Well, my plans to get into some Stax actions this year (or the Caldera Closed) have changed. Instead there's an extremely expensive headphone on the way. Crazy how listening to the Pulsar has changed my opinion. All it took was one day. At first i compared the Pulsar to the Verite Open. On the same day later, i listed the VO in the classified and compared the Pulsar to the Susvara. The Susvara did sound thinn in comparison. Every string instrument on the Pulsar had so much note weight and lifelike timbre, i totally became obsessed with it. Lucky for me that a chance to get the bigger brother presented itsself, in less than one hour. I love this community. I honestly can't wait to hear it. I will compare the Valkyria to the Pulsar when it arrives.
I have to agree that some genres do sound very bad, but i listen to a lot of rock, metal, and also a good amount of classic. The Pulsar is just unbelievable with those genres. I played piano for ~8 years or so myself and truly know the timbre of that instrument inside and out. It's so easy for me to tell if a song has a keyboard in it or a real piano. The Pulsar brings out string instruments like no other headphone, not even the Susvara can touch it.
It's such a damn shame that the resemblance to the much worse Grado headphones are there, including the non-removable cable, which honestly doesn't bother me at all because it's so well made. I didn't see any Pulsar recommendations, ever. I can't speak for the other headphones of Spirit Torino, i read that most of them have a very wonky tuning. I honestly don't think the Pulsar is as overpriced as many other people think, the problem is rather that because of the scarcity it almost never pops up on the used market. Of course everyone just smiles and moves on when they see the pricetag of the Valkyria, but a few units are circling around inside a very small community here in head-fi that truly appreciates what it can do. I will also join that community and am very eager to experience it.
This hobby always suprises me, it's quite nuts.
To anyone: Before spending a fortune on cables / DAC's etc, make sure you check out a lot of headphones. You might be suprised what awaits you behind the standard horizon that is Hifiman, Audeze, Focal etc.