Hey yeky83,
Firstly - the very important premise here is that the OP asks for advice on studio monitors to give him a full and rich sound when playing his Axe III - so he is asking for a "pleasure listening option" and not a mixing / analysis tool.
I know you have knowledge in this field, so you probably know as much or more than me about this, and I don't want to get into technically arguments or specs here for a couple of reasons (although most or all of this is technically measurable).
1) the OP asks for something pleasant sounding and I think that should remain the focus in this thread
2) the published specs often don't tell the entire story - the specs are often not correctly or fully reported from the manufacturer, info is often lacking especially in the low to mid budget range.
Regarding 1)
The trusty NS10 is a respected studio stable for a number of good reasons, it's super useful and revealing as an analysis / mix tool and I like them for that - but I don't know many if any that think that they are the best or even a great playback option for pleasure listening. Makes sense ?
I find something like Dynaudio far more pleasing to listen to for music playback or for getting a great rich and full sound from when playing your Axe III or another monitor through them.
In the same way I know that many love the Adams range of monitors. They are great to mix on as due to their ribbon tweeters you can hear the treble freq content very clearly. Personally though I don't like to listen to music on nor to work on Adams monitors (unless we are talking the very top of the range Adams) as the extended (and IMO hyped) treble freqs sound unnatural to me and causes ear fatigue fairly quickly for me.
I prefer to work on Dynaudio, ATC or Amphion monitors or other monitors in that vein - I get all the detail I need with none of the ear fatigue (for me - others can have other experiences and preferences).
So when talking about monitors as mixing tool, it's all about finding monitors that are analytical and revealing and about finding a pair that fits your room, doesn't cause ear fatigue for you and very importantly getting to know their strong and their weak points - where finding a full and rich sounding monitor for playing your Axe III through is about just that.
Ideally the best sounding and best analysis tool monitor are not different monitors but one and the same, but that is in my experience only true for the uber hi-end variety of studio monitors, and even here there personal preference varies greatly.
The Axe through a pair of ATC ASM50SL Pro's is a near religious experience and at the same time a very revealing one for dialing presets or mixing - the famous ATC mid-range microscope is amazing.
It's late, I'm tired and rambling, but I hope it makes sense.
Thanks for the response! I'm not a pro audio guy or anything, just like learning about it a lot
So I appreciate the input.
Point 1) is well taken, OP asks for pleasant sound and that's preferential. Different monitors certainly do sound different and we can prefer different ones with regards to fatigue, analysis, enjoyment, etc.
Point 2) is well taken as well, and I agree specs don't necessarily tell everything and are very lacking in the low to mid budget range.
Resolution Magazine ($5 a pop) is a great source for most of the popular monitors of any budget. Keith Holland who is a PhD and professor in this stuff, and wrote a textbook on loudspeakers, makes measurements for their reviews. In his words,
It may well be that the dynamic ebb and flow of the music, the subtle timing differences and other characteristics are better exhibited by some loudspeakers than by others, but these are things for which we have no reliable, measurable descriptors. However, the overwhelming tendency is for a loudspeaker which scores highly in all the objective measurement regimes... to show the musical characteristics in a more artistic and exciting light.
The measurements I've seen of HS8, E8, LSR308, etc. are pretty good, nothing major to fault about them. And so I would think the "overwhelming tendency" would apply to these monitors, as it would to those expensive monitors you list. So I tend to view it like
@lqdsnddist does, unless there's something real special about a set of monitors (like Kii audio, Genelec coaxial, Sceptre/Fulcrum, etc.) that's doing something special, I think monitors that measure objectively similarly are probably more same than different.
Perhaps there is something special to the Dynaudio, ATC, Amphion, etc. that are beyond objective measurements. But it's unfortunate that they don't seem to at least make good objective measurement data available. The only popular brands I know of (I don't know a lot of brands so take it with a grain of salt) that do give thorough objective measurements are Genelec, Neumann, and a few Adams high end monitors.