In place of a dynamic, tight, fast, detailed, open and wide sound stage presentation the sound is now ‘dulled’, slow, leaden, which lacks precision and any focus or sharp images.

What has changed; nothing in the system.

My household voltage is on the high side for me at around 240-241volts.

We haven’t suffered any power cuts but several heavy downpours over the last few hours so don’t believe the system has been damaged by any mains spikes etc and has been powered off throughout until used.

This does afflict all sources and is even evident if brushing the stylus or dropping in to the lead in grove rather than a normal light crisp sound both are more of a heavy thick brush/thud sound.

There is no suggestion of any mid-upper distortion or any such nasties.

Whether my Earth rod has been over watered I cannot say but do wonder whether there is something in the grid mains supply pollution which is temporarily causing short term low performance (which I have experienced in the past albeit at least a couple of years ago).

Will sit tight and see if improves over the next few days as I suspect it will......am due a spring clean of my external mains/rod contacts so will look at those in the next week or so.

The earth rod top/clamp was very damp in its box but not swimming!  Voltage around my normal 237-8.