Howay The Tweaks!
The term ‘Tweak’ is the opposite of ‘Boomer’ and neither is a pejorative. I love the happy lunacy of bass for its own sake. The rippling of Tarmac and the shaking of windows. I also revere the purity and detail or real HiFi and yet have never felt that a wheel at each corner of your listening room should mean that all the equipment is by definition not HiFi.
However, for many years I had to be a lone voice in the HiFi magazine wilderness occasionally flinging a fine audio car into the likes of Home Cinema Choice (John Robinson got sent a THX jacket by George Lucas himself after reading about his THX Scorp’ in HCC. I was terrified and went back to check I hadn’t written anything silly, which speaks only of a guilty fearful conscience.) and once notably getting a whole supplement of pukka audio in cars attached to the illustrious organ that is HiFi News.
Clearly, this is also an issue for certain makers of fine car audio kit too. Just check out the review of the importado Clarion HXD2.
Also, there’s the Micro-Dynamics fettled Alpine F#1 Status system that is only sold through a very small dealer base and is all about hand-matching every component.
For Pioneer, their top end is a special place too and their most outrageous fabulously engineered line is called Optical Digital Reference or ODR for short. It has been around for some years now but in recent times it has become even more rarefied and fabulous. Each Japanese brand of any note does tend to have an Uber-level of equipment that even goes by another branding in their own home market.
For Clarion, it was called Addzest in Japan (and the range included that 32 inch woofer that was called ThunderDome in the UK. It needed a box the size of a shed.) For Pioneer it was always called Carrozzeria. For this ultimate layer of top end, they call it CarrozzeriaX. And there in a special glistening cabinet in Turner’s posh showroom among the speakers and amps and stuff that comprise the ODR line, is a single Japanese pass lanyard that has the Nipponese branding upon it. It’s clearly as revered as the kit itself!
ODR is badass. I recall being on Jeremy Vine’s BBC Radio Two show recently and when asked about how expensive in car equipment can get, I went, ‘Oh Wow, Pioneer ODR.’ Then, realising I was on the BBC and so shouldn’t be waxing lyrical about any one brand, kind of back-pedalled and finished a bit wetly. They do want me back to do a thing with a mad boom car though. I reckon I should get them to listen to Mark’s as well, since they are all BBC types. It’s well known in speaker manufacturing circles that getting your product approved and sold to the BBC is a top accolade of neutrality and cleanliness of sound. So any opinions of quality from a BBC engineer or broadcaster are coming from a cool place.
Mark did in fact agree to put in some serious driving hours and come and be on the wireless down south if it comes off but that’s another story. What was going on was an open weekend at the shop with discounts published via their website link and an invitation to all to come and swag a free barbecue and see a bunch of wicked demo cars and check out the EMMA sound off. The barbie food was courtesy of a local specialist butcher’s and was handsome. Ground Beef burgers, seriously high meat sausages and thick bacon for breakfast. YUM!
The European Mobile Media Association ran both a sound quality and an SPL or Sound Pressure Level (loudness) competition. All possible due to Turner’s out of town industrial estate location (well next to ASDA’s store, so easy peasy to find) which meant LOTS of parking and free space for the likes of the DurhamDubs.co.uk car club to come visit.
Demo cars and staff were present in force from Pioneer, which is entirely appropriate as Turners are the UK embodiment of the successful Team Pioneer. Pioneer work with Turners in helping get them to the far flung European shows like Sinsheim to represent the UK. Their CAI link to 600 carats installed pick up truck was rocking, all packed with the new 2008 equipment and had two Pioneer CD scratching decks plus DJ mixer mounted on the tailgate which was being tickled throughout by their DJ Toby ‘Tache’ Norton (who’s day job is an ASM for Pioneer.) Girish Janday (thass’ pronounced with a silent first ‘I’ by the way) and Richie Fontaine were in charge of the Pioneer Car Audio Innovations Audi and giving away tee shirts and the totally cooltastic ‘Bling’ pendants. Talk about a gently self-aware irony the Americans just mightn’t get that joke.
Four Masters were there, as were folks from BBG and Vibe. The lovely Vibe R8 was present and also the Vibe Astra VXR, which dropped some 150.4dB with the doors shut and 151.7dB with them open in the ESPL tussle. The EMMA SPL thing is all about how loud musical cars go, rather than tending towards the dragster. Just like in the metal, the maddest needle nose parachute-equipped cars are the most out-and-out bonkers exciting but the guy I envy is the mad street legal car. He gets to drive his home instead of towing it. Likewise, I recall an American guy called Bill Proud first anywhere to have a 160dB car that could also play music and drive and stuff. It was done with Cerwin Vega Strokers. So an EMMA SPL car has to play full range not just bass alone.
And that’s what ESPL is about it’s a combination of your brute (full range) loudness and an element of your installation’s safety and integrity. Thus, despite not being the loudest (although it was over the Holy Grail figure of 150 decibels after taking Axis Chris Woods’ advice as to how to rebuild his box) the newly improved red Astra Merit works van of Nick Coles took a first place.
Mark Turner’s passion, however, is detail, speed and fidelity. I was a live sound engineer and the first thing you do with any musician is suss their urge and flavour of sound and then try to deliver it. Sounds odd. It ain’t think Lovers Rock (that’s a slow kind of reggae for the ig’nant) or hard rock. I got to sit in his BMW at one point over the weekend and Mark played me some stuff. His choices of tracks revealed him to be a true detail hound. He loves the delicacy of gentle percussion. The gentle sexy mouth sounds of a close miked diva and superb imagery give him most pleasure.
Incidentally some bits he chose were from my fave disc of the moment Spirit of Sound #6 from Focal and it turns out that the disc is also getting a bit culty out on the Talk Audio forums. (#7 is out soon, I gather.) BBG’s John Griggs had it playing from his demo car and one of the competitors told me how badly he wanted a copy. The lovely Mr. Griggs let him have his one. Then he put one of the North East’s favourite son’s recordings on. Roy ‘Chubby’ Brown. So happily profane he is utterly unbroadcastable. It was very clear.
Amongst the competitors was a complete lifer of a bloke called Ian Edgar who impressed me as much as Bob Flynn (with the immaculate Mercedes Sprinter, who I met at Auto Audio) who was there with his works wagon, a Renault Traffic. Absolutely spotless inside and out, he is an early-rising newsagent and had a row of four RE SE12 woofers at the top of his roofline in the back, with clear windows in the boxes. The legend, ‘Built, Not Bought’ is sign written on the back of the box. He’s rightly proud of a kicking job well done. He features a bit in the video walkthrough below.
http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-3913746381435010385
The whole event had a relaxed air, with Mark’s now mostly retired dad John being in attendance and managing to make a Pioneer tee-shirt look smart under a casual jacket. The whole team is well picked and are nice guys. Ken Robinson is their front of house guy, with Steve Hanlon and David Llewellyn the backroom geniuses to Mark’s Yoda-esque expertise. They sell a selection of high end stuff at Turners. The Pioneer and Alpine top end, as well as Clarion, Sony, JVC and Eclipse. Amps from the likes of Hertz, Audison, Tru Technologies, Vibe and Rainbow, with speakers from Morel and CDT. IN these days of drop-shipping and just in time delivery, It’s pretty certain that whatever your mobile electronics hearts desire may be, Turners could get it but they tend to hold the fine kit in stock.
Started thirty three years ago by dad John Turner, his son Mark came to work with them some sixteen years ago. Mark’s sound off success rolll of honour reads like something out of Captain Kirk’s medal list.
Suffice it to say that when I asked him exactly how many trophies he had, he related that Team Turners had over the years garnered over 500 trophies and when I asked how many were just his, said, ‘I’ve got so manythere’s a seven footer over there!’
There was even one being used as a doorstop.
Top Event, top people, top cars. I had a ball and want to offer up a huge Talk Audio thank you to Turners and to EMMA for extending the invitation and letting me loose with the microphone to do the SPL competition as spectator sport. Here’s to the next one!
Turners 0191 521 2901
And here’s where to click to see a funky cool slideshow in the newly imported gallery system. We LOVE this!
link