The Damson Audio Twist is a portable powered speaker that works via Bluetooth or via a stereo analog mini jack input. The “twist” is that this stylish aluminum cylindrical speaker, at about 3 inches tall and 2 inches in diameter, makes very little sound until you set it on a surface—wood, plastic, glass, a desktop or table. Immediately, loud and full sound fills your space with a powerful bass that belies its diminutive size.
The Damson Twist uses resonance technology instead of a conventional speaker cone to produce sound. Called Incisor Diffusion Technology, the unit has a transducer in its base that couples the audio output’s vibrational energy directly to the surface it rests on. The more freely a surface can vibrate, the louder the sound is acoustically amplified.
I like that the entire upper-half of Twist rotates from center position (off) to either Bluetooth operation or analog line input. A dual-color LED lights to indicate which mode you have functioning and a short tone is emitted indicating successful Bluetooth pairing. I paired up to my iPhone 4S but it’ll work with any laptop, smartphone or tablet the supports the A2DP standard.
I placed the Twist on a small antique coffee table in my living room. It was amazing. There was enough audio power that certain loose sections of my old table would buzz with certain bass notes of the music. I moved Twist over to a massive dining room table and not only did the buzzing disappear but I gained even more volume.
The Damson Twist sells for $69.99 MSRP. It comes in your choice of four candy metallic-colors and runs for about nine-hours on an internal, rechargeable battery. Check out http://us.damsonaudio.com/products/twist.
By Barry Rudolph
miniBio: Barry Rudolph is a recording engineer/mixer with over 30 gold and platinum RIAA awards to his credit. He has recorded and/or mixed: Lynyrd Skynyrd, Hall & Oates, Pat Benatar, Rod Stewart, the Corrs and Robbie Nevil. Barry has his own futuristic music mixing facility and also teaches recording engineering at Musician’s Institute, Hollywood, CA. http://www.barryrudolph.