Bookshelf Speaker Reviews

Associated equipment included a Pioneer Elite VSX-53 A/V receiver, Oppo BDP-83SE universal disc player, Micro Seiki BL-21 turntable, Shure V15MxVR/N97XE cartridge, and the phono stage of a Denon PRA-S10 preamp. All movies were on Blu-ray Disc with DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks.

Variations on a Theme
Like other Klipsch Reference speakers I’ve heard over the years, the Reference Premiere has an upfront sound that’s rich in detail and variable in comfort level. Give it a great recording in a highresolution format, and its strong treble absolutely sings, extracting every morsel of what you love about the music. Give it something edgy that requires a little more discretion, and it will tell more of the truth than you might prefer to hear. It will achieve impressive volume levels with most receivers, though warmer-toned amplification may suit its voicing better, and some content may sound more palatable at low-to-moderate levels as opposed to high. Bass character from both monitor and sub is on the lean side. The redesign of the horn has minimized beaminess, a potential weakness of horn-loaded speakers. I could move around the sofa without much noticeable variation in vocal timbre or deterioration of imaging.

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies has been in heavy rotation at my house; Netflix will have to wait a while longer for return of the Blu-ray Disc. One scene that always gets my attention is the dragon Smaug’s fire-breathing attack on a hapless mock-medieval village. The horned tweeters sent waves of seemingly full-band energy into the room, like a more scorching version of a pink noise tone, with extra emphasis on the upper midrange. In Smaug’s death throes, I noticed Benedict Cumberbatch’s natural vocal tone cutting through the aggressive vocal processing, an example of the center’s ability to reveal detail. Strings followed that trend by being more strongly outlined than usual, sharpening the attack of the entire string section, which is often bland in even the best soundstage recordings. When battle scenes went slow-mo and the soundtrack ratcheted down into sad-and-mournful territory, the system threw the quiet choral vocals into high relief, enhancing the tragic intent of the visuals. Sword clangs were also notably metallic in these quiet-reflection-amid-mayhem scenes. Surround effects were beautifully tailored into the soundfield, but those horn-loaded tweeters wouldn’t permit any sacrifice in texture or detail. On the whole, a bravura performance.

In The Imitation Game, with Cumberbatch swapping his Smaug persona for that of Alan Turing, the opening voiceover was stunning in its realism. The RP-250C made it almost hyper-real (not that I minded). A brief scene set in a rail station gave the system a chance to simulate an outdoor soundfield, and it did not disappoint. Blitz bombers over London were effectively imaged with a feeling of open space. The Klipsch speakers revealed the mixer’s artful layering and panning, though the net effect was still evocative enough to give me a chill.

A Walk Among the Tombstones has the gunplay you’d expect from a Liam Neeson thriller. (By the way, though it’s not like me to politicize our pages, let me say this just once: I’m more tolerant of guns and bombs in movies than in real life.) The ballistic effects in a cemetery shoot-out were hot—they crackled. Rainfall, one of my favorite movie effects, got a gentler but equally vivid treatment. Once again, I noticed a little enhanced detail in the orchestral parts wafting through the horns.

Front-Row Seat
Premiere was at its best during Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 (Pathétique) with Claudio Abbado leading the Vienna Philharmonic on an LP from Deutsche Grammophon’s golden age of analog recording. From the opening seconds of the first movement, the system’s low-level resolution was thrillingly obvious. In fact, the system’s resolution invigorated this performance at every volume level, giving the string section a sinuous beauty, bringing out the distinctive tone colors of the woodwinds and adding zest to the brass. In this selection, at least, nothing was unduly hot or fatiguing. Beauty and refinement were everywhere. The speakers avoided any noticeable timbre shift as I moved around the room. When I left the sweet spot, the only thing lost was spatial resolution (but you could say that about most speakers). The only unsatisfactory thing was the depiction of basses, kettledrums, and (later on) drums in general. Turning up the sub volume didn’t help. The sub just wasn’t as much of an achiever as the monitor, and the monitor’s bass response was modest to begin with.

I got mixed but mostly positive results from Magical Mystery Tour, from the vinyl box set of The Beatles in Mono. The mono versions are deemed superior because the artists spent more time on them. So I guess Paul must have intended the title track to sound brash, and the Klipsch speakers weren’t in the mood for revisionism. Like me, they much preferred the evocative psychedelia of John’s “Strawberry Fields Forever,” extracting maximum texture from the string and brass parts. Then came the equally evocative psychedelia of Paul’s “Penny Lane,” with Premiere giving maximum zing to the staccato piccolo trumpet solo and burnishing the lively instrumental textures to a brilliant sheen. I was surprised that the mono imaging wasn’t more closed in. The dispersion of the speakers opened it up a little.

Perhaps I was throwing a curveball when I picked the CBS CD of the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main St. over the vinyl version. I knew it had a more prominent and less refined top end than the vinyl (though I hasten to add that there are many CD editions of this title that I haven’t heard and this isn’t intended as a general comment on format preference). Even so, “Rocks Off” had me turning down the volume, despite its sassy brass chart, and I couldn’t play the rest of the album at the rambunctious volume I’d have preferred. Even the less top-heavy mixes—like “Sweet Virginia,” with its more relaxed acoustic guitars—could be enjoyed at only moderate levels at best.

What the Klipsch Reference Premiere system does well, it does brilliantly. It extracts maximum information from movie soundtracks; the RP-250C center in particular is a dialogue-intelligibility champion, and the RP-250S surround helps construct a convincing soundfield. The RP-150M monitor also meshes satisfyingly with vinyl and the more refined forms of digital audio. However, it is a tough, analytical speaker, not a feel-good speaker that makes everything sound pleasant. It can be grating with bright mixes and more debased forms of digital audio, so those listeners addicted to lossy files and streaming should exercise caution. If you’re resolution-starved and have a nagging feeling that your current system just isn’t telling you enough, Premiere may be the right medicine.