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Headphones
Headphones for a sleeping house
Three closed-back headphones for making music at eleven at night: one to start with, one most people should buy, and one for when you already know you care.
Closed-back is the whole point. Open-back headphones sound wonderful and leak sound into the hallway, which is useless at eleven at night when there is someone asleep down there. Everything below is closed.
The second thing that matters is comfort, and it matters more than any frequency chart. A twenty-minute session is short enough that almost anything is bearable, but you will reach for the pair you forget you are wearing, and that is the pair you will actually use.
The third thing is honesty. A pair that flatters everything will have you mixing to compensate, and the track falls apart in the car the next morning. You do not need flat. You need predictable.
The video review
All three pairs, on the same track, at the same volume.
What we would actually buy
Start here
The cheap pair that is not a compromise
Under about C$120 you are buying honesty over comfort and build. Expect plastic, expect a cable you cannot replace, and expect a sound that is clear in the middle and vague at the very bottom. None of that stops you finishing a track. What you are avoiding at this price is the bass-heavy consumer pair that makes every mix sound finished until you play it somewhere else.
Our pick: [model name] · [price] · Where to get it
The one most people should buy
The pair you stop thinking about
Around C$150 to C$300 is where comfort, build and sound all become good enough to disappear. Replaceable cable and earpads, so the pair lasts years rather than months. Enough low end to judge a bass line without guessing. If you only ever buy one pair of headphones for this course, buy here, and spend the difference on nothing at all.
Our pick: [model name] · [price] · Where to get it
If you already know you care
The pair that shows you the problem
Past about C$300 you are paying for detail you can only use once your ears have caught up, and for the kind of accuracy that makes a bad reverb tail obvious instead of pleasant. This is also where headphones start to want more power than a laptop socket can give, which is what the matchbox amp in the other review is for. Worth it if you are mixing often. Not worth it on night three.
Our pick: [model name] · [price] · Where to get it
Some of the links above are affiliate links, and some of these are products sold through this shop. Either way the price is the same for you, and nothing is listed here that we would not use ourselves.
