What are the most important audio firms you already know, and the place do they produce audio system and headphones? Bose manufactures in Mexico; Sony, throughout Asia; and Sonos, in Malaysia. The actuality is a lot of the audio firms you’re accustomed to, American-based or in any other case, don’t manufacture within the States. Why? It’s actually costly.

There are American-made audio manufacturers, although — lots of them. They simply don’t mass-produce merchandise. Instead, these firms give attention to high-end audio gear that strikes a chord with the audiophile neighborhood.

“It doesn’t matter the place you make one thing whether it is stamped out by a machine,” says Neil Patel, president of Colorado’s Avalon Acoustics, which places out a number of the world’s costliest loudspeakers. “When your creations are handcrafted, the designers and builders turn into critically essential.”

Check out a few of our favourite firms making a number of the most interesting audio merchandise on the planet — and doing so stateside.

YG Acoustics

Lee Shelly

• Location: Denver, Colorado
• Founded: 2002

For the previous 20 years, YG Acoustics has specialised in extraordinarily high-end floor-standing audio system that reproduce the “being there” live performance expertise. Its audio system aren’t tuned or artificially manipulated in any approach. Instead, they “merely convey the recording – nothing extra, nothing much less,” based on Yoav Geva, president of YG Acoustics. “As such, they work with any kind of music, and actually, many different audio producers have bought YG Acoustics audio system to make use of as their reference when testing different gear.” (Fun truth: one pair of YG Acoustics’s flagships audio system, named Sonja, can go for over $100,000.)

Grado Labs

Grado Labs

• Location: Brooklyn, New York
• Founded: 1953

The third-generation family-owned firm is finest recognized for its flagship pair of hi-fi headphones, the PS1000. All its headphones are made in Brooklyn with the identical meticulous craftsmanship present in high-end watchmakers. “Our headphones are utilized by a whole lot of recording engineers as a result of we construct Grados to precisely reproduce what’s within the recording,” says John Grado, proprietor and CEO of Grado Labs. “We really feel if somebody desires to listen to what the recording engineer heard and recorded, our headphones are right for all genres of music.”

McIntosh

McIntosh

• Location: Binghamton, New York
• Founded: 1949

McIntosh is synonymous with hi-fi all the things: wi-fi audio system, amplifiers, receivers, headphones and turntables. And it’s all meant to final. “It’s not remarkable for a few of our merchandise from 40-plus years in the past to nonetheless be used at this time with little or no service work carried out on them,” says Charlie Randall, president and CEO of McIntosh. “Our merchandise are sometimes handled as household heirlooms and are handed down from one technology to the subsequent.”

Klipsch

Klipsch

• Location: Hope, Arkansas
• Founded: 1946

Klipsch has specialised in dwelling {and professional} audio methods since 1946. Its Reference and Heritage line audio system, together with the Heresy IVs pictured on the high this story, are recognized for prime effectivity and low distortion — and for being actually loud. “The Klipsch signature sound is just not ‘tuned’ for American music,” says Mark Casavant, Klipsch’s SVP of worldwide model and enterprise improvement. “Our audio system are voiced for all genres of music — for a impartial, but dynamic accuracy in sound replica. Our aim is a pure sound that strikes the listener emotionally.”

Avalon Acoustics

Avalon Acoustics

• Location: Boulder, Colorado
• Founded: 1989

“Avalon Acoustics’s clientele are hardly ever freshmen: they’re refined and cultivated music lovers looking for the purity and reality of the unique performances they know so nicely,” says Neil Patel, CEO, designer and president of Avalon Acoustics. The Rocky Mountain–primarily based audio firm crafts modern and design-focused loudspeakers, a few of which command a couple of grand, whereas others are among the many costliest audio system on the planet. But, as Patel explains, you’re paying for “an unsurpassed musical expertise.”

Andover Audio

Andover Audio

• Location: Andover, Massachusetts
• Founded: 2012

Andover Audio focuses on high-end all-in-one turntables. Traditionally, these plug-and-play machines — the turntable, amplifier, preamplifier and audio system are constructed into the identical field — are low-cost and frowned upon by audiophiles as a result of their pure design results in distortion. However, Andover Audio’s fashions are built-in with its patent-pending “Isogroove” expertise that drastically reduces distortion-causing vibrations. The result’s the Andover One, a $2,000 all-in-one turntable that sounds nearly as good because it seems to be.

Zu Audio

Zu Audio

• Location: Ogden, Utah
• Founded: 2000

Zu Audio’s headquarters might be discovered about 40 miles north of Salt Lake City. The firm focuses on fantastically designed full-range single-driver loudspeakers which are pretty straightforward to drive however, as GP famous in a narrative about US-made passive audio system, “your selection of solid-state, tubes, or class D amplification could have a major influence on the ultimate sound.” Zu’s loudspeaker line ranges from bookshelf-sized to floorstanders. All have picket cupboards and are made within the USA.

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