The Rainmaker is available with two types of stand: the cast-iron T4S ($475/pair) or the P2 ($199/pair). The point-to-point wiring is all oxygen-free, solid-core silver insulated with trilaminated Teflon extrusion. The crossover doesn't use ferrite-cored inductors, electrolytic caps, or printed-circuit boards. My pair were finished in an attractive cherry black ash, maple, and mahogany are also available.Įach biwirable speaker has a 1" chambered, aluminum-dome tweeter and a 5½" woofer with a cone formed from four-layered paper. According to Totem, veneers are selected that have "life" to them. Each cabinet requires 2 hours and 15 minutes of labor. The cabinets sport internal borosilicate damping and full-plane vertical cross-bracing to increase rigidity. Each cabinet panel is individually cut and individually shaped to be lock-mitered to the adjoining panels. The Rainmaker is a small, attractive, two-way bookshelf speaker built with labor-intensive techniques. (Why is it that the trend at our HE shows seems increasingly to be that the best sound tends to come from rooms with affordable gear?) At $950/pair, the Rainmaker was producing one the most realistic and enticing sounds at the New York Hilton.
At HE2004 East, in New York last May, that speaker was the Totem Rainmaker. I seek out the one pair of affordable speakers that impresses me to the point that I must have it in my house for review. Then I snapped out of it and thought I'd better review the speaker.Īt every one of our Home Entertainment shows, I'm on a quest. As I sauntered into the kitchen to refill my glass, I noticed that the Totems passed another test: They could occasionally fool me into thinking there was a jazz band playing in the next room. Next I grabbed Dizzy Gillespie's Dizzy In Greece (Verve MGV-8017), and was impressed by how the Totems blurted out the brass tuttis with the forcefulness of much larger speakers but without harshness or strain, and also rendered the delicate "drop two," five-voice lower-midrange sax blend like silky butter. Then I spun a Columbia "six-eye" of Miles Davis' In Person at the Blackhawk (Columbia CS 8469), and was transfixed by Davis' phrasing, a delicate blend of spitty and blatty brashness combined with liquid sweetness. I first grabbed Thelonious Monk's We See (Prestige 7245), and succumbed to the rich midrange of Monk's piano and the delicate transients of his solo articulations. I had just struck the mother lode at Jeff Barr's All Jazz Records (footnote 1), and was working my way through the shipping box while getting accustomed to the Totems. I'm also grateful that I can relax and listen to original vinyl pressings of great vintage jazz on speakers such as the Totem Rainmakers. (And no, I'm not stupid my boss doesn't read Stereophile.) I have my health, and have enough musical talent that I can create my own music (though I wish I had more time to do so). I have a perfect wife, two fantastic kids, and a job I enjoy that pays me more money than I need. Lounging around the house on a recent weekend, sipping wine and listening to music, the total experience of grape-infused musical involvement got me a bit teary-eyed, and I counted up my blessings.
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