[chelboed]

I used to listen to music all the time. I took a hiatus for a while and got back into it with headphones. The funny thing is...now that I'm a little more mature and "into the sound" and dynamics of the production...alot of my old fav's have let me down.
 
Prime example: I love VanHalen. Always have. When I throw on some headphones and try to rock out, I get distracted by how much Eddie liked to put his guitar in only one channel. Eddie is arguably the driving force behind most of the music. He did it for a good reason, but it's just a bit too extreme. They should have maybe panned the sound 60/40 or 70/30 to one side or the other instead of 100/0%. It's not on all recordings of theirs to my knowledge, and the earlier albums seem to suffer more in the mastering than the latter.
 
Another example: Mama Said Knock You Out (lol) I know I said "mature" earlier, but I still like this song. At least I did until I listened to it yesterday for the first time since highschool. It's so freakin' raw and one dimensional sounding. I have an 80's HipHop playlist going right now with Mr. Wendel by Arr. Develp immediately following LLCj. The difference is pretty crazy. The Mama song makes your ears feel congested and slightly irritated...the Wendel song just feels like your ears are taking a nice stretch.

 

[Uncle Erik]

Maybe branch out into some new genres - a lot of popular music is badly recorded. I've had good experiences with jazz and classical. Even if you've never listened much, there are some great recordings with lots of crossover appeal.

 

[chelboed]

Yeah totally! I have been searching. I have run into some cool electronic stuff. Not fast paced drum and bass...but more "chill" slower paced music. I like the Rippington's. I have some nice Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis. I have a smattering of genre's, but It's just funny how some of the old stuff is barely tolerable anymore.

 

[BlackbeardBen]

Using a crossfeed of some sort - for Foobar, Winamp, and Rockboxed DAPs, there's software solutions, and there's amps and DACs that will do it as well - will help recordings (when listening with headphones) with hard left/right stereo panning.  I find it to be absolutely necessary for listening to Cream, myself.
 
The problem is that headphones have limited natural crossfeed, unlike speakers (which most music is mastered on and for - especially older pre-Walkman recordings).  With speakers, you hear almost the same intensity in both ears from both speakers - there's just a time delay of around 2 ms, and the sound is of course coming from different angles (influencing the reflections on your pinna).  Software and analog circuitry solutions simulate the delay of the opposite signals, somewhat replicating the effect of speakers.  It's not a perfect solution by any means, but it does reduce the irritation that can be caused by hard left-right panning.