As the volume rises, so does the risk to your hearing. Here’s why reusable earplugs are gaining popularity worldwide with both musicians and music lovers.
We’ve all been there before – making your way home from club or concert with your ears ringing, sore from a night spent too close to the speakers.
It’s an all-too-common price to pay for the music and energy of the dance floor or an epic gig. But while generations past once viewed the sensation as a badge of honour, many of them nowadays are facing the consequences.
According to the Hearing Institute, more than half of those over 60 struggle with hearing loss and its debilitating effects. Overall, the Auckland-based audiologist group says one in six New Zealanders suffers from the condition, with this number expected to rise to one in four by 2050.
Audiology experts from Hearing & Balance say 50% of young people are also at risk of hearing loss from listening to music too loud.
With summer gigs in full swing and hearing a hot topic, reusable earplugs are entering the mainstream at exactly the right time. The noise level of most music events can reach 100-120 decibels and, according to Hearing Excellence, anything over 85dB is considered risky, with the safe exposure time shortening by half with every 3dB increase.
Brands like Belgian-made Loop Earplugs, Musicmate from Australia’s Earjobs, and US-designed Fender entered the growing market to change the norm. And here in Aotearoa, New Zealand-made earplugs Sets have set out to help musicians and concertgoers alike.
Hearing damage can occur within minutes when you're close to the speakers at festivals, gigs or concerts. Photo / George Heard
Why wear earplugs?
Professor Grant Searchfield, who leads the University of Auckland’s audiology department and co-directs the Eisdell Moore Centre for hearing and balance research, is naturally a strong advocate for hearing protection.
Searchfield explained a critical factor in the effectiveness of hearing protection products comes down to whether you will wear them, so comfort, price, availability and aesthetics are important to match.
Beyond making something comfortable to wear, Searchfield said the key to a well-designed earplug was ensuring it was “easy to get in” and “easy to take out”, given they’re “only as effective as how well you put [them] in the ear”.
He said a few concerns over the safety of earplugs remained, mainly regarding earwax build-up, accidental consumption by children and, in rare cases, an over-reliance on using hearing protection. But for the vast majority, “the benefits far outweigh any potential risks for people”.
When asked whether earplugs are ultimately worth wearing at concerts, Searchfield said: “If it’s performing according to its specifications and people are putting them in properly, absolutely.”
He said it was “really cool” to see a Kiwi company and product entering the hearing protection market: “Their objectives on these sorts of things are brilliant, so I totally support them.”
Sets co-founders Grace Ko and Emily Janus drew from their experiences when building their brand and ethos.
Earplugs like Sets aim to protect your ears without sacrificing the quality of sound around you.
Janus is a DJ who has “always been proactive” in looking after her ears, citing hearing as a musician’s “biggest asset”. However, after her first year DJ-ing at festivals, Janus developed severe tinnitus, which subsided after taking extra steps to protect them.
Ko’s dad suffers from chronic tinnitus, which he describes as sounding like “constant cicadas”. His experience was enough “to make protecting my ears (and others)” Ko’s mission.
The pair’s “light bulb” moment came during a night out on Karangahape Rd. The bar couldn’t satisfy their request for earplugs, so they resorted to stuffing their ears with toilet paper.
“After that night, we realised most clubs didn’t have any form of hearing protection available and there was a huge need for a better solution than our toilet paper plugs or those rubbish foam ones.”
They went on to create Sets, intending to protect people’s ears from lasting damage without sacrificing the quality of sound, and they include attenuation filters to reduce the sound’s strength and adhere to the EN 352-2:2020 standard.
Ko and Janus worked with two university friends who became audio engineers to create their product. They wanted Sets to be a “comfortable fit for all” that could “filter sound so you could still hear music and conversations clearly”. The pair said “most earplugs on the market were targeted towards musicians and didn’t feel accessible to those not on stage”, so they opted for a clear, inconspicuous look.
What do musicians think?
But even musicians admit earplugs come with their own issues. “Wearing earplugs inevitably changes the sound,” Auckland musician Tia Kelly said. “When I’m playing live, I rely heavily on muscle memory. So when I can’t hear a similar image to what I’ve been rehearsing, it throws me off.”
Before she starts wearing them, Kelly said she wanted earplugs to do more for musicians. She said the ideal pair would “adapt better to the environment”, wouldn’t “dissolve” important frequencies, and would enable “a better sound image without being too different”.
Musicians say earplugs tend to deplete sound quality and affect their performance. Photo / 123rf
Although Kiwi guitarist Reuben Scott says he “sometimes” uses earplugs so he can “enjoy music as an old man, ,every pair he’s tried “takes too much sound away”.
“To perform my best, I need to be excited about what me and my band are doing and what the audience is experiencing,” Scott said. “It can be hard to do that with earplugs; to convince myself that the audience is getting a faceful of guitars.”
Auckland DJ Sion Stuart admits he finds earplugs “a little uncomfortable” to wear. Others in his circle use custom-made ones moulded to their ears, yet these were seen as an “investment”.
But Stuart praised brands like Sets for encouraging him to think more about his hearing health and said they had helped normalise ear protection within Aotearoa’s music community. “They provide great stats and info to help educate people.”
A growing market
In a sign of the changing times, the company’s most popular demographic is 20-35-year-olds. At its inception, the co-founders made it a priority to sell them at festivals throughout the country; a move that has been well received by punters.
“When we tell people that hearing damage can occur after only a couple of minutes at loud clubs and concerts, people are often shocked and can’t believe they’ve been going with no earplugs,” Ko and Janus said.
The duo call the numbers around hearing loss “terrifying”, so they are aiming to prevent it “as early as possible” by teaching people about the risks. “Growing up, we never thought the ringing in our ears after a concert was something to worry about, but the reality is hearing damage is irreversible and compounds over time.”
There’s since been a shift in attitude, and they point to overseas venues having decibel readers on the wall so people can read the noise levels and make informed decisions from there; something they’d like to see “in all venues in the future”.
Sets earplugs include attenuation filters and adhere to the rigorous EN 352-2:2020 standard.
“Hearing safety should be promoted by clubs and venues or anywhere the decibels get high,” Ko and Janus said.
While Aotearoa is Sets’ top market, the co-founders say they’re expanding rapidly in Australia now, and they’ve begun moving into London and Berlin’s club scene. “We’ve done a lot of work around bringing hearing education to in-person events like festivals [and] local club nights,” they said, ensuring earplugs are available in environments where they’re needed.
Ko and Janus said contributing to a cultural change has been the most fulfilling part of the job. It’s now common to see earplugs worn on a night out and they’ve become somewhat of a “clubbing necessity”.
Hearing damage isn’t confined to concert or club environments either. Living in a loud world, Ko and Janus believe it’s crucial to look after our ears wherever the noise comes from.
“There are so many situations that accumulate damage to our ears over time – whether that be city traffic and sirens, blasting music in our headphones or even going to a loud movie,” so people should take “preventative action anywhere we can” and always be mindful of their hearing.
