VERITY OTELLO

buildings. All one has to do is walk in to understand the solidity and the quiet.

The Verity Otellos are easy to set up and will take but a little time to position and then to set them atop their “speaker plinths.” I reviewed the instruction manual for the Otello and then went on my own experience for their setup. In the end, the Otellos were nine feet apart, three feet from the back wall, and facing forward with no toe-in.

The Sound

“Perspective. Use it or lose it.” There were two other speakers inhouse for review while the Verity Otello was here. And each speaker—Tri-Art OPEN 5, Vivid Audio Kaya 45s—sported a vastly different voice. In comparison, a speaker’s prior strength would either be diminished or improved relative to one of the other speakers and there was little subtlety in those subjective aural “measurements.” The overall review process as a result of analyzing these three quite different speakers, would result in raising the bar for any subsequent product to qualify for any award.

The Verity Otellos are very energetic/ dynamic and the soundstage is wide, fairly deep, though in relation to the Tri-Art OPEN 5s and the Vivid Audio Kaya 45s, more shallow than both. And when it comes to choral or live music, it exhibits a constriction with regard to the depth of the performance, which tends to place performers along a relatively narrow band. This results in choral and live presentations via the Otello as not optimally reproduced or realized or convincing. The Otello possesses a weight and gravitas that provide for a well-structured foundation across the entire frequency range, and that pays dividends with regard to the midrange. The Otello facilitates a near in-room experience with vocalists and instrumentalists via a midrange centre-fill that can suspend disbelief in the reproduction of a performance in favour of its in-room manifestation.

Further, there is a transparency and resolution that together unearth details which bring to life one 40-year-old soundtrack— Bladerunner—which, in this case, transports me to the movie theatre where the epic sci-fi film noir—Bladerunner—was first seen. The Otellos, in this sense, have conjured a memory that plays out for me across the soundtrack. I reach out and touch tactile palpability that attaches itself to the various representations of Joan Shelly’s eponymous album plays “We’d Be Home Now” (Joan Shelly, No Quarter Records) and finds Joan’s voice centered, textured, wonderfully palpable, almost in-room and real, and Nathan Salsburg on guitar stage left. There is a familiar reach out and touch palpability conjured beautifully, no doubt, by the interplay of the “soft neo ring dome tweeter, the doped polypropylene midrange, and the edge coated reed/paper pulp cone

Choral or the stage for its reproduction, as mentioned earlier, is noticeably constricted via the Verity Otello and lies across a very narrow front to back plane. Though in truth this is the effective or default capability for the vast majority of speakers, both closed and open, which are generally unable to accurately or convincingly reproduce choral or live music. If these are not genres/ styles of music on your list, then you will be well served by the Verity Otello.

Treble heights are scaled easily and beautifully by the Otellos and there is no diminishment, audiokeyreviewsCA.com