Any engineer will tell you “Don’t mix with headphones!”. But I’ll tell you, if you have to, use these. If you wanna fork out $499.95 to get ‘em, I’d almost encourage you. The portability aspect and impeccable sound quality are worth the high sticker price. Travel a lot? You can mix a record on an airplane and it can sound like it came out of a control room in LA. Awesome.

Electronic Musician says it best – “The IE-40 professional earphones feature armature drivers that deliver extended high frequencies, clear mid-tones and natural bass. According to the manufacturer, they are significantly smaller and more accurate than comparable dynamic drivers. The IE-40 reference earphones’ audio crossover network routes each frequency to the appropriate high, mid, or low driver. The IE-40s also incorporate Ultimate Ears’ proprietary dual-bore design to deliver a wider soundstage through separate acoustic canals for high and low channels—thus allowing the sound to mix naturally in the ear itself. In addition, the IE-40 earphones provide 26 dB of sound isolation.”