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So it’s been a long time coming but I finally made the jump to replace the Klipsch Promedia 4.1s that I bought sometime between 2000-2002, paying somewhere in the ballpark of $600 at the time and having to go to an actual audio store. Staying true to that vein, pretty much the only store in the GTA which carries Audioengine is Computer Systems Centre. I actually found the brand and these speakers a few months ago but the price (CAD$349 at Canada Computers, $359 at CSC) and not wanting to trek down to CSC to try them out deterred me.

Well now that I work near CSC and in light of recent employment events, I decided to indulge a little bit. Due to streetcar traffic I ended up walking there (15 minute walk) and it was absolutely frigid. Once I got there, I plugged my iPhone in and tried out a few choice tunes including and not limited to: Sound of Silence, Coachella, Your Latest Trick and Sultans of Swing. The speakers were placed a little high in the store and the environment in general wasn’t ideal for critical listening. I have to admit I wasn’t really wowed on first listen. I could tell they were on par with the Klipsch, but didn’t sound any better. After a good 25 minutes of listening, I was satisfied and so picked them up. Partially persuaded by the long trek there in the cold.

An hour later when I got home, I began the unbox!

The ugliest box ever. Straight out of China.

Guest unboxer!

Nicely bagged and wrapped. They’re actually upside down in this photo. A felt layer on the bottom of each speaker to help with isolation and reduce vibrations etc.

Ta da! Can’t judge a speaker by it’s box; it’s a very solid, nicely finished speaker in a satin black.

The first thing I noticed is that they’re too big for my desk and because they’re so deep, you’re definitely in front of the ideal soundstage, but it’s tolerable. I can’t point them in too much due to my weird desk, so I may look into finally replacing what was supposed to be a temporary table top.

I’ve been playing a variety of music through it over the course of the evening, from Broadway soundtracks to Erin Bode to Starfield to Keith Jarrett. It sounds far better now than in the store.. I’m also listening at a more reasonable level and that may have something to do with it. These speakers are *extremely* musical. They don’t have the same oomph of the Klipsch but that was typically wanted in games and movies and not so much in music. I can finally agree with the other reviews I’ve read and say that the A5s pack more than enough bass for music.

One thing that happens often with a 2.1 computer system is that when you listen at extremely low levels (late night) there’s an obvious separation between the (typically) 3-4″ satellites and the subwoofer. One advantage for the A5s is that even at low levels, the bass is still present and mixes smoothly. I’ve not tried pushing them too loud since it’s late, but at comfortable volumes for near-field listening, the A5s are really outstanding and very full sounding.

I was deciding between the M-Audio BX5a’s and these and while I still haven’t listened to the BX5a’s, I definitely don’t regret picking up the A5’s. Reviews/comparisons for the BX5a say that it’s extremely light on bass and much less forgiving (as they should be, being monitors) and so including the cost of a sub, getting the BX5a’s would cost far more than a pair of A5s. I did listen to a pair of AV40s that JV lent to me and while they were pretty adequate for near-field use, they just didn’t do it for me.

Anyhow.. to end my rambling, very happy with the purchase (as non gadgety as speakers are) and now it’s only a matter of them lasting as long as the Klipsch did! Will try games and movies soon.

Wow… let’s hope I finish posting this Europe trip blog before I start with Asia…

December 30, 2010
We had a super early start this morning because we have a lot of ground to cover – probably the worst part of highway driving for this trip, as we head up and over the mountain towards the north where there were earlier reports of snowstorms and possible road closures. This is as far north as we’ll go in this entire trip, so if we survive driving through the snow/mountains (which was a real concern we had, that we would get stuck in the snow in the mountain with a stick shift) we should be fine for the rest of the trip from the snow. Our final destination for the day is Bordeaux, but in between the 7+ hours of driving needed to get there, we have a few stops along the Loire Valley to look at French castles, of which we settled on the largest Chateau Chambord, and the unique looking Chateau Chaumont. Both castles appear very photogenic in our online image searches, so those were our top picks amongst the many Loire Valley castles.

We left the hotel just past 8am, where we intended to get breakfast at the Subway (yes they exist in Europe too!) next to the hotel, but unfortunately the Subway doesn’t open until 9am. So we decided to skip breakfast and start driving north towards the castles. The drive was quite treacherous as it just rained and the fog hasn’t cleared, so the roads were wet and visibility was super low. After driving for 1.5 hours, we arrived at Chaumont, only to find it wasn’t the correct Chaumont… sigh navigation fail! poor driver :P. At this point I was so hungry so I decided to eat my leftover sandwich in the car from the day before. After driving for another 1.5 hour or so, I started to get this headache which I thought was from this early “intensive” driving, so we changed drivers so I could take a nap in the backseat.

After 1 more hour of driving, we arrived at Chateau Chambord, but I was definitely feeling under the weather – with a headache and an upset stomach. But despite all that, there is a gigantic castle in front of me, but unfortunately parts of the exterior is under construction, including the moat, so we didn’t get the nice photo where the castle is reflected in full by the water in the moat :(. We went to grab lunch in the stores near the castle, but my stomach was so upset by this point I didn’t finish my food. Combined with my headache, I almost wanted to go back and stay in the car – but how can I miss out on this opportunity to see the largest castle in the Loire Valley!

Chateau Chambord features a double helix staircase (which was some ingenious design by the standards back then) that ascends to the exterior terrace on the 3rd floor rooftops. The castle was generally very cold (which doesn’t help my not-feeling-well-ness) and crowds huddle by the active fireplaces. The view was pretty nice and the castle featured some French historical exhibits, but I was definitely not in the mood to appreciate French culture and architecture at that point in time.

After Chateau Chambord, we drove to the real Chateau Chaumont – which requires a good 5 minute uphill walk to get to. In my condition then, I really didn’t think I could make it to the top when I feel like I could throw up any minute – but I toughed it out regardless and the castle is definitely more interesting looking than Chambord. I think the photos are better here just because there’s no construction ruining the sight :).

One thing I noticed across both castles is that while many rooms host historical exhibits, a fair amount of rooms (and there are plenty of empty rooms) are used as art exhibits to showcase art (there’s even a photo exhibit of Cambodia). There was even some post-apocalyptic art exhibit in Chaumont which was quite scary when you randomly stumble across it in a corner room.

After Chaumont, we hopped back into the car and started driving, with one short stop along the way at Blois, but at that point I was so tired and sick that I didn’t even bother getting out of the car. I napped the entire way to Bordeaux and when we arrived at the Hotel Restaurant Kyriad Bordeaux Lac (Kyriad is another big European hotel chain) I was completely passed out and struggling to stay on my feet as I checked in for our 1 room for 4 people for 2 nights. The room ended up being a room with a ladder up to a loft and contains 4 twin size beds. The room was incredibly small and we barely had room to maneuver with everyone and their luggage. After settling in, I picked the bed downstairs next to the bathroom and showered and went to bed, foregoing dinner. The 3 of them left for dinner somewhere and I was already passed out by the time they got back.

The reason I picked the bed closest to the bathroom was because I knew I had an upset stomach and needed quick access to the bathroom – and this proved to be a wise choice as around 12:30am, I woke up feeling queasy and ended up making my way to the bathroom (like 5 steps away) to throw up all the contents in my stomach into the sink. (I even managed to close the door before throwing up, but I think I woke up everyone else regardless). Good thing I found the sink in time before I threw up – otherwise cleanup would be quite an unpleasant experience (the toilet would be a better choice, but sink wasn’t too bad). I felt much better after throwing everything up, and was convinced it must be mild food poisoning from eating that sandwich earlier in the day. Lesson learned – be more careful of what you eat while traveling!

Feeling dehydrated and with a mild headache still, I went back to sleep praying that I’d be fit enough to sightsee Bordeaux tomorrow, and would make it back home without dying in Europe O_O.

I walked into this musical with high expectations, and it surprisingly did not disappoint. Some background – Next to Normal deals with the subject of the effect bipolar disorder has on one’s family, so it is definitely a heavier subject matter. It won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2009 Tony Awards for Best Original Score, Best Orchestration and Best Lead Actress – making it one of the rare few to get both Pulitzer and Tony awards. To set the bar for comparison, Rent was the last musical to get this achievement. Did I also mention, Michael Greif, who directed Rent, also directed this musical? The composers (music, lyrics and book) actually came from Issaquah, WA, which is one of the suburbs of Seattle – so there was definitely a lot of excitement when Next to Normal made it big out east on Broadway (it did lose Best Musical in 2009 to Billy Elliot, which I’ll be catching in April).

I don’t want to give away the plot in case you do catch it (and I strongly recommend you do, the US tour ends in Toronto in June 2011), the plot is straightforward and easy to understand, so please do NOT pre-study this musical as it will ruin the surprises and affect the overall experience.

The stage design is reminiscent of Rent (definitely has the fingerprints of Michael Greif’s direction) – the orchestra is all on stage, and intriguingly they are split up on the left side and right side. Stylistically it is not rock like Rent, but it is not traditional classical like Wicked either… in fact, if I were to describe the orchestration, I’d say it is like… worship team style 😐 It basically consists of a 4 piece band (keys, drums, a/e-guitar, bass) and some strings (think 1 violin, and the bassist switches to cello/double bass at times). So the instrumentation is very much broken down (which seems to be the modern thing to do as it keeps production costs low) but it does not take away from the musical at all. The stage is divided into 3 levels, much like a house with the walls taken out, which reminds me of August: Osage County. I commented before the show started that this setup is more common for plays than in musicals, because they can do scene transitions easily by moving the spotlight between levels while the other floors are getting setup, but this is less of an issue for scene changes as they can tide it over with a song. To my surprise, Next to Normal uses the multi-floor setup brilliantly to do a lot of parallel movement across levels, notably “Why Stay?/A Promise” when the daughter/boyfriend and husband/wife sings the same song across different levels and expands on two different relationships at the same time.

I generally liked Act 2 more than Act 1 (though fellow musical goers disagree on this one) because Act 2 has the hallmarks of what any amazing musical should have – it reprises a LOT of musical themes from Act 1, and brings them back with different meaning because of the plot (much like Wicked’s “I’m not that girl”). The musical structure is very tight as there are a lot of overlapping vocal parts, but not to an extent that it gets confusing as to what is going on. I was a little concerned as to whether they would drag out the ending, but I think looking back the musical ended at the right spot as it built up to the grand finale necessary to close off a musical.

The musical also contains a few references and allusions – the ones I caught were quotes from Catcher in the Rye, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and “My Favorite Things” from The Sound of Music.

Next to Normal also has a few memorable, catchy numbers that I can hum to as I exit the theater. The only downside is because the subject matter is so serious, the songs are hardly reusable in everyday life (unlike Rent’s “Seasons of Love” or Wicked’s “Defying Gravity”) – thought I suspect if I were to let the experience settle and if I study the soundtrack more, I’ll find good use of their songs. This is the tiny ding to the musical for me – hopefully one that will get fixed over time :). For this reason I’d rate this musical a 4.9, if that’s at all possible… but for all practical purposes it is a 5-star musical for me, joining in the ranks of Rent and Wicked (finally!)

One parting note – instead of getting Alice Ripley (the Tony winning lead actress) I got the understudy Pearl Sun, which could have been a blessing in disguise. Checking out youtube clips, Alice Ripley definitely is a stronger actor, but apparently she has been suffering from vocal issues on this tour and can get quite pitchy and raspy, as reported by other reviewers. The understudy (or standby for this role) did a great job with the vocals – although being Asian, there’s that advantage of looking younger than your age which worked against her in this case as it made her role as a mom less convincing for me.