I was a Klipsch dealer for some time but when the reference premier series came out I was always disappointing with their sound - compared to the original Reference Series products and prior. Even the in-ceiling speakers didn't sound as good as other options I used (sonance, Monitor audio, KEF).

i still love the heritage line but those are for more specific applications - I have a pair of circa 88' Chorus Towers on a McIntosh receiver that is incredible sounding.

Maybe your hearing just got better and you finally hear how over rated they are. Those horn tweeeters are ok for rock and metal music, but I never liked them for other music.

Klipsch were always impressive sounding speakers.

The thing is, live music sounds like live music, but it doesn't sound like impressive speakers. Accurate speakers sound wonderful and are easy to live with, but it's easy to get tired of "impressive" speakers.

This is to say, yeah, what Fins says.

Driving most any pair of speakers with a McIntosh amp will give pretty swell results...

While some people love them, I've never enjoyed horn drivers in the home. But, they are great in large venues.

We took over a large, partially complete project for a doctor's estate. He had a workout room about the size of a small health club. We did not spec any of the equipment and had no appreciation for his idea of "loud" until the first weekend -- he blew out all of the tweeters! We added a couple of subwoofers and the speaker manufacturer added some tweeter protection. Shortly thereafter, there was a divorce, he moved out, and the gym was downsized. Most of the gym system ended up in a basement exercise room and we could achieve much higher levels in the smaller room, but it never "sounded right" to him. A year later he moved and we were much smarter. It turned out that he was a huge disco fan and hung out in clubs that played electronic pop. We used the gym speakers in the bedroom and they sounded fine. In the new exercise room we used some EV (horn tweeter and mid) sound re-enforcement speakers -- they had that "club" sound, and he loved them.

I thought that they were screechy and ugly sounding. Wimp that I am, I always wore earplugs when he was operating the system. I can't imagine that he can still hear.

I agree with Fred. The Mac amplifiers tend to be mellow sounding and mute that horn tweeter "edge" a bit.

Side note: at the venue I do sound for, I have a bowl of disposable earphones at the front desk available if I know the band is going to be loud.....

Fred,

Do you have a significant number of people who use these earplugs? Or, are the men too macho? Is there a difference between men and women taking advantage of your offer? Do you think that many people know the risk that they are taking by ignoring the earplugs?

I have wondered about Klipsch. They took Energy, a fine Canadian maker of floorstanding and bookshelf speakers, and discontinued all their good stuff, and started producing I don’t know what.

Unfortunately they destroyed the Energy line, pissed me off. They were a fantastic bang for the buck line.
Klipsch speakers have always sounded very shrill and glaring, sound fatigue to the max, but they sound so much better when you use the copper tinted plastic!

Klipsch has been owned by VOXX International for awhile now. Yes, the same company that owns Audiovox.

That is why all the good stuff that Klipsch made has gone away. And any new stuff has been crap.
I wouldn't touch Klipsch with a 10ft pole. And I never really liked any of their stuff anyway, so it was not a loss for me when they went down the tubes.

I will be the voice of opposition here...
Klipsch are selling more kit and making more money - so someone likes them.
They have been marketing their products based on their Heritage line, not exactly a big seller in the CI space.
They certainly polarise, but if you're putting another soft-domed floor-stander into the market, then there's a good chance you'll be forgotten about. Whereas a horn loaded speaker will sound big and bold... add in copper coloured drivers and you'll get noticed.

PlayFi is the wrong path for them to head down, their SkyHook in-ceiling/in-walls look interesting though.

If any fans interested, I have a signed 8x11 photo of Paul Klipsch and a coffee mug with phrase stolen from Paul Klipsch. All from late 80’s. Might have been early nineties. Met him in Las Vegas at the show. Those were fun times. Anyone been to the Polk Dinner?

People buy Bose too. That just means they have good marketing

Use to install a ton of it, but they seem to be bypassing the CI channel and resorting to weekly sales and internet promotions. Hard keep up with all the special offers and sales.

Most recently, we have had commercial jobs get delayed due to back-orders and long lead times on 70V product. I HATE change, but we have been pushed to the point of making a move.

Paul Klipsch designed his speakers to be used with the amplifiers of the day, which used tubes for the output and with a tube amp, they usually sound better. I received a call from someone asking if I could look at his Hearsay speakers (Heresy) and I used an RTA app to check the response- matched the spec sheet very well, at 30Hz-16.5KHz +/-3dB. They sounded fine with old Jazz and Classical but I always hated them for anything else.