House of Marley Revolution Headphones
House of Marley products support 1love the the Marley family charitable organization. And aside from the Bob Marley affiliation, they also claim to be eco-friendly products. What that means is a small amount of recycled plastic and a lot of other materials that are recyclable. Note: That’s recyclable, not recycled. The packaging itself is mostly recyclable, and made from an undisclosed amount of material that has already been recycled, with the exception of the small plastic sheet used as a window on the side. Revolution Headphones originally sold for about $90, but by the time I got around to writing this reviews (years…) they seem to be perpetually “on sale” for $49. Their current product lineup has on-ear headphones from $40-$80, and over-ear headphones starting at $150. I liked these headphones. At first I was a little put off by the thin cord. So these were supposed to be semi-serious headphones. I’m not a guy who spends $90 on a pair of headphones, so you’ll need to factor that in to how much weight this review holds.
I liked these headphones. Sure, the marketing material lays it on a little thick with Bob Marley references and eco-friendliness, but when I pulled them out of the box they seemed solid enough, and had some decent styling that was a little bit unique (at the time). I was a little bit put off by the thin cord for the small jack. (3.5mm? It doesn’t say.) The cord was braced in obligatory Rastafarian colors, but nab is it thin. The wire in those cables must be really small gauge, an therefore cheap. My listening tests were positive. These headphones are loud, and deliver good sound to my ears. I even tried them side by side with a splitter from the same source, in a commercial airliner no less. Against a set of Sony headphones that cost around $30 there was no contest. I even switched jacks to make sure it wasn’t a mechanical discrepancy. They fold up nicely, which means they could have used about half the packaging if they were really worried about being eco-friendly. I guess if your spending $80 on headphones, you want the box size to reflect that.
I have used these for over a year now, and the thin cord has held up fine. There’s no crackling when you wiggle or insert the cord, but there is however, a lose screw rattling around one of the barrels. Whatever it is, it happened a couple months into using them. There’s no visible way to one the barrel, so I’m just going to leave it there instead of taking the risk of marring the padding trying to get them open. The grill inside the ear muffs is covered with fabric matching the underside of the head strap, so there’s not really any way to take it apart. I have to imagine the House of Marley would repair or replace that.
To be honest, I’m not even a guy who spends $50 on a set of headphones. I didn’t buy these, they were sent to me to review. I dig these headphones. At $50 they are probably a solid buy.
