The Rodgers Report
By Rich Rodgers

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Merlin Music Systems. Every year Bobby Palkovic finds a new way to tweak the sound of the VSMs and TSMs. This year's models are labeled Millennium. The finish on the VSMs matched that on Jud Barber's Joule OTL's. Gibson SG dark cherry on hi-fi gear is absolutely fabulous. And the sound was fabulous too. Considering the minimal size of the speaker's footprint it can fill a room, and it still qualifies as my wife's favorite speaker. The Millennium VSM is a wonderful speaker, especially when mated up with the right electronics such as the Joules. Almost as fast and disappearing as the best "stat", the Millennium is one of the finest reviewer's tools around - it's called honesty. And this year Bobby has a new speaker spike/ cone that is machined like no other. The spike and the metal assembly sandwich a cone of wood. The screw threads are very tight which help to control vibration, and the tip itself is dangerously sharp, it will pierce carpet easily (as well as fingers, toes, stuff like that). At the wide end of the wooden cone is a spongy material that is spring loaded. Also in the room were two sets of Joule Electra OTL amps; one set the latest and greatest from Jud, and the second set were the very amps that Bobby had used with the VSM's in years past. I have no idea which set was playing, but it seemed like something was slightly amiss in the lower mids. A wee bit of weight was missing. To make sure of my analysis I put on one of my own CD's. The band was Blues Fuse recorded live during happy hour at a club only a few blocks from my house, John Lee Hooker's club called The Boom Boom Room. It sounded great except for a little grit in Art Harris' deep voice. I'm a bad boy, for this is picking severely on Bobby, especially considering the sound in most other rooms. These guys are the greatest.

Rogue Audio. BFS readers know that I like Rogue electronics. They're not giving the stuff away, but they do sell 120 watt tube mono blocks for $2,600. Let's just say that for people who don't have to buy audio equipment simply for ego embellishing purposes, the purchase of a Rogue is a final purchase. I haven't had a speaker in the house that didn't sound better with a Rogue amp attached. This year, in room 216 1, Rogue mono amps were powering a set of Merlin VSM Millenniums, and they were making wonderful music. The Merlins sounded better than ever, and this was my second favorite room at the entire show. . . .

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