I saw a TV story on the news about a year ago about folks with hearing damage from listening to their MP3 player too loud. The report said with some custom made ear pieces you don't have to have it up as loud, so your hearing will not be as likely to damaged as much in the future.
I took the plunge and had some made up. If you are sitting in house listening they do block out the rest of the back round noise. I had them on today at work for a few minutes, they do block out most of the noise but not good if you have to converse with some one. I will get to try them out on a plane trip on Thursday.
On planes these days they tell everyone to turn off the noise canceling head phones, these can go in my ears to block out the drone of the plane:thumbsup:
Jimmy B