Maiden's £199 headphones on sale from today

Iron Maiden have released their official headphones, ‘Ed-Phon3s’. The £199 (or €299) headphones are designed in conjunction with Maiden bassist Steve Harris and produced by Japanese electronics company Onkyo.

To go with the new headphones, a companion MaidenAudio smartphone app is available for iOS and Android and includes exclusive custom EQ settings.

Harris says: “I knew that I would need some really good headphones to use for playback of the mixes of The Book Of Souls. I’d actually started looking into this about 18 months prior to when we started recording because I’d been struggling to find a design which came even remotely close to what I felt was an acceptable sonic standard for rock and metal.

“My main objective was for a balance that wasn’t just top and bottom heavy with hardly any mid range like a lot of headphones these days that are basically designed for dance music. I wanted a good balance across the widest bandwidth incorporating a lot more mid range frequencies, something I strongly feel is vital to appreciate the complexities of our music and rock and metal in general.

“A friend at Onkyo suggested I get in touch with the company to create a design that could meet my specifications. We started collaborating and have been working on them ever since, endlessly evaluating frequencies and modifying drive units, materials, cables and connectors until we achieved my ideal balance. I am now really happy with the final result.”

Onkyo’s partnership with Maiden was announced at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January.

Maiden feature in the current issue of Classic Rock magazine, in which frontman Bruce Dickinson discusses his cancer battle, Maiden’s future, his love of fencing and the “weird” experience of watching tribute band The Iron Maidens.

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Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.