Blog posts of '2015' 'April'

Shelf of the Month April 2015

Shelf of the Month has been difficult his time round. There has been a raft of new products coming through and we haven't even got to "New AV season" yet!!

Everything was all in place for our favourite new products of the month, until last week, when the new DALI A/S Menuets turned up ‪#‎WOW‬ We have been totally blown away by these compact speakers and simply cannot stop listening to them. They are beautifully open and articulate, with amazing detail in the mid and high frequencies, yet it is the bass that impresses the most. We can only applaud the engineers for getting a tight, tuneful, deep bass out of a cabinet as small as the Menuet. The soundstage is on point too. They really are a joy to listen to and if you have any urge to replace your speakers, you MUST listen to them.

Record Store Day came into being in 2007 when over 700 independent stores in the USA came together to celebrate their unique culture. The UK followed suit and 2015 will see the eighth celebration of the UK's unique independent sector. This is the one day that all of the independently owned record stores come together with artists to celebrate the art of music. Special vinyl and CD releases and various promotional products are made exclusively for the day and hundreds of artists across the globe make special appearances and performances. Festivities include performances, meet & greets with artists, DJ's, in store quizzes and many other events.

In celebration of all things Vinyl, we have some special in store offers from Project (see below) as well as the exclusive Rega RP1 RSD2015 limited edition turntable available. 12 of the 500 production run have been signed by famous musicians. Factory sealed at Rega, you may just be lucky enough to purchase one! Click here to see the list

Here at Harrow Audio, we will have 4 systems set up and running for you to be able to bring your Vinyl along and listen to it like never before! The Rega RP1, RP3, RP6 and Project 1 Xpression Carbon will be ready to audition and Vinyl will be spinning all day long! Pop in for a coffee and enjoy the tunes! 

Our demo room gets some pretty regular use but today we have been setting up an AV demo for a customer who wants to hear the new DALI A/S Rubicon LCRs partnered with the mighty REL Acoustics S/5 Subwoofer.

What that means though is taking apart the demo room and getting the whole system working to its best. Thats cool, we can do that, but it does take 2 of us (mainly to lift the REL!) and a bit of time to get everything sounding awesome! And it does sound AWESOME!

The Pioneer LX58 is a breeze to setup and the Arcam Of Cambridge UDP411 gives a stunning picture out of the box.

Shelf of the Month February 2015

Here we are again, shelf of the month for Feb (minus the Raleigh Chopper Mug!) and its been an unanimous choice this time! Being an independent shop we get to choose what we stock and that generally comes down to what we like and what we feel offers above performance for the price tag. This month we showcase 3 products that offer exceptional performance and, accidentally, all sell at the same price!

The tell-tale sign of a product we love is how often it gets used. With the Monitor Audio SIlver 8 we have a speaker that is constantly on demo. These speakers are always playing in the shop, on whatever system is connected. Considering the staff's varied musical tastes, they never fail to convey the scale and subtlety of any music you throw at them. What makes the Silver 8 special is the dedicated Mid-range driver. It takes the load off the mid/bass driver and lets the vocals and instrumentation breathe. On looks alone, you would think the Silver 8 has oodles of bass, and it does, but it is very controlled and never feels like it overpowers the rest of the range. Tall but smart in stature, they come with an Editors Choice recommendation from Hi-Fi Choice magazine and a glowing Stereophile Magazine review. If you visit the shop and they are not playing, they will be in the demo room upstairs being listened too. Guaranteed.