Right ear become much louder

Three days ago, when I was at a seminar, I was updating my status via Twitter and keeping my friends informed about it. After a couple of hours, my iPod's battery said it's low and I plugged it and charged. After the charge was completed(with the sign 100% charged on the display), I unplugged it and used it for half an hour. It said "battery too low" and I was shocked. I recharged and locked it(plane mode on, every app is off) and put it in my pocket. After 5 hours of waiting time (with no app or anything) I get it out to check the battery level and the iPod was switched off! I plugged it to the charger again (btw they're official Apple equipments) the display showed me a level of low battery that I have never seen. After 10 mins, the iPod turned on and the time was not right. The battery was so low it could not keep track of time! I forced a restart twice using the home and lock buttons but nothing changed about the battery. After a couple of charge/discharge cycles (5 or 7 I'm not sure) it just went to normal battery life.

Yesterday, I got on the plane to come home and when I plugged my earpods I noticed that right ear is so much loud I cannot listen to music that way. I lowered the volume and I discovered another thing: When I start increasing the volume, right after the 8th press on the volume button, the volume becomes so high. And when I lower the volume below the 8th level, there is white noise on the right ear. (I checked the earpods on other devices, they're fine.)

I managed to fix the un-balance using the accesibilty settings but it is a problem.

Also I wanted to check the problem using my bluetooth headset and when I listen to music with them, it just seems normal. Nothing's wrong.

I bought the iPod touch 5G last year in March from the 5th ave. store NYC.

Do you have any solutions besides contacting Apple and have them inspect the device?

PS: I never dropped or hit the device right before/when these problems occured.