This outdoor speaker is a real rock star
PRETENDS TO BE A LUMP OF GRANITE… WITH A 60-WATT AMP
Lithe Audio G5 From €375 for two speakers ★★★★★
Ihave discovered the ultimate prop for dad jokes. I can now say casually to guests at a barbecue: ‘Do you want to listen to some heavy rock?’ Then I gesture at a speaker actually shaped like a lump of granite and dissolve in laughter while my guests look at their watches to work out how long it is before they can go home.
Garden ‘rock’ speakers like Lithe Audio’s fibreglass-clad G5 aim at a rather niche market.
They’re for people who can’t bear to disrupt the feng shui of their garden with anything that looks like a speaker but who have nonetheless installed mains power out there.
You could (in theory) run a cable out of your kitchen but it’s just going to shatter the illusion.
‘Rock’ speakers are at least more tasteful than speakers disguised as garden gnomes, which I regret to inform you do actually exist.
The Lithe Audio G5 pretends to be a foot-high lump of granite, and is (sorry) a seriously heavyweight performer: it has a builtin 60-watt amp and is sufficiently waterproof that you can sling it out in the garden and forget about it.
It (ahem) rocks out with gusto, and there’s no fiddly app: you can stream music or radio via Bluetooth from any phone or tablet.
It’s not cheap, though, at €306 for one speaker or €375 for a mono pair. You could get a very, very fancy indoor Bluetooth speaker for this money – although, of course, it won’t blend in so tastefully with your ferns.