monitor sized speaker
all the audiophile tricks
rock the house
without bleeding my ears
that live feeling
You are describing my Green Mountain Audio Europas. They were the first time- and phase-coherent speaker I ever heard, and also the first to properly recreate an intangible "something" from live shows that I hadn't heard any other speaker do. They have surprisingly little dynamic compression, and they get plenty loud for the hard rock/metal/hard electronic music I often listen to. They pull off the counter-intuitive trick of revealing many recording flaws, while NOT making those flaws intolerable to listen to. They also were the first speaker I ever heard properly reproduce the comb filtering of a distorting multidriver guitar amp.
Unfortunately, the Europa is no longer made, although it will occasionally show up for sale on Agon. GMA is currently making other speakers in your price range, however, all of which share the same time- and phase-coherent design principles of the Europa.
As good as the Europa is, adding a subwoofer to fill out the lower frequency range was still a significant benefit. Unless you're listening in a very small room, I'd recommend that at least demoing a subwoofer in your setup to see how you like it.
www.greenmountainaudio.com
