I think imperfect rooms and/or setup may be undermining what you're hearing, and maybe the Blade's opposing, side-firing woofers may have been helping them couple better to the room.
I have two potential suggestions. One is to go to a dealer that employs some kind of room/speaker correction technology (i.e. Lyngdorf, etc.) to see if that does it for you. Lots of folks here are praising what the Lyngdorf integrateds are doing in their systems. The other thought is -- if you haven't already -- to go listen to some time- and phase-coherent speakers (i.e. Vandersteen) to see if that clicks for you. Past that, Brit speakers like ATC, Linn, etc. tend to be PRaT focused so they might have something to offer too. That's all I got. Best of luck.