Retro And Fun JBL L100 Classic Loudspeakers At Audio T Cheltenham

Originally introduced in the Summer of 1970 the L100 was conceived as the domestic version of the L4310 Professional Studio Monitor and it soon became JBL’s biggest seller.

This new JBL L100 Classic looks very similar and indeed keeps the original styling with the distinctive Quadrex grille foam, but the boffins at JBL have done a turbo on basically everything to put this new version in the mix with the very best.

Thicker cabinets with better bracing than the original models and a brand new and bang up to date complement of top notch drive units to include a 1” titanium dome tweeter with soft surround and acoustic lens wave guide, a 5” Pure-Pulp cone mid range drive unit and a monster 12” cast frame White Pure-Pulp bass unit all in a bass reflex enclosure weighing a very chunky 27kg each and tuned via a single front firing port. The front panel also has high and mid-range L-Pad adjusters. These may come in useful for a little fine tweaking work depending on personal tastes and speaker positioning but we used them set to their flat position.

Now in this day and age where the majority of fashionable loudspeakers tend to be tall and slim and come in all sorts of shiny piano lacquers, these JBL’s are quite a lot wider than they are deep, making them about as trendy as professing to be a Marillion fan. But then what do the fashionistas know about good taste anyhow. By dismissing Marillion they would be missing out on some of the loveliest music produced by a band in recent times and by dismissing these JBL’s they would be missing a loudspeaker that is loaded with fun. Accurate? …… Possibly not as accurate as the B&W’s, KEF’s and many others I could mention, but who cares about accurate when you can have this much fun? They are wonderfully animated with amazing dynamics and a real and palpable sense of authority. I played the track Eyes Of The World from the new live Grateful Dead album Saint Of Circumstance and they were digging out the most joyous of basslines and made the whole song take off within a soundstage bigger than most speakers can only dream of.

This album really gives those 12 inch pulp drivers a work out!

Prospective purchasers have the choice of walnut , walnut or walnut for the cabinet finishes but then you can choose between orange, blue or black for the grille foam colour to complete that real retro look.

They proved very easy to accommodate position wise in our demo room on the supplied JBL stands, which gets the speaker up off the ground and angles it back slightly. This helps with the time alignment of the mid and high frequencies, which will manifest itself as an improvement in clarity and detail. We had them working really well about 50 cm away from the rear wall and angled in slightly.

They proved to be a very moreish listen, making us want to try lots of music of many different genres one after another and they were not fazed by any of them. If you are into something that goes against the grain a little and offers up a charismatic alternative to many of today’s samey and some would say, boring speaker designs then give us a call and bring in a pile of your favourite music and have some fun……..we do! We also make great cup of tea or coffee and have some nice biscuits too!

Thanks lots for reading, Andy, Jon and Farid.

The JBL L100 Classic loudspeakers are only available at Audio T Cheltenham