The Death of Dynamic Range - people against Loudness War

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Leader: vitos
Join Policy: Open
Created on: 16 Feb 2007
Description:
Group for all those who are fed up with current "Loudness Race" audio mastering practices.

Group for all those who are fed up with current "Loudness Race" audio mastering practices.

IF:
  • you feel exhausted just after a short listening of a new (or remastered) album of your favourite artist
  • you hear annoying crackles and distortion in your favourite tracks, despite having very good quality audio equipment
  • you often find modern bands/artists with great composition, melody, instruments, lyrics, but somehow their music lacks punch, dynamics, life, clarity and becomes annoying

THEN

You become aware of a disease of modern music industry - massive overcompression squashing great music into constant wall of noise, JUST TO MAKE RECORDS LOUD, LOUDER, THE LOUDEST!!!
Welcome to the real world, Neo.

So if you just can't stand that your favourite music is being destroyed by our-tunes-must-be-the-hottest-and-loudest-on-all-the-planet morons having no real music understanding - join this group.

Some articles explaining "Loudness War" issue:

To the music industry:
If we want it loud, we'll know how to make it loud! We know how to use volume knob! Don't make shit out of great recordings!

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  • nichtstuer

    http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/sep11/articles/loudness.htm

    Tuesday evening

  • lemmling

    Disappointing and annoying, fortunately I haven't bought it already :(

    March 2012

  • rettrou

    Mars Volta's Noctourniquet is DR 3. Loudest of the year in database. http://dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=18713

    March 2012

  • metawirt

    RHCP: Californication Unmastered... ;)

    February 2012

  • Ton87

    Oh and Steve Hoffman's forums are really good indeed. http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/index.php You can search google with for instance something like this "site:stevehoffman.tv hendrix electric ladyland best sounding".

    December 2011

  • Ton87

    @ Bolshevized: I've heard MFSL, AF and Steve Hoffman issues with less dynamics than not-audiophile issues. Seems like even some audiophile labels think compression is a requirement to make music sound good.

    December 2011

  • Athropos

    Public Enemy No. 1 from Megadeth's latest album: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/593/pen1t.jpg/ Enjoy...

    November 2011

  • rettrou

    Nightwish will do it again. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09MTDBb8qro They have a sad history with overcompressing their music. http://dr.loudness-war.info/index.php?search_artist=nightwish&search_album=

    November 2011

  • tonique

    Ok, to be fair, not every song is clipping on that album. But curiously, the songs are squashed but have different peak amplitudes; there's no consistency.

    October 2011

  • tonique

    Buffy Sainte-Marie, Running for the Drum: album replaygain -9.55 dB. Bleh. AND IT'S CLIPPING!

    October 2011

  • Bolshevized

    Honestly, a pretty good rule of thumb is just to assume a remaster is going to be inferior, unless there are special circumstances (for example, albums remastered by Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab or Audio Fidelity often sound good; if a remaster is done by Steve Hoffman, it's quality assured; etc.). In addition to what people mentioned below, you can also search the Steve Hoffman forums for information on different masterings. That place is a goldmine.

    September 2011

  • Maellril

    I bought Seasons in the Abyss about two weeks ago, same problem. The digital remaster is shit and I'm just gonna download a better version.

    September 2011

  • Athropos

    Cool, exactly what's needed. So original version of Seasons in the Abyss has a DR of 10, while my remastered version has a DR of 4... Should have known this website before...

    September 2011

  • Maellril

    http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/

    September 2011

  • Athropos

    Don't know if one exists, but if that isn't the case it would be great to create one. People could contribute by posting e.g., waveforms of the different versions of albums.

    September 2011

  • JeffersonBV

    Hi! Does anyone know any website where I can check if some remastered versions clip like crazy? I don't want to waste my money. Thanks!

    September 2011

  • Bolshevized

    The good thing about Red Hot Chili Peppers ruining their latest album with more shit mastering is that it does help to raise at least a little awareness about the loudness war. Not likely to be enough to change much, but at least some people will be able to better tell good mastering from bad.

    September 2011

  • Athropos

    I recently bought a remastered version of Slayer's Seasons in the Abyss, and two minutes into the first song I could already tell my money was lost. The original one sounds so great, I just don't understand that shitty practice...

    September 2011

  • Maellril

    I just took a quick look through my CD collection and this is just freaking horrible. There is nearly no dynamic range in most of the albums I own and the waveforms are just about as loud as it fucking can. So now I've spent my money on a bunch of shit recordings. Thanks, loudness war.

    September 2011

  • nichtstuer

    pathetic

    September 2011
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