The boombox is back…sort of. Portland-based Touch of Bass has made the boombox a work of art in their latest creation, Touch of Bass, “The King”. What is it? It’s a framed portrait print of a traditional boombox…which actually plays music via Bluetooth. And it doesn’t sound half-bad.
The picture itself was created by a local Portland photographer, and the drivers have been cut out and replaced with actual speakers. Pretty cool, huh? The art itself is very well done, with a sort of 3D effect that seems to jump out of the frame.
With the “The King”, you can hang it on a wall, and it will immediately start up conversations. Start piping music through it, and you’ll get a few dropped jaws.
Touch of Bass Performance
Performance-wise, it sounds a hell of a lot better than the boom box of yesteryear, thanks to a DSP-controlled, 60-watt efficient digital amplifier, Bluetooth and very high-quality drivers. Specifically, the amp powers two 5.8-inch tweeters and a pair of 6.5-inch woofers that produce serious sound.
The creators of the Touch of Bass device fine-tuned this sucker until the sound quality was on par with higher-end Bluetooth speakers. Additionally, a little creative technology went into “The King”, allowing the Digital Signal Processing to work it’s magic and create large sound from a small box. The Touch of Bass gives you rich and large bass, and crisp and clear mids and trebles, rivaling many top-shelf bookshelf speakers on the market.
Mounting and Connecting
Mounting the Touch of Bass “The King” is a breeze, requiring only a couple of wall screws. The speaker itself has to be plugged in, as the Touch of Bass doesn’t have a battery supply.
Besides Bluetooth, which is very easy to pair by the way, the Touch of Bass also has an auxiliary input for connecting other audio devices.
Bottom Line
The Touch of Bass “The King” is one of those gadgets that doesn’t come around to often. It marries great art with high-fidelity, a very cool and creative concept. Audio sounds much better than we expected, filling a room with surround-sound-like quality. The bass is what we were most impressed with. With little room to work with, the DSP managed to facilitate the drivers in a way that allows the device to pump out thumping bass.
The Touch of Base “The King” runs $349. You can purchase it here, or through Amazon.
