Review: Meze 12 Classics Gunmetal – Depeche Node

Disclaimer: Meze graciously supplied the Meze 12 Classics Gun Metal for the purposes of this review. It goes for 79$ USD. You can find out more about it here: 12 Classics Gun Metal.

I want to avoid the word classy. I want to do that because I hate getting bogged down in excessively icky alliteration. But like 11 Neo, there is so much good to say about 12 Classics. And, though I hate doing so, I’m tempted to start with price. 79$ isn’t a lot of money in today’s audiophile milieu. It’s also not a lot of money for an earphone as polished as the 12 Classics.

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Both the 11 and the 12 start with the same essentials: box, three single flanged silicon ear tips, one dual flanged silicon ear tip pair, and a pair of always-comfy Complys. 11 Neo’s dual flange tips surprise by being comfy enough for a full album listen, though do the usual pain thing after that. But my ears are super sensitive. Neither do they like loud, nor do they like tough and invasive. Comply it is. That, or Ortofon’s brilliant clear flanges, which you’ll find in the ortofon e-Q8 and the Grado GR8e and Grado GR10.

Hint to both makers and enthusiasts: Ortofon flanges are the bomb.

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I can’t complain about the cramped and zippered case Meze threw in. While its chemical smell curls nasal hairs, it protects and organizes well.

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With the exception of its walnut cabinet, Meze 12 Classics and 11 Neo feel and look the same. That means that 11 Classics is sturdy, and for a 79$ earphone, extremely polished. About the only thing I can complain is how fat its sound chamber is post sound-tube. It bunches up against my ear canal, at times making sturdy fit a bit of a thing.

Whatever. Read my 11 Neo review. You’ll get the drift.

Sound and more after the jump: