Well Lou apart from making me feel 'Old'. I AM so no offence taken, those Koss cans were quite good in their day and perhaps the best sounding I'd ever owned at that time.
They were not the best I'd listened to but the best was well out of my reach financially. I had to make do, live within my means and they performed very well. Without inducing a hip pocket neuropathy!
I was then and remain today, very fond of American Speakers even the small ones you wear on your head. The VERY BIG earthmoving types were my passion though and still are.
I did try several European types (earthmovers) but largely because of the music I listened to in those days, like the trusty Labrador, I always returned to 'American Made' It was my cosy kennel and the place for me. Infinity,Bose,Cerwin Vega and AR were NOT players in the headphone sector, neither Sonab,Ditton,Tannoy and Wharfedale from over the Atlantic. In the 60s and 70s headphones were quite a niché market and nothing like the playground of today, so in that respect,I think headphones have more emerged as a market sector rather than coming a long way.
Perhaps HiFI boffins then, were a little more socially unthoughtful (disrespectful) or had dedicated soundproofed listening rooms. Listening to hifi music was a larger experience,headphones and IEMs were a novelty and not really mainstream. Maybe today because life is a little more 'compact' and constrained, we can have a gazillion tractks in a tiny digital box, we need to commensurately contain/confine our musical joy and delights to much smaller spaces/venues. It would not be much fun (in the lugging) a pair of CV D7s onto a train to commute to work...but (in the listening) you definately would have the whole carriage ROCKIN'! Differently and sometimes sadly today, everybody looks to/at and are wholly consumed by their devices, they escape to their own private musical nirvana(s)...without reading a newspaper a book or speaking to a soul. It's kinda sad to watch really! A seething mass of non-interactive ectoplasm fastidiously avoiding eye contact...I don't get it...is it political corectness gone mad?
I do understand you, in saying headphones having come 'a long way'. I'm just not quite so sure I'd fully agree. The science is still largely unchanged, it's still about moving air,even in tiny volumes. Yes there are some newer types of speaker around some that are almost microscopic and overall they are cheaper than they ever were. Electrostatics both large and small were the only flat surface ones I knew or heard of...there are now others that are 'Planar' and move or are excited differently. So indeed the technology has changed and for the better in my veiw. You couldn't walk the street or ride a bus with 500 albums in your pocket much less listen to them.
There are many more manufacturers than in your Dad's day and mine too, than when his first 'Real Stereo' became a reality ! But what's still unchanged,from that time, is it's just as easy to spend a fortune if you want/need to, that will never change.
But conversely, you can much more easily, spend a very modest amount and get a lot of sonic performance. I suppose for me that's what has changed and where I'd agree with you. It's the mid to lower end of the market, it has a LOT MORE CHOICE and pretty decent performance for a modest spend. The high end is still there,always will be with all it's bells and whistles, generally touting stellar performance, often but not always delivering, but always for a price. I suppose there are indeed more players in that sector than there were 50yrs ago, simillarly, there are even more players again, in the mid to low end than ever before.
Quite often it's the same hi-end guys,wearing different hats and in their jeans and sneakers, instead of their dinner suits,silk scarves and patent leather dancing pumps!
As a card carrying bottom feeder...I'm well and truly spoilt for choice. There's so much for me to choose from and as this (HiFi Stuff) is and always will be a very subjective experience, the high end (to my ears) are not 10 times better than the low end (sonically). However the high end is frequently 10 times the money of the opposite end of the market scale.
A truthful final analysis must always appraise and account for the individuals ability to hear, how many of us actually know how good (or bad) our hearing is ? I'd contend not very many! Very few would have knowledge of or recent and accurate measurements of their audiological ability or lack of it. I doubt a pair of $10,000 dollar headphones will do much for advanced presbycusis, any more than a $500 dollar pair, other than perhaps leave you with $9500 for beer and skittles!
Cheers, Tom
