3. Or the ever elusive 801Ds. There's a guy on you tube called audiophilemetallian with the 801Ds. Check out his videos, the 801Ds really rock!