JVC Fx101. Pure basshead IEM. I can feel the bass all the way to my chest.

Soundmagic PL30. Get easily congested on faster tracks. Treble rolled off in anything but the shallow silicone tips. Durability, one of the drivers of mine suddenly died off after couple of months without warning.

As OP I also has M4 which is my main IEM especially for rock.   For vocals I used PL30 (its successor E30). In my ear, PL30 has mids that has this sort of tiny echo that gives listening in an empty room kind of feeling. This sound signature I believed what people to laud it as having a great...

Quote: That was exactly I expected of HD239 befire having auditioned it. Boy, glad I was wrong. I would say it was akin of HD598 in party mode. Doesn't take itself seriously but seriously focus on having fun.

Having just auditioned ranges of Sennheiser's headphone at their store, short answer YES!.   HD239 is really ood. In fact the HD598 which was put close by to HD239 and I went to and fro comparing the two and HD239 just surprised me. While HD239 has nowhere the resolution of its higher end...

How well does PX100-ii handle rock?   I'm not asking for bright, great resolution, fast driver type of headphone; I'm just curious if PX100-ii flexible enough to handle tracks like those from The Mars Volta or System of A Down.

JVC's FXHF101 bass does really goes deep for the genre but doubtful about the speed.

Having a similar taste in music as OP, I would highly recommend Brainwavz M4 BUT with at least a mini amplifier like Fiio's E6. M4 is definitely fast enough especially for bands like At The Drive In or The Mars Volta. Without an amp, for me M4 sounds like flat even with a high volume but paired...

Heard the GR02 BE will be stopped in production by the end of the year. The GR02 has nice cable. SQ is good but for my taste the mid is just a tad recess because of the slight bass emphasis compares to E10.