Pilgrim Noir

That sounds like just the sort of shit that I have no tolerance for. It’s such a dumb decision to price and value dance and insult your customer’s intelligence. You’re operating in a hobby with people that have some form of discretionary income. Maybe not every hobbyists, but a damn good amount of them are going to see through bullshit fairly easily. I immediately replaced the MKIV cable with a Hakugei Ashes. Thieaudio could’ve packed in a similarly beautiful cable for as much or less than their stock option. Elysian managed to do it for half the price with the Pilgrim Noire; that black/stealth Eros S is the only reason I own that IEM. I’m not even sure what it sounds like.

I picked up the 5+2 as well, and I agree with you that the slightly less energetic treble of the Explorers is what appealed more to me, especially for long listening sessions. It’s one of the few IEMs I could wear for 12-16 hours. If I ever overcompensate for the treble in a mix, I’m almost always going to run through a pair of diffuse field headphones like the 1990 or 770s and notice right away, but so far I haven’t had to correct much if at all. This is the same reason I preferred the Pilgrim Noire to the original Pilgrim. They were neutral, detailed, and more rounded off up top. Great working IEM as well, although overpriced.

In my years being an audiophile, i've heard tons of speakers, headphones, and iems and i've always preferred natural sou'ding ones over bassy, or trebly ones. My favorite speakers for that are the Triangle Magellan Concertos sw2, but that's far from practical. In the iem space, i enjoyed the Pilgrim Noir a fair bit, but thr tuning is emphasizing bass and high treble too much. If you can, i highly suggest you try the Final A8000. It's timbre is the very best i've heard, in some aspects it even surpasses the Magellan speakers (and some others it fails to). It's rather peaky in the treble, but given proper recording and good source (and a fair bit more powee than you'd think) it has an ability to reproduce instrument timbre lile no other. Truly alone on the market in that regard.

Tbh i used to enjoy my hd800s a lot, but iems have spoiled the fun for me. The first iem where i realized i wouldn't go back to headphones were the Pilgrim Noirs. Already loved the Pilgrims, but the Noir sounded so much better, more separated, way mire effortless where the Silver Pilgrims are pushing the bass and mids way too much into your face. Those were exactly what i wanted, except for realist timbre and a but better imaging. When i got the Final A8000s, it was all over. Nothing sounds as good as those to my ears. I prefer them over the HE-1, which I've spent lots of time on. I EQ them, because i think i have a mild hearing loss around 620-780Hz, and i prefer more linear treble. But the raw capabilities of those IEMs are just nuts. Whatever you plug them into, you hear the flaws of. Even 6kUSD dacs, even top of the line niche headphone amps built in Poland by boutique builders. TL DR i think IEMs are just plain better than headphones. Bit of a pain in the ass to admit but i've switched fully and happy to do so

I prefer to tip roll for days/weeks to “EQ” and will only keep IEMs around that need PEQ if they are guilt-free affordable (for me.) 2025 GOATs no EQ: DMA, ET142 (Gold nozzle + medium foam) Great, no EQ: EDC Pro, Gale, PA02, Mimosa, Pilgrim, Pilgrim Noir, RSV Great with PEQ: Grit, Soundpeats H3, Relentless Great but needed PEQ and too $: CP622B, Monarch MKIV No real worst, but I’m disappointed with the Noah. I had the Yu9 Que and it needed a little EQing, and frankly EQ’d my Relentless to the same sound so out the Que went - thought the Noah would be it (meaning not needing EQ) but the Que bodies it in all sonic preferences I have.

Endgame for me would be something like Annihilator 2023. I think the Mangird Xenns Top Pro is a good “endgame” iem. I have the Top OG and although it was real good, I tried the annihilator, elysian x effect, u12t so now I consider endgame to be the best possible experience for me. I upgraded to the FatFreq Quantum and I’ll keep these until I can justify spending $2k-3k on IEMs.

A big leap... Elysian Pilgrim. It is currently on sale on AliEx (sale and coupon) Well within your budget. This set usually sells for just under 400. It is a slight U shape with good treble extension and nice bass presence. Out of YOUR list...Kiwi Ears Astral and Ziigaat Odyssey are both good buys as well.