Audio (Af)fairs

Everybody says they hate ‘em, but if they had not existed somebody should have invented them, hence when they’re missing somebody pops up and creates one: I am talking about more or less specific Audio Fairs. This issue # 6 of Videohifi.com is almost fully devoted to them, and especially to one, that is the most important in Italy and is part of Europe top rank (first of it, by some criteria). It is that Top Audio & Video Show that we have kept you informed about in real-time, but that we present to you under a point of view that few have tried yet. Thanks to our “special reporters” Igor Zamberlan and Marco Caponera, we show you almost the whole fair, for your eyes and your mind. We’d have been glad to let you listen to it as well, but, though we’re getting organized to amaze you with special effects, technology isn’t that sophisticated yet. Had we enclosed to this issue a giant MP3 file, we couldn’t anyway reproduce the time schedule of the event, not to mention the poor sound quality. We’ve also taken into consideration a stack of 1,180 CDs, with the Top Audio running radio commentary but on budget the task proved rather expensive. Moreover, we considered that sooner or later we’ll have to cope with the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas, and how could we disappoint you then? Well there’s no parcel service we know of, that can deliver 40,000 CDs or more than 10,000 DVDs at a cost we can afford.

So we turned back to the typical reportage.

You’ll see that practically all the show is covered, for the joy of your November evenings (and for the December ones as well, unless you’re trained in fast - reading). We made this coverage up for those who were not at the Top Audio and for those who do have been there but can’t rely on the same endorphin supply of our guys, and therefore gave up at some point. We don’t like the usual “selection”, and to us it also doesn’t look fair either: who do we suppose we are, to define ranks (we do that in our personal comments), to decide which items public is interested in or not? As an outcome, you can have a trip through Top Audio & Video 2003 like if you were at the Quark Hotel, floor by floor, room by room, like if you had four days off to hang around – but with no hotel bill to pay!

Our “very special” reporter Matteo Lupatelli, after a short visit to the bar of the Quark, more astonished by the bill than by the spirits he had possibly guzzled, shows us unseen and exciting sketches of this fair. He was the only allowed to visit (almighty Videohifi.com!) the –1 ½ floor and there he discovered the most interesting, definitely esoteric items!

A second reportage about the definitely smaller, but extremely well - deserving show in Rome, the “Roma Hi-End”, is coming very very soon.

Let me spend some words about audio fairs: first of all, I find the common attitude towards this very one especially ungenerous: I happened too criticize, even bitterly, the Top Audio when it shaped like a separatist and freemasonry-style event. At that time, the Association of Italian hi-fi dealers (APAF) was a kind of fraternity. It was held by a sort of rule stating that “if one is member of APAF can take part into the Top Audio, but to be a member of APAF one must have taken part in some Top Audios, and only APAF members can take part in the Top Audio”. Or when, in a more liberal scenario, people used to say that big Jap names couldn’t enter the Top Audio. Two sins in one. First one, that of limiting the fair into the attention of few (coherent with the concept that “the fewer, the better”). Second one, a pride sin, since no written or unwritten law states that by grace of God a small U.S. brand must produce better gear than a large Jap one, and we know very well how often things went the other way round.
But whole geological eras have bygone in Italy since. A load of referendums, Swedish station wagons became a bit unfashionable and money to purchase them vanished like a witchcraft taking with it most of those who had made the Italian Audio market the largest in the world after the U.S. – and not always after.

Honestly, CEOs Presidents and Organizations have turned and have done a very good job. Those who strongly complain about the layout of Top Audio, about rooms acoustics or even about its costs, have usually a narrow view of the international fair business, and the difficulty if not the impossibility of packing one, also because of rightful safety rules.

The Quark Hotel is the only one in Milan, as far as I know, that got organized to carry out the task. These who have attended shows worldwide for a couple of decades know very well that the acoustics of its rooms is not worse than the acoustics of Las Vegas, Frankfurt or London show rooms. I don’t think it comes by chance that Top Audio gets frequent and public appreciation by manufacturers and foreign press. Dear friends, a fair is a fair, it’s a place where one goes to see, to search, maybe to plan his/her fore purchases, not to seek an unlikely hidden truth.

Perhaps (but this is a transnational phenomenon as well) we might wonder why many exhibitors do so little or even nothing at all to improve the acoustics of these rooms.

Too often we still happen to see rooms where gears – even outstanding – had been laid carelessly, denoting extremely poor attention and respect towards public.

Yes, I know, public is not of interest to some manufacturers and distributors: they feel bound to be there in order to meet dealers and retailers. Having won some retailers by means of very respectable reasons that have little to do with the reasons why more than few people are still interested in silicon parallelepipeds and woody boxes, they will force their gears into those shops. They’re making a bad mistake: their items will stay, covered with dust, sitting on the shelves. Those retailers quite obviously won’t then rush to embrace the manufacturers and distributors begging on their knees “please give me more”.

One of the worst diseases that keep affecting our field of activity, maybe worse than MP3s and self-erotic mobile phones, is the philosophy of “sell just to sell ”, even (often!) one - off. And, you know that, a sale is denied to none, provided you probably won’t purchase an item any more. Unluckily there’s still plenty of dealers (distributors, manufacturers or retailers) whose sole target are buying the coolest car by season’s end or a trip to Cancun.

This having said, I wish to add that this year – amid all the troubles of the situation – the organization has worked full throttle. Problems, if any, fixed in a wink, immediate and careful support, a “true” press room and even an ADSL-powered Internet “hot spot”, thanks to which we managed to keep you updated on-line. Nice shot my friends, really nice. I also wish to give my very special thanks to that “cute war machine” that goes by the name of Raffaella Oldani, in charge for such an organization.

Talking about audio fairs in general terms, well, I can say I have quarreled all my life with all my editors (and even with myself) for them. That because in my opinion where it was possible we had to be present at all of them: big and small, beautiful or ugly, square or round. Especially in the 80s, audio shows have been bread for this market. No leaflet, ad, promo or press launch will ever be able to replace direct contact with public.

If a fact exists that we can really regret about, it is that large fairs stop at Milan. Rome has been unrightfully neglected for years: any bug-size fair, even an awful one that was held some years ago, draws crowds there.

“It’s just people idling around” – dealers say to justify themselves- forgetting that curiosity is the needful thrust towards the Unknown represented, because of its own nature and of a weak promotion, by this odd field of interest.

Once upon a time, when the giant SIM fair was held in Milan, and hundred thousand people used to come see it, people used to say “Ok, it’s only kids coming here just on stickers and leaflets”. An important issue was being neglected there too: those kids would grow up, dreaming over these leaflets, staring at the stickers in their room, and would grow up to become tomorrow’s customers.

That vital lymph that – not by chance – the Audio business has long been missing and that other, smarter dealers of even neighboring businesses have often been able to grow and embody.

I’m therefore writing also in praise of the (still) small but extremely meritorious Roman event, organized by Stefano Zaini – a.k.a. Mr. "Milano Hi-End".

Skipping to more trivial items – that also more trivially interest us – this year, with a big scandal for the evident conflict of interests, I self-assign the “Special Bebo Moroni Award for the Best Sound”, (consisting of the usual, warm handshake), to the Videohifi room. It honestly seemed to me to offer the best musical performance of the whole audio fair. And trust me when I say that in this kind of matter I’m so self-critic that I almost get self-damaging. Other rooms I liked much? AudioNatali (Krell + ARC + Wilson) for the impressive soundstage dimension, dynamics, sound physical sensation. The Absolute Sound (Burmester), thorough timbre, all but a German-style piercing one, overwhelming dynamics, Sound & Music / Acustica Applicata (Graham / Dynavector, Spectral, Avalon Pro) great overall musicality and utmost precision in timbre reproduction. The MCL "old & new" High Fidelity / MPI room (McIntosh and Klipschorn + La Scala) fascinating and sometimes overwhelming sound. The Accuphase / Tannoy one, Jeez what a bass range! Not to mention the Dromos room, national hi-fi pride, the Audioreference room where the Micromega Minium with the ProAc Response One SC where deliciously playing, and for the second year in a row the Mantra Acoustic room with its, in my opinion, extraordinary Dulcet.