Private Ear: Getting started

By John Groom

December 2006

Private Ear My affair with headphones began because I needed to lose weight. I have lost the 20kg okay, but for several hours a day the headphones are still hanging around my neck. There are a lot of myths about weight loss and one is that most of us can lose weight through moderate exercise.

GBH of the ears

The problem that I ran into - literally - was that my programme required numerous hours at the local gym. Usually a gym is not a source of hi-fidelity sound and my gym is typical. The CD source is a $50 Warehouse DVD player. The amplification is a surround sound amplifier pumping into plastic two/way speakers, placed at opposite ends of a 15 metre long room. My guess is that the ‘sweet spot’ would be out in the car park. The ‘deep bass’ switch is permanently left on. The resulting sound is below low-fi and out the other side.

To add icing to the cake there are no original CDs available. Only compressed copies of recordings are used, probably so that those of us who are impressed with this musical fare won’t be moved to steal the recordings. As the recordings themselves are chosen from rhythmic but multi-miked material they tend to merge into a garish musical wallpaper that is too demanding to ignore but too unworthy to warrant attention. Given this setting, is easy to see why I would reach for auditory relief.

Oh for a SNAG

This is not the first time that I have sought the sanctuary of headphones. A few years ago I started my psychology practice in a medical centre. The GP who owned the practice was also supervising extensions to the building. The building was concrete block and required extensive digging out of the foundations. As a GP he made a good project manager and as a project manager he would have made a better GP. I approached him about the noise problem, as my job obviously requires a lot of careful listening. It was he who suggested headphones, though when I suggested that he make a token drop in the rent as recognition for the noise factor, he gave me the sort of look as though I was suggesting something lewd and illicit.

I figured I would be pushing it up hill to bill him for some decent headphones but I dutifully plodded off to my local hi-fi store. I purchased a modest set-up with a ‘personal’ CD player and some moderate priced closed headphones. The headphones were not particularly comfortable, gave a very ‘in the head’ sound, probably were a poor match to the source and had zero street cred. I blushed with embarrassment when other staff members came pounding on my office door and caught me donned out with a couple of dustbin lids glued to my head. But they did block most of the sound. I traded them back in as soon as the renovations were finished and began the search for a more sensitive landlord.

Flying high

My only other excursion into private listening was the result of a bit of experience with international flights. One downside of our hobby I find is the increased sensitivity I have to unwanted sound sources. The deep drumming bass created on a long flight can be quite tedious. This design of ‘anti noise’ headphones can be surprisingly successful and significantly reduces fatigue. The experiment was short lived however, as they got stolen on my second flight. I am obviously not the only one who appreciates the benefit of this approach.

On the cheap?

These examples perhaps give the impression that private listening is in fact the poor cousin of serious hi-fi and is only to be used out of necessity, to block unwanted sound or out of consideration for others. These are certainly some of the advantages.

I am going to go further though and suggest that headphones can in fact be comfortable, surprisingly open sounding (with the right design) and while I am waiting for a pair that I would call the ultimate design statement, some are quite discreet. The biggest advantage however is that the level of fidelity possible with good headphones far exceeds what those dollars would buy with a speaker based system.

In simple terms they give a great ‘bang for your buck’. One Auckland pundit claims that his Sennheiser 600 headphones, which sell for $899, are "the best $10,000 speakers" he ever heard. I have heard systems based on the Wilson Watt Puppies, for example, that don't resolve material as well as the best headphones.

The menu

This column has been suggested by the editor as a place to wax eloquent and opinionated about the virtues of the headphone experience. We are hoping that you will also use the forums to stimulate more discussion. It will include product reviews but will not just be about that. I am looking forward to exploring headphone amps, the use of valves, website resources, cables, set-up, being “in the flow”, hearing loss and a myriad of other minutiae which might take my fancy.

And the secret of the weight loss? Back off on the exercise and live on salad, yoghurt and fruit for a few months. It is good both for the hearing and the waist line.

John is an executive coach and mentor who lives on the North Shore of Auckland

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