Which speakers do the hologram thing?

What Sean has heard with the AvantGardes, I've heard with the A-Capellas, which are also modern horn loaded speakers. I see his point about dipoles, radiating out of phase towards the back wall. However, when you listen to live music in a room or hall, you never just have sound reaching your ears in phase, having all sorts of reflections from everywhere in the listening area. This is probably one of the reasons, why a well set up pair of dipoles in a carefully treated listening room can sound uncanningly real, more real in fact, than the A-capellas, which though beautifully holographic, will sound just a tad too "pure", ethereal, speak artificial, compared to say Sound Labs or Quads. Though more holographic, they cannot really sound "dirty" like live music and dipoles often do.

Sean, you are dead right of course. It was the good old Quad 57, which had the backwave at least partially blotted out by a fairly thick felt layer and this speaker, especially in the HQD version threw an incredibly good soundstage. Many people preferred the 57 to the later iterations for just that very reason. Unfortunatedly the thing never played really loud and you had to sit exactly in the sweat spot to get the highs right. I've experimented with blotting out the back wave, but very dilletantly and unsuccessfully. I find the idea you bring up fascinating, but I'm not knowledgeable enough in these things to design or even dream of something similar. Besides, with my setup, it would be impossible anyway.

Sean, one thought has been bugging me. As you quite rightly say, dipoles, by the very nature of their design, must distort the sound. I bet, that most concert going Maggie, Sound-Lab or Quad owners will heartily disagree with that statement. I also, trying as hard as I might, don't hear any distortion. Perhaps the secret lies in the way I hear the differences, as described by me above, which I hold to be generic by the way, between the sound of the newer hornspeakers and dipoles. I do indeed find the sound of the A-Capellas "purer" than what my system AND the live experience can render. So what is happening here? Is it the dipole setup in the room, which will render the "theoretical" point of their distorting practically mute/moot, if its succesfull, is the ear so easily fooled, or is it just the fact, that dipoles distorting as they do, render a sound, that more often than not fascinate music lovers?
Wonder what your thoughts are.... Cheers, Detlof