Berlin-based Lex Barkey is among the most successful music creators in Germany, with numerous awards to his name. He has been refining pop, dance and hip-hop production through projects with chart topping artists like German DJ Felix Jaehn, with projects increasingly coming in from the US.
After extensive testing, Barkey chose a pair of PSI Audio A21-M as his monitors. ‘I have tried so many set-ups, but nothing sounds like the PSI Audio speakers,’ he says.
New monitors were part of the relocation of his studio: ‘I put some serious effort into the new room concerning acoustics,’ he recounts. ‘I was actually fairly happy with my former speakers, but they were amateur level and I figured it was time to move a step forward. Some monitors colour the sound and make everything sound great,’ he says. ‘You cannot work on such speakers, they will not show you flaws.’
Of all the speakers on trial, Swiss company PSI Audio’s A21-M stood out. Barkey: ‘At first I could hardly comprehend what I heard. These speakers are so detailed, so accurate.’
The monitors never left the studio, and were subsequently involved in hit singles and chart success records. Barkey is particularly pleased at how easy they are on the ears even in long listening sessions. ‘They do not sound awful, they just unveil each and every flaw in a mix, but they do so in a very gentle way. And I love them for that,’ he says. ‘I had 18-hour days when a project was due, and it still worked.
‘Before, I used to work in a band in the highs. Like between 10kHz and 12kHz, for example, or between 8kHz and 10kHz. Suddenly, I would arrive at 11.3kHz, and even 11.2kHz would sound wrong.’
‘That wonderfully wide sweet spot’ is also valuable in situations where using outboard gear means moving around the studio. ‘You might lean over the desk, and with my former speakers, the sound would then change considerably,’ Barkey reports. ‘With the A21-M, I can walk around in circles and have the same sound everywhere.
