For like two years now I was using Sony’s MDR-E10LP earhones whenever using my headphones was not an option. While the Sony’s neon yellow color and nice high range output made it charming at first, its utter lack of bass made me only pick it up when I really had no other choice. However, a while back its cable got caught in my bike’s chain and alas it was a goner. I still had my Audio Technica headphones, but in the humid Japanese summer heat no sound’s worth sweating that much for.

But I was (am) pretty satisfied with those headphones (the first to last longer than a few months), so I decided to look for some cheaper earphones in the AT lineup. After a short search, I found the ATH-C505 and that was it. First of all, it’s stupidly cheap, under a thousand yen on Amazon, which is less than half of what I paid for the Sony earphones. Second, it’s Audio Technica, which spells reliability to me.

It didn’t let me down. Of course I didn’t expect perfection from this price range (nor should anyone), and all the more surprised I was that these earphones gave me something that I could never before find in any earphone: bass. Lots of it. I mean, lots of it. Considering how a huge portion of my music library is very heavy on the low end (lots of metal and bass-oriented electronic music), this was great news to me. I could finally listen to my music without having to tweak the equalizer to boost the bass to audible ranges!

Naturally this comes with a price, as while the lower ranges sound great, the upper end feels a bit clouded. It’s clearly noticeable when I compare it to my headphones, but it’s not disturbing, at least not for me. Especially with the ClearSound whatever thing built into my Xperia’s music player, the high range can squeak almost to its full glory.

All in all, I consider it a great buy.