Victrola Music Edition are tough, take-anywhere speakers
Portable duo are all about the (not so) heavy metal
When it comes to rufty-tufty Bluetooth speakers, design is usually one of the first things to take a back seat. Not so with Victrola’s latest pair of mobile music boxes: the Music Edition 1 and Music Edition 2 are seriously stylish, while still being able to shrug off the elements.
Both models are rated IP67 water and dust resistant, so are perfect for taking the tunes outdoors, but are machined from anodised aluminium, which makes them a whole lot easier on the eye than the mix of fabric and plastic you’ll find from the similarly-priced competition. Soft-touch rubberised plastic panels and buttons that sit flush to each unit add to the premium feel, so they should look snazzy inside the house as well as outside of it.
Geometric patterned speaker grilles give a small hat tip to the firm’s heritage: it produced some of the world’s first gramophones, and gave birth to one-time high street icon HMV here in the UK.
The smaller Music Edition 1 has a 2in driver and passive bass radiator, with a battery good for 12 hours of playback. Stepping up to the Music Edition 2 brings a 3.5in driver, 1in tweeter and passive bass radiator. It’s got an even beefier battery that promises 20 hours of listening, along with a wireless charging pad for topping up your smartphone while it’s pumping out playlists. There’s also a 3.5mm auxiliary input for hooking up an analogue source.
Both speakers have USB-C charging, and support multi-speaker pairing so you can double up for extra volume.
They’ll be hitting the US first, with prices starting at $100 for the Music Edition 1 and $200 for the Music Edition 2. Brits should hopefully be able to get their hands on them early next year.
Tom Morgan-Freelander
Deputy Editor 
