{"id":534875,"date":"2026-07-20T08:53:24","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T08:53:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/534875\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T08:53:24","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T08:53:24","slug":"inside-audeze-and-manny-marroquins-mm-520-headphones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/534875\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside Audeze and Manny Marroquin\u2019s MM-520 headphones"},"content":{"rendered":"

Threatening airport security is rarely wise, but Manny Marroquin<\/a> had his reasons. \u201cThey pulled the headphones<\/a> out, and were like, \u2018What are these?\u2019\u201d says the celebrated mix engineer, stopped on his way back from Mexico. \u201cThose are my fucking weapon. Don\u2019t you mess with me.\u201d<\/p>\n

The weapon in question is the Audeze<\/a> MM-520, the American brand\u2019s new flagship planar magnetics, and the first pair of headphones to grace a MusicTech gear cover<\/a>. More records than ever are mixed and mastered on headphones, and the MM-520 \u2013 the second product in Marroquin and Audeze\u2019s collaborative MM-series \u2013 arrives engineered for the job\u2019s toughest call: bass<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Audeze MM-520 on the MusicTech Cover. Image: Simon Vinall for MusicTech<\/p>\n

The prolific Grammy Award-winner has run Larrabee Studios in Los Angeles since 2001, with production<\/a> credits from Rihanna to Rosal\u00eda<\/a>, and began tuning Sonos<\/a> products in 2012. He first mixed on Solid State Logic<\/a> consoles aged 17, and speaks to us from London before visiting SSL\u2019s Oxford headquarters to test new equipment.<\/p>\n

He used to think mixing<\/a> on headphones was a joke. \u201cIf you had told me 10 years ago I would be mixing on headphones, I\u2019d think you were crazy,\u201d he admits. \u201cI used to hate that. I would laugh at people.\u201d So what changed?<\/p>\n

The short answer is Marroquin badgered Audeze CEO Sankar Thiagasamudram to build the professional mixing headphones he actually wanted. He was repeatedly told there\u2019s no money in pro audio (as compared to consumer audio), but one day, Thiagasamudram finally approached him at a trade show and said: \u201cManny, I think we\u2019re ready to do this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AudezeImage: Simon Vinall for MusicTech<\/p>\n

Marroquin worked through various prototypes with Audeze\u2019s engineers, and the result was 2022\u2019s MM-500<\/a>. \u201cMy career is better because of them; it\u2019s my set of speakers,\u201d he says. It\u2019s why he keeps coming back to work with the brand. \u201cThey took everything I told them and everything I wanted to do, and they were like, \u2018Yeah, we\u2019ll do that. Let\u2019s go.\u2019 They believed in me.\u201d<\/p>\n

The $1,700 MM-520 headphones come with a strange sales pitch: you might not need them. \u201cI am not saying they\u2019re better than the 500s, but it is an alternate version,\u201d Marroquin insists. \u201cIf you own the 500s, it\u2019s not like, \u2018My gosh, I need to go get the 520s.\u2019 Not about that at all. I want to make sure people know it\u2019s not us trying to sell you a new pair of headphones.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you had told me 10 years ago I would be mixing on headphones, I\u2019d think you were crazy\u201d \u2013 Manny Marroquin<\/p>\n

A SLAM dunk<\/p>\n

The star upgrade is SLAM, which is short for Symmetric Linear Acoustic Modulator and mercifully simpler than it sounds. Air passages running beneath the ear pad create extra space between the driver and your ear, forming a larger acoustic chamber and allowing Audeze to selectively boost the low-end frequencies.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s kind of like increasing the body size of an acoustic instrument or a speaker,\u201d explains Chris Berens, Audeze\u2019s head of A&R. \u201cIt gives a little more resonance in the low end, and we tune that specifically for the headphone, so we have a nice, healthily reinforced low end.\u201d<\/p>\n

SLAM balances the air pressure on both sides of Audeze\u2019s ultra-thin planar magnetic diaphragm, letting it move more freely and accurately. Measuring just 1.8 micrometres, the nanoscale polymer is around 40 times thinner than a human hair.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not like we\u2019re just adding a subwoofer,\u201d says Berens. \u201cIt really enhances everything that the driver does, which makes things [sound] a little bit wider, and gives you more accurate imaging in terms of location.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AudezeImage: Simon Vinall for MusicTech<\/p>\n

Peter James, Audeze\u2019s director of marketing, says the tuning target was extension rather than flattery. \u201cThe bass of the MM-520 is pretty much flat to below 20Hz. We tuned this system to get a better bass extension rather than a bass shelf, the way the Harman curve has.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Marroquin, the low-end obsession is where records live now. \u201cWhether you\u2019re doing hip-hop, pop, country, or whatever, you want to make sure the low end is tight,\u201d he says. \u201cLow end is the most important thing in pop music, because if it\u2019s too heavy, then it weighs down the track. If it\u2019s too light, it sounds weak. Low end in today\u2019s world has to really be accurate.\u201d<\/p>\n

The MM-500\u2019s slightly forward upper mids, a common gripe, have been levelled off. The cost of all this is weight. Planars run heavy to begin with, but the 520s pile on more. SLAM adds material, while new snap on earpads require eight magnets per side.<\/p>\n

Tipping the scales at 555g, they\u2019re 60g up on the MM-500 and tower over non-planar rivals such as Sennheiser<\/a>\u2019s 330g HD 800 S, though Audeze says memory foam on the new earpads help disperse the extra load.<\/p>\n

\"AudezeImage: Simon Vinall for MusicTechTurning the tables<\/p>\n

For decades, engineers trusted monitors<\/a> and used headphones for a second opinion, but increasingly, it\u2019s the other way round. Low end is arguably the hardest thing to get right in any room, and Berens believes even serious money doesn\u2019t fix it. \u201cWe have a lot of pro people in the space who are really primarily referring to our headphones for bass,\u201d he claims.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey can trust what they\u2019re hearing, versus their room, [which] they can\u2019t quite trust. Even people who have invested tens of thousands in great speakers, room treatment, all that stuff, there is always something that\u2019s not quite right.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marroquin still mixes on Yamaha<\/a> NS-10s; a mix that survives these famously brutal nearfield monitors is said to survive anywhere. He dreamed of taking that trusted reference on the road, and the MM series became his answer. \u201cTo me, that\u2019s like [being] a kid in the candy store.\u201d 99 per cent of the time, he says, he runs them straight out of his laptop, streaming his Larrabee sessions via a real-time remote streaming plugin<\/a> by Audiomovers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"AudezeImage: Simon Vinall for MusicTech<\/p>\n

Audeze says it intentionally designed the 500s and the 520s to function perfectly fine from most devices without a dedicated headphone amp. That\u2019s tricky, given most planar headphones are notoriously power-hungry. The efficiency comes from the company\u2019s Fluxor magnet arrays, which pack a denser magnetic field across the driver, so the diaphragm needs less power to move.<\/p>\n

Rival planar makers shed weight by using fewer, smaller magnets, James says, at the cost of needing an amp. Some of the 520\u2019s heft, in other words, is precisely what frees you from carrying one.<\/p>\n

The deeper reason Marroquin never travels without them has nothing to do with specs. \u201cI\u2019m pretty sure everyone is insecure, and it\u2019s okay to admit to it,\u201d he says. \u201cSometimes you\u2019re having a bad day, or you didn\u2019t sleep well, your mother\u2019s sick. That\u2019s going to reflect on your work. The successful [people] are the ones that can cut through the BS and just focus on this one thing.\u201d His cure for mixer\u2019s block lives in his headphone bag. \u201cI\u2019m feeling a little insecure, a little lost. Let me just put them on, and immediately, I\u2019m back. I\u2019m back within a split second.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI created these headphones for the masses. This is how I hear things\u201d \u2013 Manny Marroquin<\/p>\n

Sony and yet so far<\/p>\n

Audeze was acquired in 2023 by Sony Interactive Entertainment, the PlayStation<\/a> arm of the Japanese multimedia company, primarily for its patented technologies, planar magnetic drivers, and audio engineering expertise. So where does a pair of pro studio flagship headphones sit on PlayStation\u2019s list of priorities? \u201cClearly, it\u2019s still a priority for us because we put it out this year,\u201d says James. \u201cNothing about the Sony PlayStation acquisition has changed that market orientation. We\u2019re going to continue developing and deploying cutting-edge sound solutions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Is it odd that Audeze is now part of a bigger brand that makes the MDR-CD900ST and MDR-7506, some of the most ubiquitous studio headphones on the planet? James is unbothered, pointing out PlayStation sits a long way from Sony Electronics<\/a>, and \u201cSony\u2019s most expensive studio headphone is somewhere around the price of our least expensive.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf PlayStation is the car brand, Audeze is the racing division,\u201d he argues. \u201cWe\u2019re out there at the edge of what\u2019s possible, innovating and trying to see what we can do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AudezeImage: Simon Vinall for MusicTech<\/p>\n

The proof is SLAM, which debuted before the 520 and is now what James calls a foundational technology, deployed across the range as products refresh. That includes this year\u2019s \u00a3339 Maxwell 2 gaming headset<\/a>. And just last week, a Maxwell 2 ANC variant arrived<\/a>, bringing active noise cancelling to a full-range planar magnetic driver \u2013 a world-first James claims the brand has spent over a decade developing. It also adds auto-calibrating head tracking and Dolby Atmos<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So who does Audeze want to see in the driver\u2019s seat of its newest MM-520 racecar? \u201cIt\u2019s a studio product for folks who are serious about learning their craft and perfecting it,\u201d says James, pointing budget-conscious buyers to the MM-100<\/a>, tuned for \u201cthe same kind of vibe\u201d. For his part, Marroquin wants zero gatekeeping. \u201cI created them for the masses,\u201d he says. \u201cThis is how I hear things. And if you like it, if you give it a chance, do 10,000 hours on them.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s plenty riding on his own pair. Marroquin is starting Post Malone<\/a>\u2019s next album, has just finished a Quavo record with Pharrell<\/a>, and tonight will be back in his London hotel room, laptop open, controlling his console at Larrabee from another continent.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt gives me a lot of confidence,\u201d he says. And confidence, as he puts it, \u201cis everything\u201d. We sure hope airport security sees it that way.<\/p>\n

The Audeze MM-520 is now available.<\/p>\n

Words: James Day
Photography: Simon Vinall<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Threatening airport security is rarely wise, but Manny Marroquin had his reasons. \u201cThey pulled the headphones out, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":534876,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[263763,5702,111,139,69,145,38],"class_list":["post-534875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-digital-covers","tag-headphones","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-technology","tag-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=534875"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534875\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/534876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=534875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=534875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=534875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}