The Redemption Song Headphones -
Made of recycled or sustainable (naturally occurring) materials the Redemption Song headphones are impressive to look at. You can tell at first glance that these are a quality set with none of the usual plastic or tacky fake leather. Here you have the real deal from the real beach wood to the real tanned leather even down to the cloth braided cabling.

The Redemption Song headphones also have a very comfortable weight to them. They are not light by any means but the weight they have sits very comfortably on your head. This weight also does help to reduce secondary vibrations in the headphones that can affect sound reproduction. Before we get too far let’s start a quick walk around the Redemption Song On-Ear headphones to make sure we cover everything.

Behind the audio for the Redemption Song Headphones is a pair of 40mm moving coil drivers that are capable of a 15 k – 22 KHz frequency response and also allow for move impact from the sound they deliver. But just having a good set of drivers is not enough. These are tuned for the materials they are encased in; after all the best speakers in the world can be killed by putting them in a bad cabinet. The engineers at HOM know this and have made sure to tune the audio accordingly. The ear cups that will sit on your ear are made of tanned leather (nothing synthetic here) and not only provide for comfort but are also breathable. When they are on your head they provide a good seal to help shut out noise that could interfere with your listening enjoyment. On the back of the ear piece is a thin slice of real beach wood. This adds a nice aesthetic touch to the Redemption Song Headphones. Around these (as we have mentioned before) is a recyclable aluminum ring. This is cut a little thicker than some but this only adds to the weight and stability of the headphones.  The ear piece rings are connected to the head strap along an adjustable slide a thin braided cable connect the two drivers through the head strap with a small coiled loop at each side to complete the look.

Moving on to the head strap it is also made of sturdy aluminum, but enclosed in more tanned leather. Along the outside of the head strap HOM has also put in a cloth inset that proudly shows off the colors of the Reggae Culture (which come from the colors of the African flag which is usually symbolized by the colors red, yellow, green and black, but also include the green and yellow from the Jamaican flag). The head strap is also padded but here the leather holding the padding is vented to allow it to compress easier (which means more comfort).

Unlike many on-ear headsets the cable that connects you to your audio device is not permanently connected. There is a small 1/8-inch port that you plug the included cable into. Speaking of the cable this is without a doubt one of the nicest one that we have tested out. The cable is sturdy and covered in a cloth coating (again with the red, yellow, green and black colors). The cable has gold plated connectors at each end (these are nice, but unless the port you are plugging into is gold they do not do much they are a nice touch though).  HOM did include audio controls for the iPad, iPhone and iPod, but unfortunately these will not work on other devices the button in the center (with the House of Marley Symbol) should connect and disconnect calls on most smartphones though). Still for the iFaithful this is a great feature. Along with the controls you also get a 90-degree angled 1/8-inch plug which helps to reduce the change of bending or damaging the plug once is connected to your audio device.

Back at CES 2011 we talked with the guys from House of Marley and they told us that they were going to were not going to skimp on hardware, but wanted to make very high quality audio reproduction devices. So far from our casual look over the packaging and the headphones they have certainly done that. Now let’s see if the audio quality can live up to the marketing statements…