Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Culture
  3. News

Grado Labs’ gorgeous PS2000e headphones are hand-crafted for stellar sound

Grado Labs, the family-owned headphone manufacturer out of Brooklyn, NY, recently released its first new flagship pair of headphones in over a decade, the PS2000e, which just happen to be the fanciest pair of cans the company has ever built.

According to Grado, the PS2000e were in development for over two years, drawing upon the company’s 64 years of experience in the audio field. In those two years of development, the company perfected a brand-new, proprietary driver design for the PS2000e, which Grado says will keep your music as clear and pure as possible, and look great doing it.

Recommended Videos

As one would expect from Grado, the PS2000e are open-backed headphones manufactured with a hand-carved inner chamber made from maple wood, which is known for its superior acoustic properties and vibration-dampening characteristics — meaning your music will remain clear, and won’t distort. The newly-designed dynamic drivers boast an incredible claimed frequency response of 5Hz-50kHz with 32-ohms impedance.

While the internal structure is important for sound quality, the construction also makes for a gorgeous aesthetic. The PS2000e sport a smoked chrome shell — a first for the brand — and a leather headband, all of which is crafted by hand Grado Labs’ Brooklyn workshop, blurring the line between high-quality audio equipment and luxury craftsmanship.

All that old-world craftsmanship comes at a premium, however, as the PS2000e will cost you a whopping $2,695 — and that price doesn’t appear to include a carrying case, though you can pad the package with a mahogany case for $100 more after purchase (insert “rich mahogany” joke here).

That said, Grado’s impressive claims about its new flagship cans — and the fact that the company is able to squeeze such fantastic sound out of its much more affordable offerings — have us utterly intrigued to strap on a pair and try them for ourselves.

You can pick up Grado Labs’ PS2000e from the company’s official online store, 4OurEars.com now.

A version of this post first appeared on our “brother” site, Digital Trends.

Brendan Hesse
Former Staff Writer, Home Theater
Brendan has written about a wide swath of topics, including music, fitness and nutrition, and pop culture, but tech was… Read Full Bio
We’re only a few months away from our new Bond, Producer Amy Pascal teases
Accessories, Sunglasses, Transportation

Since Daniel Craig bit the big one in his James Bond swan song in 2021’s No Time to Die, fans have been waiting to find out who the next person to drink the martini shaken instead of stirred will be. In true Bond fandom fashion, a whole slew of fancasts have started to muddle the waters as to who could possibly be the new 007. Callum Turner, Jacob Elordi, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and more have all been pitched as possible replacements. Some more ethnically diverse options like Henry Golding and Rene Jean-Page have also emerged. But, alas, no word has come down from on high to give us the scratch to this fan itch raging on for the last five years. That is, until Producer Amy Pascal sat down during her Spider-Man: Brand New Day press tour and gave a bit of insight on when we can expect an announcement, and also what we can expect in the cast.

I would say the end of the year is a good bet. We are being really, really methodical. – Amy Pascal

Read more
Elevate your elegance: Choosing your first cigar
Face, Head, Person

Earlier this year, I was strolling the streets of New York and ended up sitting in the Carnegie Club with an Old Fashioned in one hand and a cigar in the other while My Way by Frank Sinatra played from a speaker flanking leather-bound books behind the couch I had been using as my perch. It was my first cigar, but it led to a slight obsession that recently found me on the back deck of a lodge in Kenya, staring at Mount Kilimanjaro and smoking a stick while giraffes meandered by. Admittedly, there has been no intention in my budding hobby; I am aimlessly choosing the cigars that look good (the ones that look like those smoked by Arnold or Stallone in the movies, obviously). But I have decided to approach these in a new way, with a little help from my friends over at La Aurora, who graciously decided to navigate my ignorance with some info compiled by Brand Manager John Gaglio, with input from Master Blender Manuel Ynoa, CEO Ed McKenna, and Brand Manager Elvis Batista.

What to look for in your first cigar

Read more
FIFA’s Gianni Infantino Is Uglifying the Beautiful Game With $20 Billion Plot — But the Global Soccer Community’s Punching Back
People, Person, Crowd

For the better part of two decades, perhaps even more, corruption has allegedly run rampant within FIFA. Sepp Blatter, in particular, became the face of alleged extortion schemes, and he operated with impunity while at the helm of the organization for 17 years, from 1998 until his forced resignation in 2015 amid an FBI corruption probe. He’s banned for life from all football-related FIFA activities. If you’re new to the organization’s alleged deep connection to corruption, Netflix offers a brilliant 2022 documentary, FIFA Uncovered. In that documentary, Gianni Infantino appears in his previous capacity as Secretary General of UEFA (2009-2016) and later as the newly elected FIFA president, who vowed to root out corruption and hand the beautiful game back to the people where it belongs.

That, as it turns out, was all wishful thinking.

Read more