The Kiwi Ears Serene: Paradoxical
Contents
The Serene is intriguing. At Alpha-Audio, we typically favour audio equipment that sounds neutral. It allows us to listen to music for a long time, perceive information from the recording, and be completely present. The Kiwi Ears Serene are far from neutral. And yet, these are headphones we keep coming back to. Perhaps because of their intimate signature?
Happy with compression
And then we make another remarkable discovery. We listen to “Each And Everyone” from the album “Eden” by Everything But The Girl. Our playlist contains two versions: the original from 1984 and the remaster from 2012. We use these tracks to demonstrate the difference between an original with a high dynamic range, due to the responsible use of compression and loudness, and a compressed remaster.
In most cases, the original sounds spacious, layered and pleasant. The remaster sounds muddy (and sometimes horrendous) because the different audio tracks have been compressed to the maximum.
The Serene headphones are the first device where the remaster sounds better than the original. Unbelievable! We hear this with other tracks too (Sabrina Carpenter, Olivia Dean, Yello). And we hear it when we use Spotify (Lossless). The Serene seems made for compressed tracks! And remasters! Whether it works the same way in your home will depend on the DAC/headphone amplifier combination. As you can read above, the Serene sounds different in every configuration.
Comparison
At € 135, the Kiwi Ears is a very competitively priced planar headphone. As far as we can tell, the only competitor that comes close in terms of price is the Fostex T50RP, which is currently available as mk4 for € 245. We have an earlier version that cost less than € 170 at the time.
The Fostex is also a planar headphone, sounds much more neutral than the Serene and is also less comfortable (because it is heavier and has less comfortable ear pads). It is mainly a workhorse at a mixing desk, but when paired with the HP-V1 headphone amplifier, it comes to life.
The Hifiman Sundara closed-back (€ 145) is comparable in price. We haven’t been able to test it properly; we have the Sundara open back ourselves. We expect this Sundara to sound more neutral than the Serena and to be a bit easier to drive.
Conclusion
We find the Kiwi Ears Serene to be somewhat paradoxical headphones. It's right and it's wrong at the same time. It's pleasant to listen to for long periods of time, while the sound signature is warm and far from neutral.
It's a pair of headphones that definitely does something enigmatic to the sonic signature; yet we still kept putting them on. For this price, there is probably no better planar headphone on the market.
This makes it a great first step for people who want to experience planar but are not looking for neutral and sterile sound. Because the Serene is anything but neutral and sterile. Definitely worth auditioning with a matching headphone amplifier.