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Its midrange was a simple continuation of the frequency range without emphasis or reticence. It reminded me much of the Polish Silvers but those tube amps were even more resolved to bring the midrange more to the front. This specific range sounded best with the Reimyo yet the Luxman too renders it incredibly full. The Glory did not slim down or emphasize here but the resolution of this range was a tad lower. The Krell for example is less saturated than the Sovereign while the latter guarantees a better flow of information and emotions due to its splendid continuity. Rhythm is almost ideal here, almost as good as the EVO402 - simply outstanding. Here the Luxman was slower to remind me of the Krell in whose review I described the Japanese’s mid bass as slightly colored to gently round over the attacks.


But we should not make the mistake of putting the Glory in one drawer with all the ‘consumptive’ devices. Vocals like Sinatra’s, from the fantastic re-edition of My Way prepared by the Sinatra Society of Japan, was full and slightly warm just as recorded (at least I think so). The same was the case with Chris Connor whose voice on I Miss You was centrally placed on stage. This mono recording makes the singer most important but it could be heard that this was recorded and mixed accordingly, that the vocals were not louder than the big band but the choice of the recording engineer. Both voices were full and strong but Chris had a mike with lesser quality on him which somewhat emphasized the upper midrange to underline the throaty aspects of his singing.


The cleanness of the sound was impressive. I’ll repeat that only the Silver Grand Monos and to some extent the Krell were similar and only the Polish amplifiers better at least from amongst the machines I heard at home. I could confirm that the Sovereign does not dry anything out with two ultra-purist discs, Heartplay between Charlie Haden and Antonio Forcione and Salzau Music On The Water with Danielsson, Dell and Landgren. Those were reproduced with passion and emphasis as I would not expect from a solid-state amplifier. Saturation had a different structure than over tubes and differed also from the Accuphase P-7100 by not being a constant. The Glory differentiated timbres splendidly and refused to render everything in the same ‘pleasing’ way.

With less well recorded discs like De Vision and Diary of Dreams, their lack of bass foundation telegraphed immediately. This amplifier did not try to improve them as sometimes happens with my Luxman.


Because it is enough to round off the hoarse midrange and slightly underline the midbass, the sound despite obvious flaws is 'better' and everything flows nicer.

Frankly, in most cases this repairing action is quite desirable and in the lower price ranges even required or most discs would be less listenable. But the best machines—and the Sovereign is on the verge of this exclusive group whose members number less than 10—do it differently. They just show reality as it is. If there is little bass, then there is little, if the treble is sharp then it is sharp. But if such truth sayers are really remarkable (plain neutrality can sometimes already be found in components for about 5000z) they go a step further with an inclination towards music. The flaws and errors of the signal are then something which sits besides the music or many times even behind it. Those two planes interact and the recording is the same - but not identical. This can be heard easily on turntables. Tracking noise, clicks, pops and distortion resulting from tracking error are obvious in good turntables. But it is enough to hear the first few notes of music to overshadow them as something that accompanies rather than leads. This is exactly what I am talking about here.


I will be short about the bass. It reaches lower than my Luxman and although it is not as fiercely atomic and brilliantly controlled as with the Krell, it still sits at an exceptionally high level. The timbre of this range is also very good even though slightly more saturated bass comes by way of the Luxman and Accuphase. Yet none of those show the sub-bass passages of electronica with such ease and naturalness (I exaggerate a little, I refer to the 20-30Hz range but this describes the impression very well). Despite this, infrasonics remain agile and hellishly rhythmic. When the piano player hits a chord with his left, it is really reproduced in one single moment without splintering apart into separate sounds. When a good big band as on the Sinatra disc directed by Don Costa swings, it is classy swing, not a fireman party. The midbass is slightly drier here that with my amplifier or the ASR Emitter II but this is probably the price to pay.


This is a fantastically built, hellaciously honest amplifier which needs no improvements. Is it better than my Luxman M-800A which costs about same? In some aspects - yes. Must I trade now? Rather not. The differences are not systemic but occur within the same paradigm. Something is better here to compel me stating that the Glory is the better amplifier. Yet I do not feel forced to make a change. For that I’d need to encounter an amplifier that’s a whole class better. On the other hand, the Luxman is the best amplifier up to 50000zl—at least it was—from all solid state amps I’ve heard and, with some exceptions, also the tubed challengers. To me, this makes the Sovereign special. Here is an amplifier which harnesses the power of transistors without introducing any annoying artifacts. This should be especially appreciated and I am doing that now, precisely.
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