Verdict
If a vigorous , active and thoroughly engaging interpretation of your favourite music is what you ’re after , and if you do n’t mind paying for it , Austrian Audio would care you to see The Composer …
Pros
Cons
Key Features
Introduction
It ’s been getting on for eight years since a chemical group of AKG employee decline to affect themselves in the move from Vienna to California dictate by parent troupe Harman , and adjudicate to set up their own headphone caller rather .
So it has n’t engage all that long for Austrian Audio to establish its credential not only where consumer - design headphones are refer but also with studio apartment - grad mike too .
Until now , though , the vast majority ofAustrian Audio productshave been aim at the mainstream – some are even contesting the debut level . But with the portentously named The Composer , the company is set up its sights on the rather more rarefied area of the market contest by the likes of Grado , Sennheiser and , yes , AKG …
Availability
The Austrian Audio The Composer telegraph over - ear open - backed headphones are uncommitted in the United Kingdom for £ 2249 per twosome . In the United States you ’re looking at $ 2699 , while in Australia the going charge per unit is AU$3849 or thereabouts .
Need I say with undue emphasis that a ) this is mess of money for a distich of headphone , and b ) you ’ve plenty of alternative to consider . Brands as believable as Beyerdynamic , Grado and Sennheiser ( to name but three ) all have similarly configured , likewise priced products with which to twist your head …
Design
Fundamentally , you know what you ’re getting here . These are over - ear headphones , after all , and where design is concerned no marque in its right mind is about to throw caveat to the wind .
So The Composer look like a steady pair of over - ear headphones – albeit a pair that uses cautiously selected material that are equally carefully assembled . The multi - hinged yokes allow the headphones to fold bland and afford a arcdegree of fore / aft movement as well in plus the four careen position the earcups can be moved into .
The earpads are of soft pleather - covered store foam , and the rear of the earcups is a fine wire mesh that a ) affords a view of the back of the drivers , and b ) means these Austrian Audio are about as open - back as they come .
The headband is a two - tier up design – the inside is a light , flexile internet - and - pleather airstrip that observe the headphones secure and your head mercifully unsweaty at the same meter . Outside that is a slim aluminium band that settle the headphones and preserve them in post . With admirable understatement , it carries the legend ‘ The Composer ’ and ‘ Made in Austria ’ on the interior . The only other stigmatisation is the company name on each of the slender earcup - to - yoke legal profession .
Specification
Austrian Audio has suit a twosome of 49 mm full - range dynamic machine driver to do the audio business – each diaphragm is coat with Diamond - Like Carbon for strength , stiffness and minimal exercising weight . Austrian Audio is take a frequency response of 5Hz – 44Hz , which is both way below and above the range of human audience .
Each one is fed by a cable that fits into the earcup using a bespoke two - bowling pin banana tree jack connector . There are a option of three overseas telegram in the cock-a-hoop , businesslike boxwood in which The Composer arrive : a 1.3 m length that terminates in a 4.4 mm Pentacon connector , a 3 m distance that finishes with a four - oarlock XLR and another 3 m cablegram that ’s terminate with a 3.5 mm plug . This last can be fit with the provide 6.3 millimetre arranger .
Sound Quality
First things first : expensive headphones in general , and the Austrian Audio The Composer specifically , lean to ask an equally high - reach source of medicine if they ’re going to give you everything they ’ve got . Yes , you could punch The Composer into the earphone socket of your laptop – but you know as well as I do that ’s not a good idea . These earphone are the end - point of a arrangement , after all , and a imperfect link in the mountain chain will be ruthlessly peril by these headphones .
But with a connection made to the 4.4 millimetre output of one of iFi’siDSD Diablo 2headphone amplifier , The Composer desolate little fourth dimension in lay down their credentials . And what direct , dynamic and exhaustively revealing credential they are too .
Given a big 24 - bit/192kHz FLAC data file of David Bowie ’s Sound and Vision to deal with , the iFi and Austrian Audio combining is little short of thrilling . The speech sound The Composer serve up is absolutely wide open , with an tremendous sense of outer space to the extensive and deep soundstage they create .
The care they pay to the finest details of the recording is easily described as rabid – but the balance they come across between analysis and enjoyment is attractively judged . Yes , they ’ll let you have intercourse about every aspect of the recording , and give even the most ephemeral of details the appropriate weight unit – but everything ’s in context , and everything is in service of the bigger video .
There may be good deal of space available on the soundstage , and the headphones may give just as much emphasis to the muteness and gaps , but they commix the transcription into something approaching a genuine public presentation .
They ’re a staggeringly positive listen – the typically tight - mic’d vocal during a 24 - bit/44.1kHz FLAC data file of Billie Eilish ’s All the Good Girls Go to Hell is direct and unequivocal . The same recording tolerate The Composer to demonstrate their mastery of tonality ( neutral and natural every time ) , their power to travel the whole of the frequency compass without over- or understating any surface area ( eldritch ) , and their ability to hit prodigiously operose at the bottom remainder without any deficiency of control or impact on impulse .
The moral force of the transcription , both where the obvious shift in strength and the more subtle harmonic variations are concerned , are relayed with the form of effortlessness that ’s the marker of a truly accomplished pair of headphones .
The Composer express the hectic rhythms and stunt pace - change of Chick Corea ’s issue to Forever without break travail . The control condition they exert over the attack and decay of individual sound is inviolable , and they charge even the most speedy , fleeting element of the transcription with a stack of selective information regarding tone , texture and intensity .
Really , about the only problem of any billet pertain want of leeway The Composer have for ropey transcription or small , contract digital audio files – aggregate the two , for example with a listen to a 320kbps MP3 file Holy Calamafuck by campaign the Jewels and the lack of forbearance the Austrian Audio have for this nonsense is almost powerful . Is it crude and jagged around the edges ? Is it squashed and press ? This is exactly how The Composer will make it voice , and I get the unassailable belief they ’ll judge you as a hearer at the same time .
Latest deals
Should you buy it?
Although to be honest , The Composer sound so good you ’d in all likelihood want to listen for hour even if they were n’t so delightfully comfortable …
Understated is about as positive as I can be when it add up to the looking and feel of The Composer
Final Thoughts
I ’ve heard and enjoy several pairs of Austrian Audio headphones before now , so my hopes were jolly in high spirits for The Composer – but equally , it ’s hard not to interest when a company attempts to break the hegemony of some deeply credible ( and longer - base ) stain .
So here ’s where I gently chide myself for ever having doubted Austrian Audio ’s ability to deliver in every meaningful respect , no matter the market in which it ’s competing …
Trusted Score
How we test
We examine every brace of headphones we review good over an prolonged period of time . We employ industry - received tests to compare feature properly . We ’ll always tell you what we find . We never , ever , accept money to reexamine a mathematical product .
Find out more about how we try in ourethics policy .
FAQs
A 3 m with 3.5 millimeter Jack Plug ( TRS ) , 3 m with XLR 4pin , 1.4 m with 4.4 mm Pentaconn vogue
