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Dianne Reeves, Steely Dan, and Robben Ford are wonderful artists worth checking out (HD 800 or not). Slower genres like jazz, vocals, acoustic, ambient/lofi, orchestral, and big band/live performances are such a pleasure with them.

Radiohead is a must for any headphone but you probably knew that already. If I had to pick two must-try songs it would be “Detox” by Strapping Young Lad and “The Promise of Snakes” by The Angelic Process. People also bring up the Made in Abyss OST and Death Note OST a lot, and for good reason. They sound great. Especially on the HD800S

Slow Dance by Ann Popovic with Robbin Ford on guitar.

People make playlists on Spotify and co. related to 800s qualities. Just search for them!

So, you like jazz?

Anything “classical.” Or really, anything recorded live. I was listening to a live recording of Max Richter’s On The Nature of Daylight - already a beautiful piece in and of itself, but the recording had an enormous bass rumble that echoed throughout the venue.

Acoustic stuff like bluegrass, folk, rando singer with a guitar or piano, etc. all sound spectacular. Post rock stuff, like Sigur Ros, God Is An Astronaut, Explosions In The Sky, are perfectly suited as well. I’d argue that even stuff unsuited for the HD800S will still sound great. I listen to a lot of metal, punk, rock, etc. on them as well, and the sense of space/separation they give to those tracks always puts a smile on my face.

Here are the songs that stood out the most to me on the Sennheiser HD 800 S :

Beo Brockhausen - Wolkenmeer

Yosi Horikawa - Bubbles

Yosi Horikawa - Interlude

Talking Heads - The Great Curve (2005 Remaster)

Yello, Heidi Happy - Kiss In Blue

Terje Isungset, Lena Nymark - Fading Sun

Seven Lions, Kill The Noise - The Blood

Radiohead - Paranoid Android (Remastered)

The Fairfield Fou - These Bones

Wish you were here, Comfortably numb, well just Pink Floyd in general is brilliant on these

Why Are Sundays So Depressing — The Strokes

Probably the song that has the the biggest difference between HD800s and any other headphone, in my personal opinion. The guitar sounds so damn good.

Latest album from St Germain is incredible. Beautiful mix and master

i love almost everything on the hd800s when i demo’d it

and other than just saying classical, there was a song in particular that used both classical and electronic instruments

the song in question that stood out was another halcyon by xi

If you’re a fan of metal, some of the more recently mixed metalcore or djenty metalcore albums really takes advantage of the soundstage and separation

While classical sounds great, I’ve never been a classical music guy. Some songs that stood out to me were

Brave Soul - Illenium

Stargazing - Kygo

Walk me home - Said the sky

Taste like cigarettes - Masked man

Fire Stone - Kygo

Falling in love - Dennis Kruissen

Snow - Masked man

Wishing on You - City girl

Let me know if any of those scratches your itch!

All music. I can’t think of anything that didn’t sound fantastic on them