Home of Marley Stir It Up Lux assessment: the candy sound of sustainability
MSRP $400.00
“Home of Marley fancies issues up with the Stir It Up Lux, whereas clinging to its sustainable roots and stable sound.”
Professionals
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Made with sustainable supplies
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New glass platter
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Bluetooth connectivity
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Constructed-in phono preamp
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Simple setup and use
Cons
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Underwhelming zoetrope slip mat
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Sound wants some EQ tweaks
Home of Marley, the audio model began by reggae legend Bob Marley’s son Rohan, has been making trendy and well-designed audio gear that focuses on sustainability for greater than a decade. Its flagship turntable, the Stir It Up, with its distinct, au naturel bamboo stylings and recycled supplies, has lengthy been interesting to file spinners with an environmental conscience and a discerning ear who’re in search of a superb stability of worth and value.
Home of Marley has for the primary time given the Stir It Up turntable a pleasant little makeover. Branding the brand new deck with the “Lux” moniker, the entry-level to midrange Stir It Up Lux Bluetooth Turntable is sleeker (with stylish black accents), has a stunning new glass platter, and some different design upgrades that set it aside from its predecessors. However with that Lux naming additionally comes a extra lux value, up $150 from the earlier mannequin to $400.
Whereas you should still sleep simpler at night time understanding you’ve spent your cash on a high quality, eco-friendly product — and hats off to Home of Marley for being one in every of few audio firms making this a precedence — are the upgrades value the additional {dollars}? We’re going to search out out.
Setup
A turntable within the beginner-to-midlevel vary just like the Home of Marley Stir It Up Lux must be easy to assemble and arrange, and it ought to include all of the parts and instruction guides essential to stand up and spinning in lower than 10 minutes. The Lux ticks all these containers. Every thing is handily packed in recycled, molded cardboard inserts that maintain all the fragile elements protected. There’s a little bit of meeting required with the Lux, although, however it’s all nicely laid-out within the included instruction information, and you can too head on-line for extra help when you want it.
Whereas the headshell and cartridge come preinstalled and aligned within the field, like with any new belt-drive turntable, the rubber belt must be put in, the platter dropped in place, and the tonearm counterweight and anti-skate mechanisms calibrated. The Stir It Up Lux comes with every part you might want to do that, together with a stylus strain gauge (the little white plastic seesaw factor pictured above), though I desire to do it manually.
Within the field, you’ll additionally discover RCA cables, an influence adapter with 4 worldwide plug attachments, an adapter for taking part in 45s, and a USB-C cable that, surprisingly, is only for charging different gadgets with — comparable to the corporate’s Get Collectively audio system — and never for connecting to a pc so you’ll be able to digitize your information.
And a particular inclusion for the Lux is a reversible slipmat that includes a cool zoetrope design on one aspect that shows some trippy animated Bob Marley designs when it spins that you may house out to. The one factor lacking from the Stir It Up Lux is a mud cowl, which this line of turntables has by no means included.
Design and construct
Total construct high quality of the Stir It Up Lux is superb. In step with Home of Marley’s mandate of making eco-friendly merchandise, the Lux maintains the road’s custom of getting its plinth comprised of sustainable bamboo, which produces a pure and recent look that has outlined the corporate’s aesthetic in all its merchandise. The Lux, nonetheless, has dropped the older fashions’ black plastic base enclosure, making for a a lot cleaner and leaner look.
The tonearm, tonearm base, counterweight meeting, sound-isolation toes, cue lever, pace choose dial, and lots of different parts of the turntable, are comprised of recycled aluminum and plastics. Home of Marley has additionally opted to modify issues up from the older fashions’ silver accents to the emphatically extra “lux” black.
The aluminum tonearm is lighter, which Home of Marley says makes for improved monitoring and fewer distortion, and the headshell continues to be stamped with the inexperienced, yellow, and purple stripes of the Rastafari, a pleasant nod to the corporate’s iconic namesake. The one destructive I’ll level out with the tonearm is that the clip that holds it in its cradle is a bit too agency, and the assessment unit I obtained from Home of Marley had a groove scratched on it from use.
One of many greatest upgrades with the Lux is the change from aluminum to glass within the platter materials. It’s designed to supply improved sound absorption for quieter and cleaner operation. Glass is heavier and denser than aluminum (the general weight of the turntable has jumped from 9 kilos to 10 kilos whole), and in addition higher qulity, very like the glass and acrylic platters on higher-end turntables.
Lastly, can we discuss in regards to the zoetrope slipmat? I preferred this eye-catching concept when Home of Marley first introduced the turntable and I used to be excited to test it out. The colourful cork mat, except for serving to additional scale back resonance, promised “an sudden animation that elevates your vinyl expertise” with pictures of Bob Marley and trippy designs animating earlier than your eyes. A good suggestion in idea, and factors for originality, however experiencing it required shining an 11Hz strobe gentle on it or filming it with a digicam that shoots in 11 frames per second. The directions provide ideas for strobe apps you’ll be able to obtain so Android or iPhone gadgets can pull this off, however it’s underwhelming. It’s a cool slipmat, although.
Options
The Home of Marley Lux is a belt-drive turntable that performs information at the usual 33 RPM and 45 RPM speeds, that are managed with a sturdy choice dial on the bottom-right of the plinth. Lifting the tonearm into place units the glass platter spinning, and I used to be impressed at how briskly it will get on top of things — it’s on par with many direct-drive turntables I’ve used. The Lux additionally options auto-stop when a file reaches its finish, which I personally suppose is a must have nowadays, particularly for absent-minded sorts like me who wish to putter whereas listening to information. This fashion, I don’t have to fret about pointless put on on my stylus when a completed file retains spinning as I clear the toilet.
One other frequent function with entry- and midlevel turntables is the Stir It Up Lux’s switchable built-in phono preamp, which makes the Lux prepared to attach with any receiver/amplifier or set of powered audio system, with out the necessity for a phono enter or exterior phono stage. It’s a decent-sounding preamp for a $400 deck that places the Lux simply on par with many turntables in its vary.
The Lux can be well-advertised as a “wi-fi” turntable and options Bluetooth 5.3 connectivity for connecting to Bluetooth audio system and headphones. Pairing is definitely carried out by urgent the pace dial, which, after pairing, additionally acts as a quantity dial. But when wired headphones are extra your jam, the Stir It Up Lux additionally has a 3.5-mm jack positioned on the base of the pace dial.
The opposite massive influencer of a turntable’s sound high quality is its cartridge. The Stir It Up Lux contains the midrange Audio-Technica AT-95E, the older model of A-T’s newer VM95E that I lately reviewed on the comparable Fluance RT81+ Elite. Audio Technica is well-known for its high quality cartridges, and the AT-95E might be discovered on entry- leve;and midrange file gamers from every kind of producers due to its low price, replaceable stylus, and well-balanced, forgiving sound for a variety of music. Must you wish to, nonetheless, the Lux might be upgraded with a higher-end cartridge that you may simply set up to the headshell.
So, how does it sound?
The Home of Marley Stir It Up Lux sounds simply pretty much as good as just about each different turntable on this vary that I’ve heard, with just a few dings to contemplate.
I examined the Lux by means of a classic Marantz 2230 receiver with the EQ set to flat. I used the Lux’s built-in preamp ,in addition to an exterior Schiit Mani phono preamp, performed by means of newer Wharfedale Diamond bookshelf audio system. For Bluetooth, I linked the Lux to the wonderful Sonos Period 300.
Total, the Lux sounds good for its value, with the AT-95E cartridge delivering the constant dynamic vary that it’s identified for, even when the soundstage is just a little narrower when in comparison with higher-end turntables with higher cartridges, just like the Ortofon 2M Blue on a U-Flip Orbit Idea, which I A/B examined only for reference.
On the low finish, I discovered the Lux just a little heavy and borderline boomy, particularly on bass-saturated pop tracks from artists like Harry Types (As It Was) and Billie Eilish (All of the Good Women Go to Hell). I performed a variety of information, from Stone Roses and Queens of the Stone Age to Beastie Boys and the Star Wars soundtrack. Fortunately, the low-end boominess is definitely reined in with some EQing, and music with tighter kick drum hits like rock and hip-hop truly profit.
I clearly couldn’t conduct a assessment of a Home of Marley turntable with out taking part in some Bob Marley, which actually helped me get a superb sense of the mids and highs of the Lux. Like with the lows, just a little EQ tweaking goes a good distance, and I discovered the Lux missing in definition and separation with the EQ set within the flat place. Flip up the treble, nonetheless, and people Three Little Birds begins singing. Throughout the monitor checklist of Marley’s Legend best-of file, and because the stylus reached its break-in time, definition and readability improved. Buffalo Soldier’s trumpet hits and Stir It Up‘s backup vocals land excellent within the mids, whereas that further treble helped make cymbals and hi-hats shimmer higher. I’ll word that in case your system or audio system shouldn’t have any EQ adjustment capabilities, you could wish to verify your choices.
Lastly, whereas I’m not often an advocate of vinyl over Bluetooth because the analog-to-digital conversion and compression required reduces the constancy of the analog sound, many individuals new to vinyl are selecting Bluetooth turntables for a way simply they’ll combine into their present programs with out spending extra on new parts. That mentioned, I assumed the Lux sounded wealthy, clear, and heat by means of the Sonos Period 300 speaker over Bluetooth, even when it did appear to take away a few of that good vinyl crackle, which many listeners would possibly like. Keep in mind, although, that the Period 300 is an amazing-sounding $450 speaker, so handle your expectations when you’re pairing to one thing extra modest.
The underside line
Turntables at this value have come a good distance for the reason that resurgence of vinyl just a few years again, with producers turning out good-sounding decks at respectable costs to try to put one in the lounge of anybody trying so as to add vinyl to their life. The Home of Marley Stir it Up has constantly, and comfortably, lived on this echelon for years, and the Lux continues the custom with a solid-sounding, easy-to-setup and use turntable with standout seems and every kind of connectivity choices that make it excellent for novices and past.
Whereas I can’t vouch for whether or not the upgraded glass platter, lighter aluminum tonearm and headshell, and different enhancements have truly had any impact on the Lux’s sound over its older fashions, I can say that its sound and options are akin to different turntables within the vary, together with the $300 Fluance RT81+ Elite, the $400 Professional-Ject E1, and the
$219 Audio-Technica AT-LP60XBT
making it positively worthy of consideration.
What could set the Stir It Up Lux aside from others, nonetheless, is Home of Marley’s dedication to sustainability and the truth that its result’s a superbly constructed and designed turntable with a novel bamboo end that’s certain to show some heads in your house. That alone is perhaps value the additional $150.
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