Yeah, they had too much treble for me as well.

Lacking bass on a ATH-M50x? Are you sure you got a legit product?

Thanks for the comment and the rep

Never heard them, but not sure why they are rated at #29

BartSimpson1976; it definitely has the outward appearance of a legit product, but the sound quality is frankly not what I expected based on the price and the reviews here and elsewhere. I got it from a major electronics chain with which I've had plenty satisfactory transactions in the past. It is not that the bass is completely absent; in fact in several hiphop tracks by Gramatik it is actually pleasantly punchy. However those were exceptions, and I have the impression there is only a fairly select part of the bass spectrum where there is proper presentation. The lower bass regions where the AKG K181 really delivers those warm fuzzy earhugs is non-existent in the M50x, while the upper parts of the bass, which roll sensually into the mids on the Grado SR60e, also sound surprisingly absent and hollow. I find that, although the mids on the AKG's are unremarkable, the bottom and top ends sound much better on the AKG's. Of course this is all also subject to taste, and my ears are tuned to the Grado's. I was prepared for less great sounding mids from any pair of non-Grado closed cans, but I was also expecting more satisfying bass presentation. However for me, the Grado's trump the M50x on the bass front as well.

ps. it sounds impressively spacious, more so than the Grado's, and if it weren't for the completely overpowering treble I think it would be a nice pair of cans, even though I'm not in love with the bass. So, I don't think it's counterfeit. If that were the case I'm fairly certain it would sound a tonne more horrible.

I had two different units of the M50x, and I can tell you that I'm pretty sure something is wrong with yours. It has overwhelming bass and slightly rolled-off treble.
 
http://cdn.head-fi.org/2/2b/2bec6adf_Audio_Technica_ATH-M50X.png

The M50 is probably the most overrated portable closed back headphone on headfi, but is it lacking bass? I think not.

Well maybe the culprit is my ears then, with respect to the bass. I haven't found a single person online saying they enjoy the bass boost on the AKG K181's but to me it sounds better with than without the boost.

I own the m50x and owned the original m50 , never had problems with the treble , it sounds clear and pleasant.

Yes, something is wrong.  I don't particularly care for the ATHM50s, but I know they don't generally sound as you describe.

The thing here IS maybe just the contrast to the other headphones. I'm getting more and more convinced how earlier listening puts an effect on trying out a new sound signature. Everything written above is true about the M50x, though if the review was written by someone who never owned any nice headphones the perspective would be different. The M50x have bass but no sub-bass. There is a section of their extremely lower bass which contains absolutely no detail at all. The romance is how they do the bass frequencies above the area of no detail. The treble is thin and dry and sits in an area of small soundstage. Thus a member like this coming from the soundsignatures he was used to with the other headphones would precieve it as the worst. It's a thing where the listener has to take lots of time, like 30 days before they start to understand why the M50x is regarded so high as an entry level purchase. It's not that they do stuff all THAT bad, but simply gloss over their own issues very well. They seem to hide their own sonic faults, which new listeners just fail to notice.

Redcarmoose, I agree completely that my experience is colored heavily by my previous experiences with other headphones, and that a user with different experience will think very differently of the M50x. I remember my first 'real' headphones being a pair of Sennheiser HD205's; a tightly clamping, closed bass-machine ideal for the early dubstep days. I was in heaven with those things on my head, even though they gave me a headache. After breaking two pairs I bought the cheap Koss Portapro before eventually somebody imported the Grado SR60s for me.

If the M50x was the first pair of proper cans I owned, I would absolutely give them a lot more love than I'm able to now. However, although it is always subject to taste, for the money the SR60's I think give absolutely superior sound quality, and honestly I think overall the AKG K181 DJ UE's is a better pair than the M50x. I've been wearing the K181's for two days straight now for several hours at a time and although they do clamp somewhat, I do not find them uncomfortable. In fact although the Grado's clamp much less, they hit a few sensitive points on my ears and chafe there which after a few hours is noticeably more uncomfortable than the K181's!

@Redcarmoose "The M50x have bass but no sub-bass." If you click the measurements I shared in my previous comment (taken from InnerFidelity, then with compensation curves superimposed), you can see that the sub-bass extends all the way down under 20 Hz, and even then it's still boosted by 8 dB or so. (Neutral bass is the green line.) Bass detail and bass extension are two different things.

Oh, and the most obvious reason you can tell that the bass of the M50x is boosted to extreme levels is because it makes things sound muddy, especially voices. (This is assuming the unit is not defective, in which case it could have a different frequenty response than it was designed to.)

@Music Alchemist. Thanks for those measurements. I was unfamiliar with that website, great resource! However, the graphs in this case do not accurately represent my subjective experience. I might not have the experience to pinpoint exactly what I don't like about the M50x's, but I'm not a complete newbie either. Maybe it's my ears, maybe the M50x's are, in fact, defective. In any case, I'm not getting any subbass and the higher bass/lower mids sound murky. This would all be acceptable if it weren't for the, to my taste at least, completely overpowering treble. Still, they don't sound defective to me, just unbalanced. I imagine a manufacturing defect would be immediately apparent as a defect and not a lack of balance.

The fact that @Redcarmoose experienced the M50x in a rather similar way strengthens my belief that 'it's not just me' and that spectrum plots do not tell the whole story. We could probably continue this discussion endlessly (if we were willing to put up with my lack of technical knowledge), but ultimately I can only describe, to the best of my abilities, what I hear and compare it to my other headphones. My personal opinion is that the M50x does not nearly offer a listening experience as compelling as the Grado SR60e and the AKG K181 DJ UE (which are two very different headphones!), especially considering its price.

Well, I don't like the M50x much either. But I've heard many, many headphones that are far brighter. You mentioned the bass and lower mids being murky. That's my experience as well. The bass overpowers the mids and makes them sound muddy, at least on the two units I had.

When used directly from my sources, I can't tolerate the "piercing" treble of my M50x after a few hours (of playing "Dire Straits - Absolute Hits").  Bass is pretty good for me though.  I was using my Macbook Pro 13 Retina 2015 or my iPhone 5S.
 
Everything changed when I used Chord Mojo with my M50x though.  Now I'm enjoying it much, even for a full day of using it, thru either my rMBP or iPhone and the "piercing / shrilling" trebles are gone!
 
If you have a DAC/headphone amp, it may help.  Just my 2 cents.