You can’t name a single headphone that has consistent reviews here. And not only that the reviews aren’t consistent, they are compeletly in contrast to each other and you can’t get any useful info on products because of that. I’ve been looking around for a headphone that i can upgrade to and after 2 weeks of watching reviews on YT and reading people’s opinions here, I am pretty much convinced that there is no point in reading nor watching the reviews here and YT.
I also do not understand the overly negative feelings people have towards different headphones. It almost feels like 75 percent of reviewers here are just fan-boys of a single brand and are trying to destroy other headphone brands.
And I’ve been into the hobby for about 4 years now and I know the terms people use and what they by them, so no I’m not confused by terminology or anything like that, I’m just frustrated by everyone here thinking they are absolutely right about everything (sometimes even about things they haven’t even tried)
It's a simple matter of you needing to come to terms with the fact that you MUST try before you buy. Just as you said, everything is subjective as it is in food. The only thing you should take away from reviews are things like build quality. BUT even then build quality is subjective because some people are ham-handed morons who deal with their equipment like it's something you should be able to toss around like a bat and ball. People always complained about the Sony MDR-V700's cracking at the swivel points, and it took 20 years for mine to develop a stress crack and that only happened because my kids kept knocking them off my desk--in my loving hands they were never going to crack.
Unfortunately, there are tons of "audiophiles" who aren't actually looking for what sounds good to them because they are so blinded by the idea of equipment that is mathematically or electronically perfect, which is also a faulty concept because our hearing is all different and equipment with flat response will still fail us due to peaks and valleys in our own hearing--a flat response at 3kHz becomes a low spot due to our damaged hearing at 3kHz or similar.