A Musical New Way To Indulge Your Sweet Tooth
A review of Skull Candy G.I. headphones.
As a college athlete, I do a lot of traveling—three to four hour bus rides are the norm, and of course there’s the occasional drive from Virginia to Florida. Imagine: 18 other women, cramped in our seats, in a smelly old tour bus with terrible climate control, bored out of our minds. This doesn’t seem like the ideal place to grab a little “me” time, but if faced with the other option—socializing—you’d find that busses make for crabby people, and crabby people don’t make for good conversation.
That’s when I reach for my trusty iPod and… tada! my Skull Candy headphones. These headphones have been an absolute staple in my experience as a traveler, whether in the above scenario, walking to class, or flying back home to Detroit. They are larger than the average headphone, yes, but they are surprisingly lightweight and not too bulky. It’s not so great for those that like to lean the side of their head against the seat while grooving, but other than that, I’d say these puppies are pretty comfortable. They are big and cushy around my ears, which I like, and there’s no exposed plastic on the underside part—basically, if it’s going to connect directly with your head, it’s going to be cozy.
What makes these headphones so great for traveling (besides the comfort and lightness) is that they block out a considerable amount of ambient noise as compared to regular headphones, such as the earbuds that come with iPods. They also have a volume adjustment wheel that is located halfway down the wire that extends from the earphones to the iPod. This is nice for some quick control if one song is much louder than another, or if you find yourself drifting to sleep. The actual speaker that covers the ear is also designed for comfort and convenience—the connection of the speakers to the headpiece is relatively flexible, and allows for a pretty wide range of movement away from the ear and face. In my experience, this has been nice (especially combined with the volume wheel) when coach is making a bus-wide announcement, or when the captain is calling out landing information on the loudspeaker.
The G.I.s get another gold star in travel for their handy carrying case. This protective little drawstring sack is made out of a really smooth material that will keep the headphones in good shape. Unfortunately, it doesn’t’ keep them from being crushed or jostled around by half-asleep teammates or surly airport personnel, but that’s all good, because they have a great warranty.
The warranty may sound a little overkill for headphones, but at the average retail price of 65 buckaroos, you better believe these suckers came with one. And it isn’t a bad deal: register the product with the activation code included in the box, and you’ll get a lifetime warranty that includes full replacement of faulty products, and even if you break it due to your own stupidity, Skull Candy understands. They’ll give you a replacement for half the price of the original.
As an athlete, I am an active person and do enjoy to run and work out in the off-season, and I love to listen to music as I do so. Unfortunately, these aren’t the equipment for that kind of purpose. The G.I.s were designed to be similar to what a DJ would use, and they’re more for recreational, limited movement activities. The DJ style isn’t just indicative of their size and shape, but it also refers to the quality of sound that the drives in the speakers produce. They are 40mm in diameter, and their temporal frequency uses 18-20K Hz, which basically means that they are a great size and frequency that together produce a nice, crisp sound, especially at mid levels of volume, bass, etc.
And of course, I couldn’t possibly leave out my personal favorite attributes to these headphones. They come in the sickest of designs and paint colors. I’ve seen chrome, pink and fluffy (I’m not kidding), denim, graffiti print, and more. Personally, I have the “Rasta” G.I.s. They feature the typical Rasta colors of red, yellow, and green, and perhaps my favorite accouterment, a handy bottle opener that slides out of an extremely well concealed compartment on the top. This company is serious about the functionality of their products, but they also couldn’t have been more appropriately named. The G.I. headphones are definitely candy for the skull.
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