Oh sweet lord, I’ve done it now.
In nine months I’ve gone from my first $100 pair of IEMs to a set that is eleven times as expensive. A smattering of other in-ears bridged that gulf, including two personal favorites, the ATH-IM03 and the Klipsch X7i. I shall hold on to those for some time yet, for they serve two important functions: The Audio Technica delivers a sound I adore, and is therefore well suited for backup, should the worst happen. The Klipsch are the smallest, most comfortable IEM’s I’ve tried, so I keep them near at hand for listening to podcasts and audiobooks via the Galaxy S6.
I think they’ll hold those positions for quite a while. Partially, because they fit those roles so very well, but also because Angie threw me into debt, and I CANNOT buy another… anything… for a long, long time. If I can’t buy new equipment, the roster can’t change.
So this is me, near the precipice of top-tier audiophile kit. Am I an audiophile now? *******, I don’t know. I’m starting to look like one, for good or ill. Such distinctions are better left to wiser goons than me. All I care about is the music, and what I’m getting out of it.
On that front, Pinky is a blessed, blessed man.
It began with me dickering over the price of a Head-Fi’er’s new, unopened Astell & Kern AK120ii DAP. I won him over at $1040. Incredible bargain! I was beside myself with anticipatory joy. The kind of joy which clouds your mind and makes you shag your best friend. Or in my case, turn right around and put down a grand on the old credit card for a set of phones capable of taking full advantage of a player of this caliber.
Enter Angie, the newest sibling in the Siren Series by Jerry Harvey Audio and Astell & Kern. She possesses eight drivers per side: Duel low, duel mid, and a whopping four Balanced Armatures to cover the treble. While I’m not a treble-head by any stretch of the imagination, I appreciate this asymmetry, since it’s very often the high frequency spectrum where lie the greatest offense by IEMs. Sibilance. Distortion. General harshness. I support any effort for smoothing out that range without chopping off the head of your music.
Angie succeeds. It takes four drivers dedicated to nothing but those high frequencies for her to render them with the effortless purity only heard in full-size cans.
I paired Angie with the X5 Classic for a whole day and a half before the AK120ii arrived. Therefore, my first impressions are based off that combination.
Coming from the ATH-IM03, Angie strikes me as remarkably clear. Now, I always felt the IM03 delivered clear, capable sound. Compared to Angie, they are muddy and effete. Thanks to those quad highs, Angie’s upper range stretches forever. You think this would make them bright. That was my fear, going in. But the Siren Series IEMs have adjustable bass, and I found 2 o’clock on the pots to bring enough warmth into the mix that Angie never feels cold, hollow, or analytical. That clarity is accompanied by bold, agile bass, and crisp, organic mids.
On the X5 Classic, Angie is an indisputable step up from my IM03, but not much more.
Then the Astell & Kern arrived.
The 2nd Generation AK120 elevates all my headphones a notch or two, but Angie, using Balanced Out, tramples over the IM03, crushing its skull on the way to the throne. I don’t have a balanced cable for the Audio Technica, so it never competed on that field. For Angie, it was here she truly flowered.
I’ve heard it described, when upgrading to the next tier, as lifting yet another veil between you and the music. The lower down the rung, the more veils shroud the naked soul of sound and melody. There’s no telling how many veils remain at any given stage. You only know when another is removed. You can hear it. You can FEEL it.
This is how I felt when I first listened to Angie and the AK120ii together. I hadn’t felt a leap like this since January, when I purchased the Klipsch R6 to replace my Skullcandy Ink’edII. In other words, my first foray into head-fi. There have been a few veils since then, but that first pair of proper earphones blew past eight thresholds in one go.
It’s happened again. It only cost me $2000.
Plenty of folk have gone to great length describing the benefits of balanced lines. They say element separation sharpens as the soundstage widens, positioning takes on a sense of three-dimensionality, while line noise is all but eliminated. This is quite true.
Don’t feel bad if you are skeptical of such claims. If someone were to tell me the AK120ii had a noise floor, and I hadn’t yet heard its Balanced Out, I would punch him in the crotch and spit on his neck and say, “You know nothing, Jon Snow!” as I strode off.
Experiencing first-hand what Balanced is like, I must condemn that instinct. The clarity of Angie’s balanced cable is quite frankly alarming. Equipment should never sound this transparent. It has to be dangerous, getting this close to that pure, naked soul we spoke of earlier.
In this setup, Angie’s treble reminds me of the Sennheiser HD600. It has weight, contour, and richness of timbre. SO strange for an in-ear monitor. Usually earphones are described as having highs which are sharp and detailed, and if they are not attenuated, fatiguing. Not so with Angie.
I found the stock tips uncomfortable, and was happy to see my old favorites, the JVC Spiral Dots, fit Angie rather well. They are extremely wide-bore, and don’t obstruct the nozzle in any way. With these, the sound opens even further, making Angie smoother, and all the more natural-sounding. I’ve been switching between JVC and Ultimate Ears 600 tips. Both are amazing with this earphone.
The mid-range is a bit of an enigma. I find it hard to describe. Vocals are not what I could call lush, which is a little disappointing when I write it down like that. However, listening to Angie as I am right now, there is absolutely nothing wrong with them. They sound technically perfect and honest in color. You get all the grain and texture the source contains, with flawless articulation. The mids don’t stand out as Angie’s showpiece, even though they are a bit forward in the mix. They just sound RIGHT. Not special, not the sort of thing you’re going to talk about around the cantina. Just… right.
Bass is something I like to talk about. Angie will never have the most bass. In fact, I think the IM03 might have a bit more. As they say, it isn’t the quantity that counts, but the quality. Angie’s bass is controlled so well, and textured so beautifully, it stands out as something very special. Now, I haven’t heard other TOTL earphones. I’ve never been to a meet, and we just don’t have stores like that here in Kansas City. My comparison is against the equipment I own or have owned. Take the IM04, a phone I returned after about a month for being too dark. It has two BA drivers for the low range, just like Angie. And yet the ATH does not stack up. The Siren drowns the IM04 in the ocean of its perfection. Again, not in bass quantity, but in every other aspect of the sub’s character and presentation.
If it sounds like Angie is light on bass. It’s really, really not. In all honesty, it might be VERY close to the IM04 in weight, when you turn the pots all the way up. I haven’t done that since first trying them on. This was too dark for my tastes. Your mileage may vary.
At 2 o’clock on the pots, the bass is already more than the HD600. Which isn’t saying much, as those headphones are not known for a bass-heavy sound. In texture and tonality, the two phones are quite close. From me, that is a high compliment indeed.
I won’t lie. The craftsmanship of Angie’s build is a major selling point for me. I am so tired of cheap plastic shells that look as if they will chip and crack at any moment. At the time of this purchase, I was actively pursuing a used pair of Earsonics SM64. The Velvets also perked my interest. Then I read up on Angie and Layla, and these lesser options, with their famously poor construction, lost appeal. The Siren Series is a different beast altogether. The handcrafted carbon fiber and kevlar, metal bezel, and serious cable connection make my nipples hard. Nothing I’ve owned in the audio world is this fine. Even the HD600 is wrought of mostly ugly, painted plastic.
It gives Pinky great pleasure to announce the actual product is every bit as advertized. Angie is splendidly well-made, as is the AK120ii. She and the Astell & Kern DAP stand apart.
The girl is big, though. VERY big. Absurdly big. I’m more than a little afraid of her, actually. If she gets angry… I don't need to tell you what will happen.
In spite of her enormity, Angie is rather comfortable. I easily forget how large she is until I reach up and touch my ears and feel these monstrous protrusions. In moments of insanity, I’m tempted to get the customs. Of course, this mustn’t happen for a long time. My credit card cannot bare it. And since Angie is so comfortable, it’s not nearly as important as it otherwise would be.
The only aspect I haven’t yet talked about is the cable and memory wire. I’m not a staunch hater of memory wire, though it can lead to frustration. The stock cable for the IM0x series by Audio Technica can actually hurt, if you use it to its full potential. Angie’s cable is as close to perfect as I’ve known. The memory wire is just long enough to direct the cable back over your ear, and then it disappears, leaving a very soft, supple cord to drape down. I have no qualms with it, whatsoever. JH Audio does it right.
And that is my dominating sentiment towards Angie. She is simply done right. What more can I say?
It’s a point of agitation that Angie is seldom spoken of without comparing her to Layla. That is a foolish thing to do. Most folk cannot afford $2500 on a set of IEMs. I sure as hell can’t. We look at Angie as the upper-most of our price range. We want to know how she compares to other phones in that bracket. It confounds me that such comparisons are practically nonexistent in official reviews. I’ve found only one.
Well… mine’s no better in that regard. Not for lack of trying. I’ve matched her against the closest competition I could muster. Angie mops the floor with the lot of them.
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