However, to reach this intimacy, good headphones must be driven with appropriate headphone amp.
But it does not have to be that way. Theoreticaly headphones should allow you to be closer to the music, more intimate, not disturbed by outside noises. Furtermore, it should be easier to cover the whole frequency spectra with one voice coil, no crossovers,no phase shifts; not influenced by room accoustics, just the recorded sound; should be easy to drive, just a couple of miliwatts...
Whay it is not that way?
As I said, to reach this intimacy, good hedphones must be driven with appropriate headphone amp.
When it come to headphones, I settled with Sennheiser's HD580 and Grado's SR325. I am not saying that there are no better cans, but these are exceptionaly good. They are just like jin and jang. Two different wolds. Grados are neutral, well balanced, deep powerful bass is combined with extended hights, clean and precise sound. Very dynamic. Their 32 ohm resistence can be a problem for high output impedance tube amps. But I use them often, sometimes I have a taste just for this precise presentation. Sennheisers on the other hand are lighter sounding, nice soft hights, generaly more lush and sweeter sounding. Might be too sweet and light with some tube amps. Very pleasant to wear unlike Grados.
Headphone apms?
I have Musical Fidelity's X-Cans, excelent headphone amp. (you know this is not actualy a tube amp, its just tube input buffer, its op ne5532 driving the headphones) A while ago I had HeadRoom's Little, dry awfull uninspireing sound, I had to returne it. Plus I built a couple of headphone amps myself. Each amp sounds differently. As well as each headphones. So there is a lot of combinations to explore.
