Bluetooth audio quality issue after installing Bose app

I have a 13 mini that I connect via bluetooth to a Bose Portable Smart Speaker. Sound quality and volume was excellent before I started messing around with setting up wireless access to the speaker for supposed audio quality improvement over bluetooth. I downloaded the Bose music app and tried to connect to wifi at work and couldn't get it to work. Giving up, I switched back to bluetooth and noticed a marked difference in the sound quality. Volume is lower, takes almost twice the amount of volume clicks to get the same volume as prior. Also sounds dead and lacks punch, bass muddier and the top lacks the brightness it had before. I did a factory reset of the speaker to eliminate that, no change.

From the phone side, I forced a restart and re-established the bluetooth connection - no change. What's also concerning is that when I connect to via bluetooth in my car I noticed the sound quality difference there too. Would a full restore from backup help this issue?

Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks.