Nice write up Mojo and thanks for the invitation to tag along. I will just add my 2 cents, I felt the M80's had a tad more open, spacial feel to them and were ever so slightly more forward. Some of the softer points in the recordings I found to be easier to hear on the Axioms as well. The differences were hard to pick out with out A/B switching. (Ian where is that consumer A/B switcher?)
You forgot to mention our non critical listening of the $15,000 Focals that we felt sounded smoother, more even in the bass (8"passive woofer)and had the M80s upper and mid sound, but for the money the artist should be coming to your house to play!
Also the interesting conversation about wires, interconnects, fiberoptics and such, but I won't go there. I really should have brought some home to play with. I can believe the interconnect issue, even the optical cable to a minor extent, but the speaker wire was a little hard to bite on.
It was a fun couple of hours and I too could have stayed longer, as I had my M22s with me for some comparisons, but as was eluded to, I had to run off to pick up my son from preschool, then off to work, where I am now.
