$999 in-ear headphones - audio jewellery for your ears

I love headphones, mainly the over-ear style ones but a solid in-ear set also floats my boat. But when our Dictator Trevor Long handed me $999 worth of wired in-ear headphones, I must admit I did a double take.

Back in July Japanese brand Final Audio released its newest range of in-ear headphones called the B Series. That’s all well and good but at almost a grand? Well I had to hear more, so to speak.

There are three stainless steel finishes, we scored the B1 rose gold set on loan. The B1 is said to place a “particular emphasis on proximity of sound and sense of reality. In music represented by animation soundtracks, recordings make the proximity of sound more conspicuous. For this type of music recording, the B1 has been designed to achieve playback more consistent with the balance of sound as created by the engineer.”

Now I agree with all that, but at almost a grand? I still needed to hear more. So, I plugged it into my iPhone and dialled up Spotify. Here’s my verdict, if you really need to have a concert hall screwed into your ears than the B1’s might be worth a look. The sound is tremendous and I can hear all those dollars driving some crazy tech none of us understand here.

But to put it bluntly they sound shit hot.

My only issue is the design. First of all, the cord looks like something my Great Grandma “Nanny Burford” knitted in 1986. Secondly, I’m not sure I’d be caught dead in public with those gold nugget plugs hanging out of my ears.