Auteur Classic

Hi Everyone! TL;DR: The ZMF Atrium Redwood Burl are works of art and sound incredible, super happy. I was on a mission to try out several headphones I've been unable to demo elsewhere and hopefully come away with an idea of what would be next for me. I've been spoiled for choice with some of the local shops here in the Twin Cities area but a few brands/higher-end options haven't been available. I reached out to ZMF to ask if they offer workshop tours and have demo units available to try. I thought I'd make a trip to Chicago and pay them a visit. While they do have kind of open-house days, they also told me they'd be at AXPONA. I'm a bit embarrassed to say I'd not heard of it prior, as I had only known of Canjam. I had previously lived in the LA area so the show was there all the time, but I had been pretty happy with my HD800S and LCD-X for a while, so I had not visited in years. I decided I'd visit AXPONA since pretty much everyone would be there and I'd be able to demo pretty much anything I'd be looking for. I made the rounds and tested several headphones out I had been considering and pretty much steered clear of the options that are $10k+ or of questionable quality/new brands. Any and everything was there to demo, but I didn't want try stuff that would linger in the back of my mind and ruin my wallet (Warwick) or disappear from existence in a few years. I tried the Audio Technica ADX3000 and ADX7000, ZMF Auteur Classics, Atrium, Tessidera, and Caldera. I also tried the Hifiman Arya Organic and Arya Unveiled despite being a Hifiman hater. I'd pretty much tried other contenders at the local shops; Meze Empyrean II and Elites, Audeze LCD5, Focal Utopia and Clear MGs, and Fostex TH1100RP. I like my HD800S, but I've since given them to my wife and I wanted kind of the "next level" for open backs and perhaps something with a bit more bass (thanks Sony) and "different" tuning. The ADX3000 and ADX7000 both had interesting tuning and I'd have loved to listen to them longer, but I didn't like any of the AT pads, the ear opening is just too small for my ears. The Hifimans I tried: The Arya Unveiled made me nervous to touch it ,and the booth had it hooked up to a laptop with literally only one Led Zeppelin song in windows media player. I didn't sit there long. The Arya Organic sounded pretty good, but I could not get them to feel secure on my head. Huge ear openings and relatively comfortable, but they kind of sloshed around on my head. Unfortunately for them, I had already visited the ZMF booth and the wood veneer and overall build quality just felt bad (I'd hazard to say not just bad by constrast, but just objectively bad). I also didn't listen to them for very long either as the track-list available at the Moon Audio booth was pretty poor and the folks working there were kind of cold / perhaps more interested in peddling cable snake oil to old folks with more money than sense. Sidebar: Shame on the audio industry and a lot of the trade show vendors for just making up lies about cables. I heard a vendor I won't name talking about $5000 speaker wire and $9000 1m long XLR cables. Onto the ZMF booth. Auteur Classics - like the HD600s but more of everything, including weight. I felt these would cause some discomfort for longer listening sessions and they didn't quite feel like "enough" of an upgrade to my ears from what I'm used to. I tried the new Tessidera and Caldera and both also felt too heavy for me despite the otherwise great ergonomics. I also think in contrast to the Atrium the timbre and the midrange of those planars just didn't hit right with me. I think they're both very technically competent with interesting tuning, but the key here is contrast. So the Atriums. Kind of funny, both my wife and I had the same general first impression, "wow". I sat with these the longest as it was clear to me these struck a lot of the right chords (pun intended). To sum them up in simplest terms, they have authority. Notes have heft/impact. The mids/upper mids are a bit forward, the bass hits hard, the treble is detailed, but not too bright. Instrument separation is good, sound stage isn't huge, but it's not overly intimate. Others have written more eloquently than me on how these sound, so I won't go on. I had a separate problem now, can I get one? The folks working the booth were great, especially Bevin, she was super helpful and very gracious. We went through the list of options they had available there and I felt like a kid in a candy store. There were so many wonderful combinations to choose from. The decision was complicated by some banter between Zeos, Bevin, and Zach. There was discussion of boneless versus bone-in chicken, chef boyardee resin stabilized LTDs, etc. I'm just standing there admiring the different wood, chassis, and grill choices. A truly surreal experience. Ultimately the Redwood Burls suited me best. Coming in at almost exactly 500 grams, they are hefty, but among the lighter options there because of their lower density. They have a really great sonic character and look stunning. The Atriums are a really special headphone that just ended up doing more right for me than everything else I've tried recently and I've been super happy listening to them the past few days. To those that made it all the way through, thanks for reading. If you have questions about why I chose these over some of the other models listed, I can answer in the comments, this post is already too long.