in modern day, i think Kaworu would actually be the one to fall down the audio tech rabbit hole, faster and deeper, despite Shinji being the one associated with earphones and music players.
i imagine Shinji using hand-me-down earphones that probably came with the sdat player for most of his teens. he’d listen to them so mindlessly in his depression, the only thing could he care about is if the volume is loud enough to drown out his surroundings. this would carry on into his adulthood despite him overcoming his depression because his audio taste is so warped (man hasn’t heard good audio in his life) yet the boomy quality of dirt cheap earphones (for modern day) sounds comfortably familiar.
enter Kaworu, the music-loving angel nerd. for the funnies, i would like to think he was only enduring Shinji’s (technically G*ndo’s) earphones in 3.0 but anything for the crush y’know. when Kaworu gets a taste (listen) of modern technology, his eyes (ears) gets opened and he’s instantly hooked on IEMs and quality headphones. chase the bass clarity, the treble sparkle, the technical details of his beloved instrumental pieces. he makes it his mission to wean Shinji off the god-awful dollar store earphones. and i suppose this is how their audio shop dates are going to look like:
Shinji, trying his 5th IEM in one sitting: i think i still can’t really hear much of a difference between these and my old earphones… (^^;)
Kaworu, exercising the patience of an angel: i see. the pair you just tried has a v-shaped tuning with a bass boost and supposedly makes basslines sound clearer. you might have heard overlapping qualities with your old earphones but don’t worry, listening takes practice. it doesn’t hurt for us to come back again (^w^)
…it’ll take Shinji a while. but Kaworu is a yapper and a patient, loving partner. and in the meantime, Adam bless Kaworu’s ears whenever he has to share Shinji’s earphones.
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