An Interview With John Grado - Page 10

Hi Guys,

I reread my review and I realized I did leave out some things from my notes, namely the Alessandro stuff. I'll include it in the write-up later tonight but in short, George Alessandro is a friend and he had a little business in the works and wanted to include some headphones that could be offered to the pro market. He asked John if Grado could make these for him. After discussing the sound he wanted (more analytical, akin to HP-1000's) John went out to make them. Interestingly, they are not made "from" a given model. That is, though the MS-Pro's share a body with the RS-1's, that is about it. They are built from the ground up as something different and not just a tweaked RS-1. Same for the MS-2's and MS-1's. So what model are the MS-1's made after? Same answer, no phone. They are a unique product that simply resembles the lower Prestige models. What is specifically different between the Alessandro and Grado models? Well besides the sound...John wouldn't reveal. It is an Alessandro product, same as the PS-1 deal and he feels it would not be prudent to reveal the differences.

As for the tiny model disc that Grado uses but that are absent from the Alessandro and PS-1's, they make no difference to the sound. The reason they are absent is because of cost. Grado uses them as model distinguishers, since the Alessandro phones and the PS-1's don't really require them, it was a way to lower build time and cost. Those little discs are difficult enough to produce and take time to put on each phone.

As for what is built in house, everything save for the cables which comes from overseas and the wood from New Hampshire. All the plastic cups are in house, the driveres, metal work, plastic work, headbands, all in house.

I didn't "polish" the writeup, I figured I could do a decent job with a first run-through and then work from there afterwords with the feedback from the members. I'll be sure to include the things I missed of course.

The one thing I wanted to emphasize is that I think John is a great man who thinks of his family first, then the music, then the products. Regarding production, if he can't get that Grado sound, he won't release a product. He has standards and is not willing to compromise. That means integrity which is sadly lacking today.

As for the "fun" sound of Grados, though John has that as a main attraction, he of course lists transparency, resolution, dynamics etc etc as other main features of the Grado sound. A full description of the sound can be found on his website.

Perhaps as I have more time (I have some time off at the end of August) I can elaborate on this document and kinda do an all encompassing Grado writeup which includes the complete product lines and an indepth history (from what I can take from the site and review articles). We could make this a collaborative effort and provide this as an archetype for other companies perhaps? Anyway, musings on my part.

RobN addressed this somewhat with his SME remark. The SME V arm is still state of the art and is rarely if ever matched. It does some things other tone arms still can't do. It is also 20 years old. New does not always equate to better.

John sees producing new products as a means to increase profits. I tried to convey that his main goal was not to become filthy rich but to do well, maintain a strong foothold in the world of hi-fi and to ensure his products maintain a quality standard he is proud of while producing a sound he wants to be known and remember by. If he were to continuously produce new products, he would be working ALL the time. Because his company is now doing well, he feels it is his time to relax a bit and enjoy this success by spending more time with his family and watching his sons grow. If his company took a turn for the worse, he would at that time burn the midnight oil, as he did when he took over the company. In the beginning he requested that the accountant not pay him a salary at all. That meant, he would only get paid of the company did well. This went on for 3 years. During those years, things were very tight, there was a lot of stress and John spent much of his time designing, testing building and then releasing new products. This turned out to be a success and now he has a solid company with excellent profits. Think...with his current product lines, his company is having the best year ever! Why tinker with something that works?

Though headphones have not advanced as much as his carts (he has recently come out with low output wood-bodied carts as the Statement line) he doesn't need to to keep sales high. Other companies do need to do that. As for new technology, I doubt there has been much advancement in headphone or speaker technology that would bowl people over. Take the Stax Lambdas. Some feel they are nearly equal to the Omega II's. I believe the Lambdas are nearing 30 years old of not already

OF course, Grado is an innovator of technology, so if we want headphones to advance, John and his team will have to go out and make it happen, but for now, the RS-1's do what he wants them to do. Remember, there are more than a few here who think the PS-1's were not an improvement over the RS-1's, some think sidestep, others think step backwards. The HP-1000's were made for a different market that John is not necessarily refusing but it was not his original target. In fact, after all my time with the best of the best, save for HE90's, L3000's, K1000's and the Qualias, I still feel the RS-1's are among the best if not the best in certain areas. Considering how many dislike the Qualias compared to the R10's, again, new does not mean better and higher tech can sometimes take away from the sound.