Clement Perry's new reference speaker

2 friends of mine have heard Clement's system. Both are extremely critical of system, and both liked it. One said it was about the best he had heard.

However Clement is using powerful room correcttion and would not play the system without the correction. I think the cost of his entire system is something like 400K.

I took Greg (who I never met before) up on his offer to hear his system, since a friend (who's quite critical) heard Clement's system was extremely impressed.

I brought some of my reference CD cuts, and was quite impressed with the speaker's qualities. I have never been a fan of horn designs, but the system really won me over. The speaker was able to reproduce inner vocal and instrumental details and inflections I have not previously heard from these recordings. Vocals were extremely smooth and never shouty (as I have heard before on other systems). Drum skin sounds were abundant, well fleshed out and properly resonant. The dynamics, both micro and macro were outstanding. This was even more evident when I asked Greg to turn the system down low- to almost sub conversation levels, where the music was extremely alive despite the low volume. This I think is the system's strongest attribute.

Greg's system does go through the Behold room correction so obviously the system can be tailored to whatever the owner finds pleasing, which makes it a little harder to judge the speakers purely on thier own.

I did not hear the cupped hands phenomenon which I have heard before in horn/quasi-horn systems, and I found the speaker tends to image forward, rather than behind the speaker. I generally prefer a speaker to image behind itself, but the Sunny's positive attributes severely outweigh this preference.

I absolutely have to hear the smaller models (which would be more appropriate for my space) and I also want to try them on my OTL amps, since I think they would be a perfect match.

In this hobby, there are many roads that lead to Rome, and in my estimation the Sunny speakers are one of them.

Just to fill in a few points to consider I learned hearing Greg's system.

As far as the cost - I think you have to see the speakers in person to realize
how enormous they actuallly are - and these were smaller than Clement's.

Surely the huge size and weight of 600 lbs each for Gregs and 800 lbs each for the largest ones has to account for the materials used and complexity of creating such a rigid large modular structure. (each cabinet is 3 section)

I believe the horn driver and supertweeter are custom made - though I could be wrong. The horn itself looks custom and like nothing I have ever seen.

Acapella horns are also quite expensive I believe.

The multiple sets of binding posts are like nothing I have ever seen before. They are jumbo sized and surely custom made.

I was told that that the discount reviewers typically get (if in fact they decide to keep the product) are not nearly as high on the Sunny's as other products.

Whenever people mention - "oh sure, said reviewer got a huge discount on xxxx product" isn't it obvious that the reviewer could most likely get the same discount on whatever item they decided to keep? People ripped Michael Fremmer for this on the Caliburn turntable - but he could have kept any table he wants - and chose and paid for the Caliburn.

Now I think cables often might be a different story. I believe sometimes cable manufacturers want reviewers to keep their cables on permanent loan so they can try them with whatever new gear comes in, and perhaps become a reviewers reference cable.

I don't know much about the audio reviewing business, but I suspect that almost none of them make a real living just from reviewing, and certainly not the web based 'zines. If there weren't some perks involved, why would they do it. Also how would they afford the kind of reference system required to review. There are thousands of products out there and I think a reviewers choice of a small handful of them to actually live with says alot, regardless of the specifics the finances behind the scenes.

Book and music reviewers get everything for free, and no ones shouts foul because a given label gave them thousands of dollars worth of free media that year.

I had a chance to hear Clement's system yesterday.
Maybe "hear" isn't the right word. "Experience" is more like it.

It does things that I've never heard another system do. On Patricia Barber's
Companion (one of my reference CD's) I heard elements in the recording I never noticed before. At one point in one of the tracks she whispers something to another musician, a detail I had never before heard. Each clap of the audience became a distinct fully fleshed out event. In fact all the live recordings he played portrayed audience cues in a way I had never heard captured on any recording. The Sunny's just have this incredible dynamic property that lifts sound off it's background in a way I have never heard any system reproduce.
Each slap of the conga on Companion took on it's own variance that was not there in other systems I heard it on, and the whole instrument really came to life as it had never before.

The bass was tighter and deeper than any system I've demo'd, and I not usually a fan of ultra deep gut wrenching bass. The room correction surely played a part in getting these 18" drivers to integrate so well in the small to medium size room.

On some acoustic guitar tracks I brought (from Springsteen's Devils and Dust)
each string suddenly became alive as it's own acoustic vibrating column of air.

Clement is to be aplauded for putting together a system that elevates music reproduction to such a high level, and for championing a new line of speakers that most of us were simply unfamilar with, by taking the time to allow strangers like myself into his home to experience his system.

I must say that when I first heard about 800 lb. per side gigantic horn speakers, I thought the notion a bit over the top. All I can say now is that if I had he room and the budget, I would not hesitate to take out my checkbook and find a good moving company.

I also got a chance to hear to hear Sunny's much smaller (traditional sized) speaker. While it could not do what the gigantic Majestics do, they are definitley a product line I am interested in investigating further.