Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) to sound; as in that listens good/well.

1908		K. McGaffey Sorrows of a Show Girl Ch. vii: That listened very well indeed, and we all climbed into a cabbage and vamped over.
1915		S. Ford Shorty McCabe on the Job (2007) 10: Well, post me for a Bush League yannigan if it don’t listen that way.
1921		N. Putnam West Broadway 22: ‘And you simply must have a copy of [...] “Arise America!”.’ ‘Sure, give me that I’ I says. ‘It listens the best of the lot to me!’.
1930		J. Lait Put on the Spot 101: It listens good, but how are we going to convince this committee.
1945		Mencken Amer. Lang. Supplement I 317: It has been suggested [...] that it listens well may be from es hört sich gut an [DA].
1916		H.L. Wilson Somewhere in Red Gap 252: That listens good to her till she finds she has to give fifty-two dollars for the deck first.
1932		K.C. Times 1 Mar. n.p.: It listened good [DA].