Occasionally there are circumstances under which a desire for sound quality is indisputably outweighed by the quest for volume. I may be speaking hi fi heresy here but I know this to be true because I have been there. Okay, I was young and when one is young, stupid and throwing a party one’s top priority in a music system is not nuance, depth, definition et al, it’s Loud.

Loud, like someone has to yell to be heard by the person beside them. Loud as in a hard driving bass beat that rolls out of the house, down the street and on to the next suburb.

The problem in my case was a lack of money, and what money I had was all going on beer and pizzas anyway. So I ‘borrowed’ my dad’s Wharfedales and cranked them up so hard the voice coils melted and the suburb was thrown into an eerie silence. A valuable life lesson for someone who, from that point on, had to buy his own speakers.

Look at JBL’s new Party Box 300 and you’d suspect it could set the dogs barking throughout surrounding postcodes. This thing is roughly the height of a bar fridge and at around 16 kilograms it’s seriously heavy and awkward to carry despite grab handles at each end. You must plan carefully before moving it. But it’s also seriously solid. And it has cool stuff like Bluetooth and colourful, ever changing disco lights that pulsate in time with the beat.