Best headphones for Rock/Metal under $2K

[raistlin65]

Get a pair of Focal Elex's if you want the best sounding headphone for rock or metal. A used pair goes for about $500 and they sound absolutely amazing powered by a THX amp. I tested them using a 789 and a SP200 and the results were the same, audio bless, lol. Right behind the Elex's would be the Drop HD 6xx's which also sounded great but only cost $200. The price to performance ratio of the 6xx's is off the charts and if combine them with a SP200 amp and a Sanskrit Mk II dac and you have a endgame setup for less that $600.

Both of the Elex and HD6XX headphones would perform just as well with a JDS Labs Atom stack or Schiiit Heresy and Modi 3+ for around $200. No performance advantage in spending twice as much or more on the amp.

 

[cany89]

@raistlin65 thumbs up for the best mage ever! haha

 

[cany89]

Quick follow-up on life with LCD2: Overall it exceeded my expectation and I'm kinda re-discover my go-to albums hah!

- I applied some EQ and it really transformed this (relatively) good headphone into something! What I liked about this plugin is you can easily a/b your settings, toggle on/off, or focus on an individual band to hear exactly what it does.

I used this screenshot and settings from a youtuber (Resolve) as reference:

EQ look like this:

- I also use CanOpener. Just using their stock settings and I'm quite happy with the result. Especially on hard-panned songs from The Beatles etc. I suspect it adds a tiny bit of color. (I cannot measure as I don't know how to or don't have any hardware to do it. But it's minor and I'm just a listener...)

- It's heavy (like I didn't know. But boy! it's heavy...) Now I understand the motivation behind spending $200 on a carbon headband for just a 40gr weight difference. After 2-3 hours, I would even die for 10gr lol

If anyone has any suggestions about EQ, CanOpener, or the weight, please do so...

Cheers!

 

[welsh]

AKG K371. Great bass.

I have the AKG K371, but only use them on the move. My rock/metal ‘phones at home are HifiMan 400i, Sennheiser HD 650 and Audeze LCD Classic. In many ways, the 650s are a great rock headphone. Using Topping A90, plus terribly-measuring Schiit Valhalla 2 for the Senns.

 

[welsh]

If this site has shown anything, its that price and performance are very losely correlated. There have been quite a lot of lower priced items significantly outperforming far more expensive items, some almost commically so.

Having seen reviews here, I find it difficult to take the reviews at many other sites seriously. It seems a good number of them seem to give, subjective, scores that are broadly in line with the price of the product; the higher the price, the higher the score, with few, if any, outliers.

One that stands out is Headphonics: https://headfonics.com/category/sources/pure-dacs/, I'm pretty sure that if I plumbed all the prices and the scores into a spreadsheet I could work out their price-score formula.

Recently I've been using a few different headphones and IEMs:

Focal Clear ~ £1,500.00
Senheisser HD560s ~ £160.00
AKG K371 ~ £85.00
Moondrop Blessing 2 Dusk ~ £250.00

Very different prices, but if I could only keep one, I could happily live with any of these. They do all sound different, but I'd be hard pressed to pick a favourite based on sound alone.

However, there are other factors that come into play. I find the closed back AKG K371, the least comfortable and my ears get quite hot after a short while. The Focals are comfortable, but the weight means you can never really forget that you're wearing them. The 560s and fantastically light and comfortable. The Moondrop are IEMs and obviously a different kettle o' fish, I personally find them really comfortable and if I could only keep one, it may well be these.

Out and about, I think that the real ride is the TinHifi p1 planar IEMs, driven by a powerful portable amplifier (I use the discontinued Fiio E12, which puts damn near a whole Watt into those tiny babies). God knows how it all measures, but it is serious fun!

 

[welsh]

Can you specify what sub-genres of Metal you are mostly listening to?
I listen mostly to Doom, Drone, Sludge, sometimes Black Metal and some classics like Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, etc. and am using the Meze Empyrean. I absolutely love it, and can recommend it not only for jazz and classical music.

Please educate me! My two sons both listen to metal and there seems to be an enormous number of genres. Including, of course, Pirate Metal…

 

[bidn]

Howdy!

I have RME ADI 2 and HD 558, and pretty happy with these. But I'm looking for an upgrade.
- Tried HD 600, slightly better but not a huge upgrade.
- Tried HD 800 S - with/without EQ. I liked it. They are definitely far better than what I have and HD 600. I had my WOW moments when I was listening to anything other than metal. Wider soundstage and more resolution overall but considering the price, it's meh. (For rock and metal ofc. Otherwise, they are not of this earth!)
- I'll try LCD-2 sometime next week.

Does anyone know a headphone that really gives you chills when listening to rock/metal music?

*I can find most of the Sennheiser, Audeze, Beyerdynamic, and AKG but I need to search for other brands like Hifiman, Meze, Grado, Focal, Stax, etc.

Thanks in advance!

I use the ADI 2 Pro as my DAC.

I can recommend the following for metal and hard rock (I listen to much more metal than rock):
Focal Elear, Focal Clear.

I subjectively find both "neutral" enough, with excellent dynamics and very resolving, and very "fast" ( sorry for being subjective, but for metal, I find that "speed" matters a lot.. . )
Main differences = The Elear has even more dynamics than the Clear (though not as much as the Utopia) ( but the Elear might very rarely feel a bit shouty). The Elear's FR is a bit more tuned towards "fun" and less neutral than the Clear's.

BTW, l own many more headphones ( incl the HD 800, which I don't like. I also own the HE-6se v1, but it has a nasty peak, is astonishly dynamic for a planar, yet still not as dynamic and resolving as the Focals, but I like its sub-bass slam).

My favorites are the Utopia, Shangri La Jr, Perun Live, Clear, Arya v1, Elear. Among those I subjectively find only the Focals to have enough dynamics to render well the musical genres you mentioned, the best being without hesitation and by far, for me, the Utopia (incredibly realistic dynamics and realism, "electrifying", super "fast" ).

Good luck,
bidn

 

[devopsprodude]

Probably get a Sundara or an Ananda.

Another vote/recommendation for Sundara cans from me. With EQ they are pretty amazing, especially for the price. I really don't see the point in spending more since they are so good.

 

[cany89]

I use the ADI 2 Pro as my DAC.

I can recommend the following for metal and hard rock (I listen to much more metal than rock):
Focal Elear, Focal Clear.

I subjectively find both "neutral" enough, with excellent dynamics and very resolving, and very "fast" ( sorry for being subjective, but for metal, I find that "speed" matters a lot.. . )
Main differences = The Elear has even more dynamics than the Clear (though not as much as the Utopia) ( but the Elear might very rarely feel a bit shouty). The Elear's FR is a bit more tuned towards "fun" and less neutral than the Clear's.

BTW, l own many more headphones ( incl the HD 800, which I don't like. I also own the HE-6se v1, but it has a nasty peak, is astonishly dynamic for a planar, yet still not as dynamic and resolving as the Focals, but I like its sub-bass slam).

My favorites are the Utopia, Shangri La Jr, Perun Live, Clear, Arya v1, Elear. Among those I subjectively find only the Focals to have enough dynamics to render well the musical genres you mentioned, the best being without hesitation and by far, for me, the Utopia (incredibly realistic dynamics and realism, "electrifying", super "fast" ).

Good luck,
bidn

Oh, thanks for the info! I bought LCD-2 a few months ago and I am really happy with it. I was almost buying Clear, so I'm still planning to get a Focal headphone (if BTC jumps a bit even Utopia lol) for dynamic open backs.

 

[Pepper81]

hi Guys
Is the HD600 a headphone that gives a lot of detail when listening to a song?
I mostly listen to 70’s blues/rock and most of those recordings are of low quality.
Masters from the '60's and '70's used analog tape, and it' common to hear (CD transfer and Vinyl) "amount of hiss" and over saturation in the higher frequency range.
I would like to understand if HD600 will put even more in evidence all these imperfections to the point of making the whole
completely unplayable, or not.

 

[Eldgrim]

hi Guys
Is the HD600 a headphone that gives a lot of detail when listening to a song?
I mostly listen to 70’s blues/rock and most of those recordings are of low quality.
Masters from the '60's and '70's used analog tape, and it' common to hear (CD transfer and Vinyl) "amount of hiss" and over saturation in the higher frequency range.
I would like to understand if HD600 will put even more in evidence all these imperfections to the point of making the whole
completely unplayable, or not.

It depends on what you mean by detail and what headphones you compare it to. It is not a bright headphone with exagerrated highs but rather neutral or a few dB under neutral in the highs, if that is what you are trying to figure out.

 

[frogmeat69]

@cany89 , which LCD-2 did you get? I noticed you mentioned 2020/2021, but did you get a pair with Fazors, or classics without? I have a 2016 LCD-2 with Fazors, and love them for lots of metal and hard rock. I use the Audeze Reveal plug in on Foobar and they sound fantastic.

 

[cany89]

@cany89 , which LCD-2 did you get? I noticed you mentioned 2020/2021, but did you get a pair with Fazors, or classics without? I have a 2016 LCD-2 with Fazors, and love them for lots of metal and hard rock. I use the Audeze Reveal plug in on Foobar and they sound fantastic.

I bought the latest LCD-2. I guess the classics - without fazors - are LCD-2c. I heard you can get better results with EQ than using the Reveal. You can try oratory's EQ settings to see if you like it better, or just continue to enjoy the current sound.

I do love my headphones. Listening to metal is so fun I noticed the metal albums I listen to while work increased a lot! (I'm a huge Blind Guardian and Symphony X fan )

 

[bugivugi]

Get an shp9500 for cheap. It kinda sounds like a cheap version of hd800s.
If you really do want upgrade, hd800s is probably the safe bet. There is simply no others sound like it.

like shp9500's attack is not very good.

 

[odyo]

DT 1990 is absolutely incredible with rock metal.
My guess: LCD X and Focal Clear/Elex would be great as well.

 

[Human Bass]

Maybe the Denon 9200? It's a refined warm, with no sibilance

 

[kwerkee]

@cany89 Do you mind share eq setting for the lcd-2. Do you use harman target?

 

[cany89]

@cany89 Do you mind share eq setting for the lcd-2. Do you use harman target?

Sure! It’s combination of 2 Harman curves. Bass section is from older where it was less elevated. Try it and if you think you need more bass, you can just add few dB below 120 hz with low shelf.

• Pk - 35hz, +2dB, Q=1.41
• Pk - 528hz, +1.5dB, Q=2.3
• Pk - 890hz, -1.5dB, Q=3.5
• Pk - 1224hz, -1.5dB, Q=2
• Pk - 2200hz, +2.5dB, Q=3
• Pk - 4200hz, +3dB, Q=2.2
• Pk - 8130hz, -2.5dB, Q=4
• High shelf - 6000hz, +4dB
• Pk - 7400hz, +2dB, Q=3