AXPONA 2023

With the assumption of audiophile Cliff Duffey (above) as President of AXISS Audio USA (aka AXISS Distribution Inc.), and the addition of T.J. Goldsby as Vice President of Sales and Dealer relations, the company has added more lines than can comfortably fit into a headline.

On the Renaissance hotel's 16th floor, in the room occupied by PureAudioProject, folks were utterly baffled. Also, occasionally horny.

Apologies. The fact that I'm away from home for four, five days to cover AXPONA means I temporarily don't have my teenage offspring to mortify with dad humor, so now I'm inflicting it on you. PureAudioProject, you see, makes open-baffle speakers. Some have horns. There's a reason I write for Stereophile, not Saturday Night Live.

As I think I wrote somewhere, it's one thing to hear equipment at a show, another thing to hear it at home. I meant to imply that, of course, at home is the only way to truly hear a piece, in your reference system.

But at AXPONA, where George Counnas (center) and Carolyn Counnas (right) debuted their new Zesto Audio Eros 500 Select KT-150 equipped, class-A monoblocks, with Zesto Audio's Leto Ultra II preamp, which I reviewed in January 2021, I was flummoxed at the beauty of sound, extravagance of liquidity and detail, and nearly spiritual physicality the system endowed to a variety of music.