These BLON Headphones are Made of Walnut (BLON BL-60 Review)

BLON is best known for its in-ear headphones but it broke new ground this year with two over-ear headphones. Today, we are reviewing BL-B60s, a pair of headphones designed to deliver powerful bass and a wide soundstage, and can do so well with dark walnut earcups. Are they worth the $155 entry cost? Find in our review!

Specifications

• Current price: $155 (Linsoul)
• Driver: 50mm beryllium coated diaphragm (four-layer composite diaphragm)
• Impedance: 32ohm
• Sensitivity: 100dB
• Frequency range: 20-20KHz
• Cable length: 1.5m
• Facade material: Whole imported walnut wood
• Earcups: Hybrid fabric, protein leather
• Headband: Protein leather, steel frame
• Weight: 264g

BLON BL-B60 – Overview

The BLON B60s are quite nice headphones. They have dark walnut earcups, finished to expose the natural grain, giving them a natural, earthy look. They are available in silver or black frames to suit your taste. I was sent the black frame version and like the look.

The headphones are driven by a pair of large 50mm dynamic drivers. They are constructed of a four-layer composite and finished with a beryllium coating for improved responsiveness, speed, and low-end detail. Large dynamic drivers often excel in bass performance, but poor tuning and/or poor quality can result in bass that’s bloated and undefined. Here, a beryllium coating is applied to add stiffness to the driver, increasing its responsiveness and clarity.

The drivers are rated for 20-20kHz, which covers the range of human hearing. There’s no distortion that I can hear, even at high volume and through a sine sweep, so its quality is pretty good. They’re not hard to drive (a regular DAC dongle will do) and there’s a bit of scaling that happens with more power, but it’s no exception. You should get the same performance from these from a high power amp as a plant protection device, as long as it’s not too weak.

The headphones are quite comfortable (I’ll talk about that shortly), thanks to the well-finished pads and a hanging headband made of protein leather. The pads are a hybrid fabric, with fabric on the face and skin around their face and inner ring. This helps them avoid sweating while maintaining bass performance. The headband is made of protein leather but works well to sit comfortably on top of the head.

Finally, we have the cable, which is also quite nice. The B60s uses a detachable cable that connects to each earcup independently using a single 2.5mm jack. The cable is uniquely braided and flexible. The cable ends are all metal and have good strain relief at the 3.5mm jack. That’s a high point in this pack!

BLON BL-B60 – Fit and Comfort

The B60s are a pretty comfortable headset. They’re light at just 264 grams and the suspension band is well-finished, which effectively distributes its weight and keeps it away from hot spots during 1-2 hour listening sessions. The pads are also very comfortable with the fabric feeling nice on my skin. Heat build-up is a problem, though, so there should be small rest periods in the warmer rooms of my house.

Comfort isn’t a big deal with the design of the headphones, it’s the terrible headband. Above the leather strap is a steel frame that sounds like a tuning fork whenever it is touched. The ringing goes straight through the earcups and into your ears. A simple rubber damper would greatly reduce this problem, but it is indeed an issue that should have been noted and corrected during the design process.

BLON BL-B60 – Impressive when listening

The B60s are an interesting headset in many ways. In the last week, I was able to spend a lot of time listening to them with different genres of music and even playing games. BLON’s multi-bass tuning makes it back here, louder and bolder than ever, with a nice boost in the mids and highs to create a V-shaped tuning.. For pop and hip-hop music, it can be very good. For other tracks, such as guitar-driven metal, not so much. This is a headset that will rely heavily on the music and games you intend to listen to.

Let’s start with the positives. Bass has pounding – or rather, the sub-bass has a strong thumping sound. I was amazed at the depth, breadth and reverberation of the bass. This is definitely bass you can feel, even on tracks that may not have strong bass in the first place. Coheed and Cambria’s Pearl of the Stars encapsulate this. On neutral headphones, the bass line is suspended at the back but the B60s pushes it forward. I have never heard a song so loud and cinematic.

At the same time, the powerful sub-bass can sometimes become overwhelming. The resonance is wide enough that it drowns out the mids, especially in songs where other instruments are less prominent (like acoustic tracks that also have solid bass lines). It’s not bad enough to make those tracks unplayable but did make me crave an EQ for one-touch backtracking.

At the same time, there is a large amount of sound that stands out and sparkles in the mids and highs. Cymbals, traps, and hats can appear right in the mix. If you like hip-hop, banging, trap and high-hat crack songs, and other instruments like acoustic guitars will be clear and detailed. Love like the way you Lier by Rihanna and Eminem perfectly encapsulate what these headphones do well. In terms of EDM, Shadows by Seven Lions is an absolute showcase of bass, layered and textured with powerful synths. The rumbling of the sub-bass makes these headphones sound big.

For other types of music, such as guitar-driven metal, it’s a mixed bag. Angel Vivaldi’s Dopamine sounds empty. The twists in the middle made it hard to hear the detail and layering in the guitar beats. The same is true in Atreyu’s Bleeding Mascara: the opening was great with the double bass of the machine gun but once the song started properly, the body – those faltering guitars – was too far back to sound great.

On the other hand, the vocals are free. They are lush and detailed, appearing at the front of the mix, closer to the instruments. Whether it’s male or female vocals, I think these sounds great.

The other high point is the surprisingly large soundstage. As a closed defender, these sounds spacious. They’re not quite on the level of a good open-back headset, but they’re overworked when closed at this price point.

Given their tuning, this seems like an exceptional fit for mainstream listeners as well as non-competitive players. Sparkling mids and highs mean explosions, footage and sweeping scores will sound louder than ever. Unfortunately, one of the things that is lost with mid lane is enemy footsteps. If there are any kind of actions, they will become very hard to hear, so just use the single player.

Epilogue

So the takeaway: the BLON driver used here seems to be more than capable of producing great bass and great detail. It’s just tuned in such a way that the mids recede a little too much for certain types of music, and the sub-bass can sometimes become overwhelming. If you’re a fan of guitar-driven music with heavy rhythm guitars supporting vocals and lead vocals, you might want to add your own EQ to get the most out of them.

But, then there is the matter of price. They are too expensive for what they are. Consider: for $25 less, you can pick up the HIFIMAN HE-400SE, a widely reviewed monster of detail that doesn’t suffer from problems and offers similar tuning and even a soundstage. more widely. It’s not 1-on-1, because it’s a flat speaker, doesn’t have the same level of bass (even if you’ve rolled the B60 and brought it in line) and requires more power to drive. . However, it puts it in perspective of how expensive the B60s really are.

And then the headband. The gravy is good, it’s bad. What’s worse is that this is a 1) easy problem to solve; and 2) cannot be missed in any kind of test. Headphones have figured this out for years, so there’s really no reason for a steel frame to sound like a tuning fork straight to your brain.

However, when the B60s hit, they hit hard. As for pop and hip-hop, they’re great. There are pros and cons to this, but while some will love them, others will find them simultaneously too much and too little.

The product described in this article is provided by the manufacturer for evaluation purposes.