In this article we look at the €2.200 Kennerton Wodan headphone.

Disclaimer: The Kennerton Wodan was sent to me by the Kennerton team. The unit doesn’t need to be returned but I have to apologize bigtime for publishing this review so late.

Kennerton

Kennerton – as a luxury brand of Fischer Audio – was founded by professionals with a single purpose – to provide its customers with high-end quality sound. Fischer Audio have been watching the evolution of the audio industry for a long time and noticed the decreasing amount of products that offer quality sound particularly the large number of fancy looking, low quality models made by famous brands. Fischer Audio is not willing to accept this. Their policy is that you pay for nothing more than the quality of sound.

“These headphones are designed by audiophiles for audiophiles.”

Fischer Audio engineers are making every effort to reveal the potential of each model and optimize every detail to find the best balance between price and quality – high quality sound at an affordable price is the fundamental principle of the company. Kennerton consists of only the best models which have incorporated the most advanced technology, highest quality materials and the best service.

Odin – Thror

The Kennerton Odin (€2.395) was the Russian company’s first flagship and then the €2.990 Thror (new and higher class, better performing driver) and a few other models followed in its footsteps.

We back in January of 2019 reviewed the Odin, and our Thror review saw the light in January of 2020. Now almost one year later, we’re back with a another high end Kennerton headphone: the Wodan.

If you haven’t read those reviews yet or if you don’t know what Kennerton stands for yet, I advise to read both reviews as they help you to understand what the Wodan is all about.

We concluded: “The Kennerton Odin is a top of the line headphone. It has excellent build quality and it’s made with the finest materials only. The Odin undeniably is heavy in weight but despite that it is fairly comfortable. Sound wise this headphone impresses as well. It has the typical orthodynamic sound with great bass and a pitch black background. The bass is impressive and addictive but to me the Odin really shines in the mids. Treble is soft but lively and the overall signature is musical and a tad darker”.

Thror is a reference headphone with a very special and unique tuning. To me Thror is the reference version of Odin with a more neutral, clear, clean, precise and lighter tuning.

What I personally love in Thror is the clean and clear sound, the fast and precise delivery, the bass precision and the energetic treble extension. Thror is a more neutrally tuned, lighter sounding flagship and isn’t the kind of headphone that will easily please fans of a warm, smooth and thicker sound. It perfectly executes how it was tuned by its designer and I am sure many people will love this typical sound signature.

I also said that I was expecting another evolution of this flagship in the future. One which will combine the technical level and excellence of Thror with the body and impact of the Odin, and the smoothness of the RAD-O and HE-1000SE. 

So let’s find out if the Wodan is exactly that!

Wodan

Looking at the Wodan’s price (€2.220) and place in the line-up, it’s only Kennerton’s fourth highest model after Thror, Thek, and Odin. Wodan is an open back headphone.

Just like the other models, Wodan doesn’t have a single dedicated web page on the Kennerton site, but they split up the Wodan pages depending on the wood chosen. Our version is the curly maple one (with the suede pads and headband), and you can find the product page right here: https://kennerton.org/shop/wodan-curly-maple/

If you read the Odin review, you will remember it weighed a massive 680g and that had an impact on the comfort, especially for longer listening sessions. With the Thror Kennerton addressed this issue and they managed to reduce the headphone’s weight to 480g, a huge improvement. The Wodan weighs the exact same as Thror, but what’s new here is the headband system. We’ll get back to that in a bit.

If you want to find out more about Wodan’s driver details, you can do so in the previous articles or on Kennerton’s website: https://kennerton.org/shop/wodan-curly-maple/ (scroll down).

Specifications

Wodan features 80mm planar magnetic drivers, with a multi-layer 8µm polyimide film diaphragm and FEM-Optimized Magnet System with 10 neodymium magnets arranged in symmetric push-pull configuration (Unique semicircular bar magnets). The Wodan uses a steel frame for the drivers and it comes with a 3 year warranty.

Looking at the specs the Wodan should be easy to drive, but we’ll find be getting into that later in this article.

The Box: Cable & Accessories

Our Wodan came in a simple and small but nice card wood box with on the inside a large leather-like carrying cage (with strap). It’s a really nice carrying bag which protect your headphones at all times when on the go, or even when you’re not using them.

Accessory-wise we also found the stock Kennerton cable (SKC-02) which is a 2 meters cable with gold plated 6.3 mm TRS and 2 x 4-pin mini XLR. The cable sells for €119 separately. This stock cable sonically is good, it’s just a stiffer type of cable.

Next to that we also found Kennerton’s warranty card and a nice cleaning cloth inside the packaging, as well as an adapter to 3.5mm.

As an extra Kennerton sent us two extra sets of pads, the leather ECL-01 and ECL-02. During checkout, don’t forget to mention what pads you want, though I advise to get both sets.

For a €+2K headphone the presentation is very simple, even if all the needed accessories at this price level (perhaps it needs a balanced cable) are there.

The article continues on page two. Click here or use the jumps below.