I'm a music aficionado, a connoisseur of playlists, an audio nerd who wakes up with tunes in her head. You'll find me wearing headphones almost throughout the day and, as a reviews writer, I get to test some of the best wireless earbuds and best headphones.
Sounds like the dream, right? It is, but it has its side effects.
The downsides of using in-ears all the time are that it can damage your hearing and give you ear infections, and the latter is what happened to me.
Instead of turning off the music for a few weeks, I instead grabbed a pair of over-ear headphones. Having exclusively used over-ears for nearly two months now (with a sprinkle of in-ear testing for work), I'm fully convinced that they are the superior choice in terms of comfort, sound quality, ANC...pretty much everything.
And I owe it all to the Marshall Monitor III and Meze 105 AER.
How earbuds will give you an ear infection
A few months ago, I made a mistake: I started wearing in-ear buds to bed. I'd fall asleep listening to binaural beats or soft, acoustic music.
In my sleep I was adjusting the earbuds and pushing them deeper into my ear canals ... this led to me developing a skin infection.
Unbeknownst to me, in my sleep, I was adjusting the earbuds and pushing them deeper into my ear canals. Unfortunately, this led to me developing a skin infection which, months later, I'm still working on fixing.
Thing is, I didn't immediately blame the earbuds and my bad habits, so I went to the doctor who, in under a minute, told me the cause: excessive use of in-ears.
"Nooooooo!" the voice inside my head screamed. That was the moment I knew I had to kick the habit, stop wearing in-ears to bed, and get a pair of over-ear headphones.
Enter the Marshall Monitor III, a pair of headphones I immediately fell in love with (and not just because Billie Joe Armstrong, one of my favorite artists endorses them). They saved my ears, and I'm surprised I didn't swap in-ears for over-ears sooner.
Why over-ears are the way to go
The Monitor IIIs are extremely comfortable. The plush leather earcups sit snugly around my ears and having worn them for eight straight hours at a point, I can confidently say they never hurt my ears — or make them too hot.
The reason they one-up in-ears in comfort is because the cushioning distributes pressure evenly around the ears, so you can wear them for longer. I appreciate the Monitor III's headband too, which is covered in a leatherette and features a silicon band underneath to relieve pressure on the top of your head.
Thing is, the headphones are already very light. They weigh 8.8oz, so the headband and plush earcups make you forget you even have them on.
Over-ears also avoid direct contact with your ear canal, the benefits of which are twofold: better sound quality, and the minimization of issues like sweat buildup and excess pressure which can lead to skin damage. Bacteria doesn't get trapped either, which is ideal.
In fact, I was so happy with the wonders the Monitor IIIs were doing for my ears that I had to make my partner try them, and now she's always asking me if she can borrow them when I'm not using them.
The sound is where it's at
And of course, one of the biggest selling points is that over-ear headphones provide better noise isolation and a larger soundstage — and the Marshall Monitor III do just that. I kinda get why Green Day's frontman is a brand ambassador now. You know you're getting bang for your buck when one of the greatest bands of all time (that's a fact, not an opinion) vouches for them.
I love using the Monitor III while traveling and even just working thanks to how well the ANC works, and noise isolation is so good that I can appreciate every note in a song. While in-ears are better at isolating noise because they create a seal, I'd rather use over-ears which don't create as much of a seal, thereby avoiding build-up of bacteria.
And how do the Monitor IIIs sound? Our audio editor, Tammy, went into great detail describing the audio quality in her in-depth review and heaped praises on them. To me, they sound excellent. Boasting a wide soundstage, nearly every genre I listens to sounds divine through these.
I especially love how well the Monitor IIIs balance distorted basslines and low/high vocal notes throughout 070 Shake's album 'Petrichor.' Likewise, hits like 'Von Dutch' and '365' from Charli XCX's 'Brat' sound even more powerful as I can feel the thumping drums in my jaw — and this applies to the entirety of Pink Floyd's discography too.
Enter the Meze 105 AER
I got so used to using the Marshall Monitor III while out and about that I needed a second pair of headphones to keep the listening session going when I got home.
Luckily, I had the pleasure of trying out the Meze 105 AER, and it's the one pair of wired headphones I've actively looked forward to using.
While the Marshall headphones were great for taking anywhere, the Meze are chunky headphones, with massive earcups that make me look like Princess Leia, but man are they insanely comfortable. Wired headphones come with an obvious limitation, of course, but they work well with my MacBook Air M2 while listening to music on Qobuz.
Like the Monitor III, the 105 AER are light and designed in a way that doesn't weigh you down. And everything you've heard about wired headphones being far better than wireless cans for sound is true — as proven to me by the 105 AER. With an impressively wide and dynamic soundstage, music sounds energetic yet warm, regardless of whether you're listening to instrumental soundtracks or heavy metal tracks.
I love that I can hear every ukulele note plucked in Twenty One Pilots' 'Paladin Strait.' As a guitarist and bassist, being able to hear subtle notes is crucial for me, and the 105 AER ensures that's always the case. The included 6.53mm adapter in the box also means that you can plug the headphones into an amplifier, making the 105 AER a great pickup for musicians.
In the wireless age, I know not everyone is keen on going back to wired headphones. But having lived with the 105 AER for a couple of months now has convinced me of one thing: everyone needs to experience living with them for a bit.
Medicinal creams have (nearly) healed my skin infection, but I have to thank the Marshall Monitor III and the Meze 105 AER, too. These are two of the most comfortable headphones I've ever used and I can't believe I went this long without them.
