finally someone said it lol

i love $b and bones but admittedly their music is nothing stellar in terms of mixing and mastering. headphones like the hd600 will blow you away when listening to rock, jazz or something that involves real instruments. they’ll blow you away when listening to IDM and ambient, music that involves a ton of little details. otherwise, they’ll reveal all the glaring flaws with a song’s mixing, and take all the fun out of them.

which is precisely why i don’t like them.

i respect them highly, but i would personally never own one. i can’t stand when a headphone just won’t sound good with 50% of my music taste. keep in mind that music has evolved a lot since the hd600s came out in 1997. a lot of today’s music is bass-heavy or mixed badly, often intentionally, and that just won’t translate well to an hd600.

i would recommend going for a more modern open-back reference headphone, as those are a lot more musical and can do hip-hop perfectly. the audio-technica r70x come to mind. they have great bass and warmth, yet retain the great clarity, detail, soundstage and imaging that you come to expect from professional headphones.