Danny and I have been good friends for over 20 years. It has been a great relationship that has grown into a complete one with our wives becoming friends, too. It is always a good time when we get together, which is not often enough. After the BS of this last year I decided that it was time for a mental enema. Iowa Park Texas is a 7-1/2 hour drive so...
Three days was just not enough time. We talked a lot (all four of us), Danny and I did the whole audio geek thing and I espent some quality time with his NX-Tremes, a 7' tall, open baffle wonder of a speaker. Paired with a pair of triple 12", open baffle servo subs they dealt an amazing audio experience.
I've been "doing audio", especially speakers since I was 13 years old. That is 60 years. I've spent countless hours, days, weeks and years with an amazing mix of speakers. From self built experiments when I was 15, 4 - Altec Lansing A7-500s stacked 2 to a corner, horn to horn in the rock and roll band house in 1967-68, ElectroVoice Patricians, Allison, Boston Acoustics, Mission, Dahlquist, Maggies, Snell, WATT/Puppies and an assortment of self-designed and built. Last pair that weren't my designs were GR Super Vs. some of these were great, some just fun, some sucked.
I've exhibited with Danny at RMAF and every year his speakers just got better. After the Super Vs, his Super Sevens raised the bar more than a little bit. That year Steven Stone and others gave us best of show accolades with the Super Sevens being world class contenders. Pete's cables didn't hurt either
I've been following his YouTube channel and when Ron Brenay and his brother visited GR Research and listened to Danny's new offerings, I knew I had to take a road trip. I was not prepared for what was waiting for me. The NX-Tremes are in a word: stunning.
In the continuum that is home audio three are an amazing number of exemplary products out there. I've heard a lot of great loudspeakers, but I can't remember when I heard a pair with so few faults. There are speakers that may excel in some area, but fall flat in others. The NX-Ts don't have that character. Powered by a 9WPC 300B amp they are astonishingly dynamic, not only in a macro context, but micro dynamic nuances abound in the soundfield. This gives image specificity quite unlike the majority of speakers in my history. With the Triples handling the low end they have a foundation that few speakers can match. The subs are -3dB in the teens, but are never heavy handed. Gary Ding's servo sensor methodology does not exhibit that slow, plodding bloated low end that accelerometer subs often have. They are clean, fast and musical with pitch definition and harmonic content that sounds real on orchestral passages. Concert drum is THERE! The pressure gradient that subsonic energy produces is very real with these subs. Soundstage is enormous, but with life-like image sizes. Depth was beyond the back wall (~ 10' away) and extended to just in front of the speakers depending on ambient cues. LikeI said: stunning.
The two things that struck me the most were the incredible transparency and the ability of these 7' wonders to absolutely disappear. There was never the inkling of sound coming from them. The sound was just there, hanging in space. I gave never heard the sense of air and space between these bells in Bernie Krause's Macchu Piccu Suite on the Citadels of Mystery recording. For the first time in my experience I could hear the wooden stick bouncing on the bell during the rim rub. I have had this recording in several formats since it was released as a MFSL half-speed master in 1980. The Rebook CD sounded better than the record played on my old Star Sapphire SME IV with any number of cartridges.
The expression gobsmacked comes to mind. I'm sure there are speakers that will rival the NX-Tremes. I'm also sure that many thousands of dollars would be spent to acquire them. For sheer musical, transparent, dynamic and detailed without harshness reproduction I'd rate them 9.7/10. For $4K + the flat pack costs a build will result in exemplary enjoyment for years to come.
https://www.gr-research.com/store/p13/NX-Treme.html
