With 18/30wpc into 8/4Ω, I was back on the parallel 300B SET beat, albeit with superior low-impedance stability which likely didn't even factor here. Just like perfect tripod focus with a superior lens for optimal depth of field, the sound locked in. It really did feel that the R25A was tailor-made for this type amplifier. To put it plain, it killed off any personal curiosity to stray and strap on 200 monaural watts. When everything meshes just so, it's like falling in love. You simply know. This was about bel canto as the elegiac element of on-the-breath song from even pure instrumentals. You've probably heard of the sighing Portuguese guitar popularized as a solo instrument by Carlos Paredes. That's an easy example. If we pick up on the earlier far spicier Khoury Project's Revelation, this organic aspect still parlayed, especially in the modal quarter-tone fiddling of Basil Khoury's violin. On the wrong system tuning played at live levels, it can approach the glassy and get – well, trying. Taming this shrew wasn't a function of soft treble. It was about a relaxed elastic midband and that tangible constant letting go of the notes. That more gushing than damped gestalt was the center around which I perceived the R25A sound to turn regardless of program material.

But like opera, it also could do dramatic to swell, crest and ride bigger waves. It could do rip-roaring Roadhouse swagger, swing and kicking stomp like the lengthy "Rod" of the World Quintet with the London Mozart Players and Herbert Grönemeyer. Even at 4:30 when the full band plus wailing brasses take up the concertized Klezmer theme, nothing came apart or lost its lunch. It simply scaled up in all its criss-crossing mayhem. The bass was fat, rotund and rumbling, not cyborg blasted or jack-hammer chiseled. The syncopated jive was jazzy loose, not counted-out rigid.

Here the rigid speaker cab school tends to differentiate out rhythm more down into its micro domain. The Living Voice captured more of the macro feel.

It's the difference between being fixated on individual beats (micro) or phrases made up of beat patterns (macro). That perspective isn't really covered by our standard audiophile vocabulary like micro dynamics (the small ripples of melodic emphasis or rhythmic accents) versus macro dynamics (the scope of difference between barely audible and the unleashed crescendi and climaxes). Just so, it's a valid position to feel and think oneself into. On the micro level, rhythm is julienned down into 16th notes. On the macro level, it's the bar-to-bar progression. With the R25A doing the latter, I saw it as an expression of the same less damped personality applied to the PRaT perception which is Brit speak for pace, rhythm and timing. With this speaker, I heard more swing, less rock. Or think of the offset between plucked upright and Marcus Miller-style popped e-bass. Like electronica and techno, the latter cracks harder. If your primary music diet features plenty of synth bass and drum-machine crunch, the R25A tuning will render it softer and less edgy than the ultra-damped attitude of an active Kii Three for example.

In conclusion, to represent the R25A with one legendary vocalist's personality versus another's, on the "Peace Wanted Just To Be Free" duet between Stevie Wonder and Luciano Pavarotti, the blind Soul maestro's freer phrasing, diction and intonation—neither crystallized by a life time of operatic training—represent the Living Voice. This goes to the heart of the speaker's special tuning. It makes for a very different discussion than focusing on sheer vocal range (bandwidth) or raw power (ultimate SPL potential) where Pavarotti and bigger loudspeakers would lead. Yet raw tech specs would miss what makes Kevin Scott's modest 25th Anniversary box stand out. In demonstrable fashion when preceded by aiding and abetting ancillaries like no-feedback triode-type amps, this smallest current Living Voice is a very soulful loudsinger not speaker. That's because no matter how eloquent, articulate and crisply enunciated, a speaking voice will always feel clipped compared to song. If that difference and these music examples convey to you a special appeal, the R25A will broadcast on your wavelength. Then you might do well to tune in when the opportunity presents itself; or set upon creating this bel canto opportunity deliberately by booking a first date.