which speaker is better suited for Rock and Roll

I get to visit studios that record rock and roll in both LA and Nashville.  Most of the comments in this thread about "sound quality or character" - as though this drove the speaker decision making for studios - is not the way it was or is.  Studios need reliability above ALL else.   They are renting rooms to people every day by the hour and a failure means no rent, no income and no clients.  It could take days to get replacement parts and that means a very big loss indeed. 

JBL became what it was largely though the amazing voice coil tech they implemented before anyone else: dense, square wire voice coils that could handle enormous power and get rid of heat (that causes the driver to fail).  No one else had this tech back in the 60s, 70s except JBL so they won a lot of work.  Today JBL is long out of the studio business, its way to small and niche for them.  Way more live sound business, commercial sound reinforcement and home audio.  

The top studio speakers you see used in studios in LA and Nashville are ATC, Focal, Neumann and an assortment of other very small company brands.  Reliability is a top value but so is low distortion- so you can hear errors and details that otherwise are covered up with higher distortion speakers.  Places like Blackbird, East West, Abbey Road, Electric Lady all have both large and small ATC in most if not all their rooms.  Many mastering houses are ATC based like Sterling Mastering.  ATC has tech that makes their voice coils super reliable, so they get a lot of the work now.  

So if you want to use what is used to record rock and roll, ATC, Focal, Neumann.  

Brad

@lonemountain - 

You bring up an interesting point.  I forget that Focal makes an entirely different set of powered speakers for the pro world that are pretty reasonably priced.  Anyone who likes Focal and is active-curious should check out their pro line. 

I've not heard them, by the way, but if memory serves they were about 10x cheaper than Focal's current home powered line. 

Congrats, Sonus Faber does require us to take a deep breath and just do it! Maybe, hopefully one day I’ll work up the courage to buy a pair. That the room, components and speakers are all playing well together is great. Enjoy

Steve,thanks much. Every time I use the Guarneri's  G5 I am so impressed. How, for their size they can do what they do. Just doesn't seem possible.  Just had my 73rd and stated to myself (to justify cost) you can't take it with you. 

     When was the last time you saw a u haul following a funeral procession?

Lots of good speakers for rock. After 40 years as an audio nerd, I do have a definitive answer for this question.

JBL M2

That’s the answer.

They also might be the best for just about everything else. 

How you get there... is up to you.  But you can do it for under 12k, maybe 10k if you shop smart.

Find a used pair of M2’s, get a BSS-Blu 50 used to run the crossover.

preamp/streamer/dac of choice and budget, a reasonably powered 4 channel amp.

Takes a little time to set-up.

Dynamics, bass, clean, crazy spl if you want it, all for a "reasonable" price. 

The active ATC’s are awfully good also, but the bigger ones that will give you the low end are really expensive.