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The best part about testing new speakers is when you get to lay the music tracks down to test the depths of the speakers, movies do a lot of the talking with huge explosions shaking the foundation of the house but music often seeks to constantly thump these sounds, instead of picking a huge array of genres I've chosen just a small selection to put the MX5021 through.

Rap/Hip-Hop

Outcast takes the honor with the first shots at the sub, only one song is really required to pull this test off and it's not even a recent played to death item on MTV. We take a look back and drop Neck Uv Da Woods on the MX5021, a song with so much bass it's not even funny; the focus of the whole song is on the bass response, yeah generic booming subs can produce the song but the hard part is getting the tones just as they should be reproduced without having the sub bottom out or push to extents that it's not even getting the sound right but just putting out clipping instead as the speaker reaches peak. The MX5021 takes up the challenge and does quite a nice job with things, while it doesn't keep up with things due to the amount of times the song exceeds the frequency response limit it still comes out pretty nice when the bass is adjusted properly, the sound reproduction is well defined and it's easy to tell that the sub is actually working to reproduce the low end as it's meant to be heard, it's just that the song happens to exceed the driver and constantly punishes the sub throughout the song, if the system wasn't broken in before it really is now. Overall the MX5021 can handle many of the songs from the genre but it's not focused at these due to the frequency response of the driver. Most songs don't constantly drive the sub into the ground such as this so it's not as much of a problem.

Alternative

Alternative covers a lot of ground, at one point mainstream punk and alternative were two different items but as time has passed the groups have merged and become a freakish conglomerate. As a result we have songs by Static-X and The Transplants. After a beating comes a bit of a break for the sub with Static-X - The Only, some might be able to pinpoint the origin of the song, it's on the Need for Speed: Underground soundtrack. The track uses a mix of guitars in the song during the chorus area. It is easy to have the secondary guitar mixed into the main guitar though but the MX5021 is able to deliver a breakdown that includes both instruments that holds onto all of the key tones. The next track up is Diamonds and Guns by the Transplants, it uses a simple beat but the chords are hard and precise, the key to all this is that the drums aren't watered down like in most final mixes, the snare is used in a really precise sound, it almost holds a raw tone as if it was never remastered from the studio, as such it never really gets into low levels where the sub attempts to attack the same tone. The MX5021 fed the sound through the midrange drivers once again but didn't fail, in the after effect tone came through clear and bright with highlights from the tweater on the resonation from it. The vocals the guitar and the piano came through without a hitch, the MX5021 handled the song appropriately and didn't attempt to feed to much to the sub as there was no real reason for it in regard to the drums.

J-Pop

The selection is more than just Pop, it includes R&B, Dance and Classical instruments, I used Ayumi Hamasaki, Da Pump and BoA as my test songs. Ayumi was first up with Evolution, the song is packed with instruments creating an almost electric beat for her to sing with, with so many sounds going at once it often packs down the drivers of my regular speakers mainly due to the bass guitar and drum kicks falling right inside each other on the sound stream. The MX5021 managed to break things up a bit with the 2 midrange drivers and the classic Altec Lansing horn tweeter, the bass notes hit low and managed to include the punch from the drum kicks as the came in. The difference can be heard between the classic paper design and the polypropylene midrange drivers at this point, the paper design often fails to cover the ranges demanded but the polypropylene has enough resistance to bounce back immediately and deliver the proper sound. Overall the song did the job it was supposed to do, the current design puts the MX5021 in another league from the rest of the Altec lineup with the exception of the FX6021 as we have not tried it out yet as it rests on a much higher price level than the MX5021.

Da Pump was next with if..., the song has a good general range of tones with the exception of the backup singer who falls into the midrange stream due to his vocal tone, when reproduced he usually falls between the midrange and horn where his voice isn't really produced all that well. On the MX5021 his voice is designated to the midrange for the most part, as a result his voice is well produced and manages to get delivered quite well along with the beat of the song which often hits a similar range. The lead singer uses higher notes which come through without a problem via the tweeter and midrange, the rest of the song kicks in quite nicely with solid kicks from the bass.

BoA closes this out with Rock With You, a great track that uses a combination of synthesizers and guitars. As the name states it's based around a rock theme, the bass is a major focus of this song, it serves to really keep the song flowing along, deep punches roll to the sub which required me to turn the bass adjustment down just a bit much like when using Outcast, the sub tends to distort and extend really far from visual observation, I didn't want to kill it so I made sure to lay off. The satellites had no problem with this song her voice flows extremely well through the midranges and her high notes come through crystal clear through the tweeter. The majority of the focus is on the bass and the high notes, the bass used in such a manner exceeds the design at high volume, as a result it needs to be backed down manually via the control pod or using the infra-red remote.