allright. Sorry I have not responded. Yes, they sound completely different. It transformed my Sennheisers. I am not the best at describing the things that I hear, but I will give it a try. I will try to describe what I remember noticing when i first got them, before I got the amp. Keep in mind, that these headphones were also recabled, and the observations are just my opinions...
The first thing I noticed was that everything seemed "lifted up", like the sound was stretched up and over my head. The stock Sennheisers sometimes feel to me like the sound is coming mostly from below, that they are trapped down underneath a barrier. I think this is the "dark" sort of sound people always comment on. The higher frequencies seemed more trasparent, and clearer. Everything was more seperated and the field in which the sounds resided in was much deeper and had a kind of a round feel to it, curving out and around me. It is almost like the wood creates a little world for the sound to live in. but this world sounds a lot bigger than the small wood cups. I keep hearing things like voices in the background of the music and freak out, but there is noone there, i put the headphones back on and hear them again. I dont know if they are haunted, or if im hearing things in the background of the recordings or what...
I didnt really notice an increase in bass. But what i did notice was that it wasnt as dry and chalky sounding as the stock. It seemed more liquid, and seemed that it wasnt constrained in its ability to portray the unique virtues of the bass notes. I first listened to "Natural Mystic" by Bob Marley. If you are farmiliar with this song, you know how the bass comes in slowly, until it is just grooving, and then there are these really loud bass drum hits every once in a while. For the first time, I noticed that these hits didnt just sound like the bassist had slaped his strings really hard, but sounded like a percussive instrument, and I could hear the material of the drum stick used and hear the drum, and the sound reverberate out of the drum. And the rhythm guitar, and cymbal work, was just swirling all around me. one would come in from behind my left side, and swing around towards the right, one would attack from the top right, and keep attacking, and then the bass drum, and then bob's voice right dead center in front of me. Wow.
I have no ability to decern which changes were caused by the cable and which were caused by the wood. As far as I know, it might all be the cable. But I am not about to mess around with these babies. Paired with my SR-71, when listening to music it is so clear and transparent, I feel like in the matrix, when he can see the code for evverything around him. I feel like I can see the sounds and instruments here, there, and over there and wrap my hands around them and bring them closer and smell them. I feel like I can almost pause the music and fly around through the stage and examine each and every instrument and who is playing it and how they are playing it and then push play again, and let that specific sound reverberate through me and just really feel THAT specific sound or instrument. Its quite an amazing experience.
The only thing I would say gets on my nerves sometimes is the size of the headphones. When lying down they kind of get weighed down off my head. And they arent quite portable anymore. but its worth it when compared to what I get out of these cans.
