I heard about noise-cancelling headphones a long time ago… on a Sony Walkman… Back then Sony’s Walkman came with noise cancelling as standard. According to my classmate, the tech works by using a mic to pick up the sound waves around you, then firing the inverse waves to cancel them out. Anyway, the effect was passable, though I clearly remember it wasn’t actually that great. Years later, I’ve found myself wanting noise-cancelling earphones again. No real mystery why: the office AC is too damn loud, my place faces the road and that’s loud too, and I seem to have developed a touch of nervous exhaustion. When it comes to noise-cancelling headphones, the only choice is naturally Bose, and I didn’t want big over-ears, so the QC20 was the only option.