Headphones

Disclaimers:

- This is a review unit that was kindly sent over by Linsoul, I was not paid to say anything good or bad about this product, If you are interested in it you can check it out at this link: https://www.linsoul.com/products/kiwi-ears-melody

- Testing was done on the Topping A90d, FiiO BTR5 and Apple dongle.

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Features:

- 12mm planar driver

- 89$ msrp

- metal faceplate with a frosted resin shell, feels really nice

- cable is good, feels premium and although it is slightly stiff it’s good for the pierce.

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Fit and comfort:

Nozzle size is slightly above average at 6.1mm so only very small ears will have issues and the shell is medium in size but it has no sharp edges inside so it’s no problem for me. To my ears it was comfortable.

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Sound:

In the past pulling off a planar IEM was a near impossible feat, until the Timeless came out… Since that the planar wars floodgate was opened and planar iem’s are a new norm.
Kiwi Ears, now late to the planar party, has released a budget planar set retailing at 90$, and my opinions on it are… Mixed…

The tuning is just borked. The bass is A LOT, but, as I have mentioned in my Legato review, I am not against bassy tunings, I have an issue with bass that bleeds into the Lower mids, and Both the Legato and Melody are Guilty of Midbass bloat. The Melody even more so than the Legato.

But my biggest gripe about the Melody is the INSANE treble peaks, whilst a few songs are not influenced too drastically, on many songs the treble really is too much. Whilst there is emphasis in the lower and mid treble, it is somewhat offset from the huge bass, but the MASSIVE upper treble peak cannot be escaped. On some songs it’s not THAT bad, but songs from artists like MJ that feature a lot of crisp hi hats are unlistenable. So whilst you cannot deny there is treble extension, with a lot of micro details being highlighted, said details are painfully shoved in your face.

With the muddy bass and piercing treble the midrange is very much left in the background and overall sound fairly unnatural. Vocals do come across as sibilant from the treble but my main issue is that the timbre is off, they don’t sound natural and have certain graininess to them. A good example is Empire Ants from Gorillaz, I love the vocal part at the start of the song and Damon’s (2D’s) voice is actually unpleasant.

Here’s a graph (credit to Paul Wasabi): https://pw.squig.link/?share=Crinacle_Target,Kiwi_Ears_Melody

On the bright (GET IT) side the iem is very detailed, as mentioned before the treble despite its issues does highlight parts of the music that usually seem hidden. My favourite part of the iem is the bass, whilst I’m not fond of the way the bass is tuned, the Melody has some brilliant sub-bass texture, with great dynamics.

Applying EQ to the iems was tricky for me as I do not have access to a fully parametric EQ, and EQ-ing iems with odd treble is not easy with any method, and the midrange still retained some weirdness, but by knocking down the treble, lower mids, and some of the mid bass, I could enjoy the positives better and despite the unperfect mids the bass was, as I mentioned, really fun. It also gave me the opportunity to appreciate the decent staging that is mostly lost with a very V-shaped tuning.

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Final thoughts:

Despite the great detail retrieval, the tuning issues are too much for me, and ereven if you like to use EQ, very peaky treble can often be really hard to fix even with the best of EQ.

I am disappointed as I know Kiwi Ears can do a bassy tuning done right with the Quartet, which I like and sometimes use in my daily rotation, the Orchestra Lite is probably my favourite iem so far and I often recommend the Cadenza.

I finally understand why teachers always said they disliked giving bad grades, as I don’t enjoy writing a negative review, but at the same time I have to be truthful despite being a fan of the company.

At the price, I believe the HBB Kailua is a better option if you want a V-shaped iem that still retains a certain “correctness” to its tonality, and is overall very fun. The Simgot ea200 is also a good fun iem if you want to save a buck or two. And if you want to give something from Kiwi Ears a try I am happy to recommend the Quartet at a similar price point.