I was looking for a hard=wearing durable brush with a wood handle and tough nylon head. This was mainly so I can practise late at night and hit hard and fast without waking up the rest of the street! What I have found though is the ability to play with expression at all volumes with these brushes, and I am still on my first pair - they seem pretty unbreakable. Admittedly they don't have the range of expression you get from a metal brush, but I have broken many pairs of metal brushes in practise and performance and metal heads aren't as kind on my heads so I'm gonna stick with these.