Over the last several years, we've become aware (painfully so) about music that's mastered too loud or too hot. Audiophiles have been fighting the "Loudness War" over internet message boards for quite some time.

While I would agree about the loudness issue, I felt that the complaints and lobbying efforts would amount to nothing. The record companies don't care about what buyers think as long as they're making money, right?

But two recent events have given me hope that maybe fighting the Loudness War has had some effect.

(1) The Beatles remasters. They could have been a loud and bloody maximized mess, but they weren't. The engineers judiciously applied limiting and gave the CDs a modest volume boost if you compare them to other current remasters. They sounded great and showed that with care, a 40 year old album can sound like it was recorded yesterday. The Beatles remasters were a major success in every sense of the word.

(2) The recent Heaven And Hell deluxe edition by Black Sabbath. From all accounts, it's the best sounding version of the CD ever. You actually have to turn it UP to hear it properly and that's great.

I know that for the most part, most CDs are still mastered too loud and probably will continue to be. The current generation doesn't care about sonic fidelity -- only that they can cram as many songs on their Ipods as possible.

But it would appear, however slight, that the bitching about the Loudness War has had some effect on recent reissues.

One small victory for music listeners.

This should have been about Loudness!

Well, IP, with the way threads go around here, that'll probably happen!!

Go for it!

Chris:

I agree with you about the Beatles, the sound on the Mono box (which is all I've heard) is excellent and not at all wearing on the ears. I also thought the Big Star box was very well done. But archival sets like those and others are geared towards a collector's market where more thought seems to be put into presentation and sound. The real loudness problem is with current releases. I'm very tired of not being able to turn my stereo past 2 on the volume control without crying out in pain. But this won't go away as long as the majority of people listen to music on i pods. God knows I'm guilty of using one (especially at the gym), but the convenience factor seems to be winning out over the sound factor for most people. The majority of my listening is still done at home on a component stereo. Granted, my tuntable would make an audiophile cry out in horror, but it suits my purposes and I can hear the difference between a nicely preserved lp and a horribly digitized cd. My ears are also still good enough at 55 to tell the difference between a well mastered cd and a lousy one. But most people don't listen to music at home with critical ears. Yes there are pockets of folks who will always search for vinyl and well done cd's, but the majority will use i pods or whatever new gizmo is coming down the pike. Record companies aren't interested in catering to what is essentially a niche audience on a large scale, it just isn't viable economically. I don't know how this will pan out in the long term. No one really does.

Even with Boxes....... The Wishbone Ash & Dan Fogelberg (!!) both fall into the loud & screechy category.... While I'm sure some folks consider DF "whiny" loud & screechy really makes no sense in his case.

I liked the sound on the recent Procol Harum box

To resurrect an old thread, just had an interesting experience.

I recently reviewed a book more Amazon Vine called "iTunes Music: Mastering High Resolution Audio Delivery: Produce Great Sounding Music with Mastered for iTunes by Robert A. Katz"

And yes, while the title seems like a total oxymoron to me, I still found the subject interesting (hey & it was free)!

You can find the book here:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0415656850/?tag=imwan-20

And my review here:
http://www.amazon.com/review/R2AJSGGB23C158/?tag=imwan-20

Now for why I bring it up at this moment:

I'm listening to the recent Counting Crows Underwater Sunshine cd.

The 44/16 cd has a Dynamic Range reading of "6" (the WORST I have ever seen). The 2 I-tunes bonus tracks have a DR of "11"; which would seem to validate the author's point that Apple is discouraging Dynamic Range compression; he makes the point that loud mastering harms lossy files even more than it harms lossless.

No, I'm not going to make mp4 or or any other lossy format my primary source due to this; but when is the music industry going to get a freakin' clue that DR compression destroys musicality?

The book is a moderately interesting read.

In another aside, I had been blaming the loudness of recent CC's albums on Eagle Rock (who tend to master REALLY Loud); but this is on an indie so the choice would seem to be by the band or management. The book states that Apple has begun rejecting overly volume compressed submissions for their "less lossy" "higher end" program; so that may account for the difference.

Hope this also sorts itself out before I lose my hearing due to old age!

More & more I'm running into reissues (including & especially Blu-Spec, SHM, HD Tracks, etc) with massive compression. It's getting me out of the buying very new remaster phase I've been in for over 20 years. The idiots at the RIAA are just shooting their profits in the foot.

Neil Young will save us.

At least SOMEBODY agrees with me (Though not sure if I agree with NY on much else!)

BTW, with the 1 exception of the early Harvest dvd-a that Young likely had nothing to do with (it sounds just like all the other dreadful Warner DVD-a's from around 10 years ago), NY's hi-rez stuff all sounds superb. He does know how to record & master. In fact, while many of us (including me) rave about Steven Wilson's mastering work, Young's is every bit as good.

Wilson does mixes not mastering for those albums he works on.

The surround mix on that version of Harvest is "out there". It sounds very much like what you'd imagine the acoustics in the barn really sounded like. I like it, but haven't ever checked how that mix comes off in 2.0.

It's expensive now:



http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00006L7MT/?tag=imwan-20

I'm surprised that WEA Japan hasn't reissued this as an SACD.

In 2.0 it's HORRIBLY compressed (like all the other WEA DVD-A's of the time); the NY Archives hi rez version of the same songs (DVD or Blu) absolutely destroys it by comparison. Fortunately most of the WEA Japan SACD's are different masterings than the dvd-a's. The 2 Grateful Dead's & the Mac Rumors are other example of Loudness war dvda's.

A thing for a new Facebook page called Crazy Compression popped up. My first thought it was some new audiophile page.

Nope.

It's for clothing.

Wearable waveforms?

I think if they did that, they'd get sued.

To settle the lawsuit, they'd have to fill out their equipment profile.

When this topic showed up in my email inbox, I was preparing to post something towards skeptics of TLW to the effect that the Earth is flat..........

Really didn't fit the recent posts, but I found it too amusing to not use it!

For Geff, here's audio engineer Andrew Scheps explaining his theory about why compressed music causes you to feel stress or even physical pain:

Interesting (& it makes sense), but he's talking about MP3 style lossy bit rate compression, NOT Loudness war volume compression. 2 totally different beasts with the same name.

Geff hates homonyms.