Nowadays, it seems everybody walking the streets listening to music on their headphones, what melody? We don’t know. We assume we know. Is a punk rocker at the rear of a bus secretly jamming to Britney Spears? Or is the tracksuit-bottomed, highlight-headed girl waiting for her friends actually moshing out with Black Flag? The pinstripe power suit in the train could be a huge Public Enemy fan or the local ASBO may just be a jazz fan using a affection for Coltrane’s sax playing.

 

People who don’t dress in any tune-themed clothes style can remain safely anonymous to the world at large as music customers. Or can they? Here are two brands and what they say about you:

 

Skullcandy are a new-ish brand name (founded 2003) and aimed exactly at the postpunk/goth/emo/whatever crowd. The clue is now in the label and the child-friendly Stencilled graphitti skull logo. Designed to go together with bullet belts, Atticus shirts and skinny fit jeans, (the last relics of indisputable subculture now comfortably removed and replaced by mere consumption of image and product in one. Punk’s early impression, i.e, the flaunting of poverty has been overtaken by a generation primed to use ready-ripped jeans and spraypaint-effect shirts, I, uh, mean whatever, man). Skullcandy headphones come in a range of brash colours, as well as a stark black and white for max appeal. Given the markup in price, it appears highly unlikely a consumer would buy these earphones unless it is to generate a statement about the music itself. This person (even when they are an 80 year old lady) is way more likely to be listening to My Chemical Romance than they are Mozart.

 

Sennheiser earphones, distinctive by their smaller, professional design tend to be more the domain of that audiophile, the music nut and also the gadget freak. This person, though they could be attired in similar manner to that Skullcandy kid, is much more likely to be listening to Charles Mingus, a vintage Delta Blues or folk piece, appreciating it the way one might a fine wine, in addition to all subtle cultural nuances therein. This person is serious about music, and his/her scorn for bands of the minute may be uniformly significant. Expect a lecture at any second on the genius of Belgian techno or some obscure Japanese arse-band (NOTE: arse-music isn’t an actual genre…yet)

 

So, the peripherals we use within the 21st century say as much about us as our record collections might. Even when we do not want them to? That definitely seems being possible, anyway. Next: How come we iPod users so bloody smug?