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"So I've got this new preamp from YBA, wanna hear it?" "Uh, okay. When?" "Say 6 tonight?" "I'm 150 miles away, haven't bathed in a week and Red Bull owns my eyes, but, sure, I'll be there."
Glad I made the trip. YBA is "that French company" making a half dozen electronic lines and dominating the French audio scene. Once described to me as the French Linn, YBA is big stuff everywhere except here in the states where YBA is usually just a footnote, thrown at the end of lists of components like "oh yeah, I guess there's YBA."
So the preamp in question is the $5000 YBA Passion 400, the latest in a line of Passion progressions. Forget trying to figure out what's actually inside of these things, designer Yves-Bernard Andre is genuine quantum physicist, packing all kinds of weird tech in his products. Unlike other audio designers who bang the quantum drum, YBA doesn't really talk about what's inside, preferring that you "just listen to the damn thing you crazy audiophile" or however you say that in French.
The speakers for this little demo were the latest ATC Anniversary 50s, the $27k active, hyper detailed laser beams. If you've never had experience with ATCs or any detailed active speaker, know these guys eat preamps for lunch. People either love or hate ATC for brutally revealing everything in the food chain and requiring almost maniacal dedication in component matching. Bought a preamp without listening first? Have yourself a good cry and put it on the 'Gon.
But once you make the match, the heavens open and angles sing or, more accurately, your orifices pucker up like clams as you claw your chair and mutter obscenities. I've heard these ATCs with probably a good 8-10 mega buck preamps over the last few months and nothing even comes close to the YBA Passion 400. Yeah, Googling "how to sell your kidney" when I got back home.
So what gives? YBA is generally perceived as a warm and luscious, anything-but-accurate, bass-lite, tubish-meets-SS, crazy eccentric French brand. In the past, that was generally the case. The revised Passion, if seems, has bass, accuracy and dynamics to spare. It's just a different beast entirely, except for the crazy French eccentricities.
So one part ATC sword of Damocles, one part YBA Moulin Rouge, bring to a boil and you have a match made in heaven. Of course, two important questions were raised: first, what do the $7500 and $10000 Passion 600 and 1000 preamps bring to the table and, more importantly, will the far less expensive ATC active 10s or 20s (around $3000-6500) with YBA produce the same magic?
We may find out soon enough. But it's worth noting that YBA probably won't be oh-so dreamy with speakers and amps that have their own luscious sound. It just may be too much in one direction, hence much of the US audio scene's perception that YBA is way over the top in the Godiva region. Then again, you still get "the third cellist from the right had Taco Bell for lunch" detail, so, who knows. Try it out. At the very least, the US scene should perk up, put down the DIY and realize a wacky physicist across the pond is doing some stuff that's worth a listen.
