Sep 09, 2007 07:16 am meanwhile we have plugin's like this!
www.gvst.co.uk/gclip.htm
check out the screenshots, they hurt my eyes and soul.
Turn Me Up...
Posted on Sep 09, 2007 07:03 am
whosyourdaddy00
Hold 'Em Czar
Member Since: Dec 30, 2004
hmmm here's an interesting 'movement' Bob Katz is startin'....i kinda like the idea of a TMU logo right next to the parental advisory!
www.turnmeup.org/index.html
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Sep 09, 2007 07:16 am meanwhile we have plugin's like this!
www.gvst.co.uk/gclip.htm
check out the screenshots, they hurt my eyes and soul.
Sep 09, 2007 07:17 am gee goly that place has a bunch of other free plugs though!
Sep 09, 2007 08:49 am Hey, thats really cool man. Ups to Bob Katz.
Sep 09, 2007 11:40 am Yeah. That Loudness War movie should be required viewing for all engineers.
Sep 09, 2007 12:40 pm its funny. i was listening to green days "american idoit" cd. THAT THING IS SQUASHED TO HELLLL!!!!! it was amazing. i didnt know it was possible.
Sep 10, 2007 05:01 am what u mean amercian idiot is squashed??
Sep 10, 2007 08:17 am i too have been cought up in the loudness war, on one end i do what the artist pays me to do ,on the other i write soap boxes like this www.homerecordingconnecti...tory&id=188 , so does that make a bit of a bastard?
Sep 10, 2007 08:24 am American Idiot is squashed to hell, actually, most everything released today is, just to keep up with the industry, thats why I don't buy music any more, I listen to tunes on HRC and that is about it...it sucks to have to turn the player up and down all the time, but in the long run, at least it has dynamics!
I agree there does have to be a general loudness standard, but it's WAY too high right now...I prefer dynamics over volume any day.
I am getting in touch with this group to see what it is I can do to help...
Sep 10, 2007 02:39 pm who cares
dynamics are for audiophiles and engineer snobs.
my tongue is only partly in cheek...
<ducks in preparation of hate>
Sep 10, 2007 03:11 pm I'll agree with Coolo (at least the part not-in-cheek).
I like the sound of music today, I like the loud (mostly) and to my ears it's still clear enough :)
Sep 10, 2007 03:55 pm Overall I don't mind the compression, but then I listen to mostly rock music that really isn't that "dynamic" some of the more theatrical type music tho I think could surely benefit from the Turn Me Up movement though.
Sep 10, 2007 10:29 pm OK, I'm not going to drive over to your house and smack you up side the head. But get a grip. Todays music, for the most part is absolute garbage! There are NO dynamics on almost every rock disc I or my sons own from the last few years.
If you like the sound of rubbish, so be it. But I myself and obviously lots of others, Katz to name one have had enough of the crap that is being pushed on both artists and listeners.
I will do what ever it takes as well to help bring the choice of a truly audible CD back into the hands of listeners. It is surprising to see the faces of the kids today when they come hear and listen to the types of music they like, only with the dynamics left intact.
And no, I do not provide my clients with smashed end product. I will beat them over the head when they tell me it isn't loud enough. Then I crush the living crap out of it and play it for them. Then replay the perfectly good final mix with the dynamics still intact. And guess what, dynamics wins over crud every time.
Sorry for the rant but wake up. With the music being smashed to hell like that soon all the record labels will have to do is release brown noise on a CD and the kids will buy it thinking that is the latest release from their favorite group.
OK, I feel better now. Hope I didn't hurt anyones feelings.
Sep 11, 2007 05:12 am SQUASHED MEANS OVER COMPRESSION, WHERE EVERY THING SOUNDS LIKE IT'S IN YOUR FACE ALL THE TIME....IT'S THE ONLY WAY TO MAKE YOUR CD FIT IN WITH THE REST THESES DAYS! IN THE EARLY DAYS OF RADIO, MORE DYNAMIC MUSIC SOUNDED 'BETTER' WITH THAT 'RADIO SOUND' THAT WAS DUE TO THE HEAVY LIMITING THAT THE BROADCASTERS USED....WELL SOON ENOUGH EVERY ARTIST WANTED THAT 'RADIO SOUND' SO THE MASTERING ENGINEERS STARTED COMPRESSING THE MUSIC BEFORE IT HIT THE AIR....THEN WHEN RECORDING BECAME EVEN MORE AFFORDABLE THE ARTISTS WANTED THAT 'RADIO READY' SOUND WHILE MIXING SO THEY ASKED THE MIXERS TO 'MAKE IT LOUDER' BEFORE IT WENT TO THE MASTERING HOUSE....
SO THE END PRODUCT IS JUST A WALL OF NOIZE THAT MAKES YOU WANNA TURN THE VOLUME DOWN AND LET THE MUSIC BECOME A BACKGROUND WALLPAPER OF ABSOLUTE CRAP.
more DYNAMIC music has quiet parts and LOUD parts (and i'm not talking clean verses and distorted choruses) but the music builds to a PEAK, then lets you down.
modern rock has forgotten how to do that for the most part these days....that's why you can't listen to your Disturbed CD from start to finish with the volume all the way up...it's too demanding on the ears.
Sep 11, 2007 07:01 am listen to some older recording of classical orchestras and you'll hear dynamics, loud and soft, in your face and backing off, it's beautiful.
Sep 11, 2007 11:41 am CBS Records (Journey etc.) had that squashed sound in the eighties. All about radio play I guess.
My 16 year old daughter insists on playing musicals in the car...Agh...
However, I did notice that the pit orchestras had amazing dynamics in the recordings. It was quite startling to me as I really hadn't really noticed the slow decline of dynamics in commercial recordings (they chip away at the stone...). For example, Tool's Undertow album (no, I don't want to argue about whether it's better than Aenima...) was quite punchy and dynamic. When they released 10,000 Days they'd succumbed to the squish.
I love that little movie from Turn-Me-Up. What a concept.
Sep 11, 2007 11:44 am When I go to Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis or shows like that, it's SO much more rewarding than your standard rock concert. There is so much more emotion in the music, it is quite stunning actually. Not full volume for 2 hours...it's in and out and up down and side to side...it's beautiful.
Sep 11, 2007 03:03 pm I guess I 1st noticed it with Journey and Boston years ago. I just figured that their sound. I never saw it becoming a standard. But that loudness wars movie was short and sweet and I finally understand it.
Sep 11, 2007 04:13 pm nothing like orchestra dynamics! wagner music is dead quiet then in your face loud, back and forth
Sep 12, 2007 10:52 am I used to go to the Royal Festival Hall in London quite regularly to see symphonies. I can't believe how loud they were! Then a piccolo on it's own, and then in with the whole brass section....mannnnn!!!
Beethoven's fifth, first movement, when the French Horns come in before the strings....Ooooohhhh....
My favourite sound EVER (okay, apart from hearing my babies giggle for the first time....sentimental old bugger that I am...) is the sound of a full symphony orchestra tuning to an A.
Goosebumps.
Sep 12, 2007 11:54 am I'm standing by my opinion. I like tons and tons of modern music and I like the sound of it. When an older track comes up the songs are still good hut I prefer the sound of today.
Sorry :)
Sep 12, 2007 06:25 pm Mathew Sweet is still abiding by the music that moves guidelines. I personally just don't like it full blast all the time and in your face. There is nothing but noise there after a few bars.
TC, I fully agree. The sound of the full pit hitting that sustained A is actually pretty cool indeed.
But ya, dB brings up a good point. We have Orchestra hall of course, but then there is the Ordway theatre. Man that is the place to go see a show. I saw Shawn Phillips there on its first season open. What a thing of beauty it was for the ears.
Sep 13, 2007 01:31 am reading the wiki page on loudness wars here. mentions gn'r UYI as an early example of harder limiting. also dirt, by AIC. never noticed that.
i wish i understood how the negative dbs apply here.
Sep 13, 2007 03:37 am if ya zoom in real close on the song, you can literally see the amount of clipping...it's quite easy...just look for the flat lines at the top of the waveform, the more, the harder it was pushed......
the early 90's (UYI) is when it really started to become the 'norm'.....earlier metal and punk bands started it, others very quickly followed suit.....you can really hear it in action if you take Billboard's top 5 from '85 to '05 and somehow montage them together.
Sep 13, 2007 10:27 am I've given this a little more thought.
Where I stand on the loudness and where I would guess 98% of the world does.
I simply don't think about that stuff. I either like the track or don't. I have never found myself saying "that's a really good song but the mix was bad" It's the whole experience. It's possible I have not liked a song because of the mix but I would not consciously think that. When I listen to music I am purely a listener and outside of listening for ideas for my own songs I don't think about the mix or the loudness or the dynamics in any way shape or form.
Sep 13, 2007 11:06 am In most rock music, I actually prefer a more "in your face" kind of mix. I love it when the bass throbs, the kick booms, the snare cracks, the guitars are thick.
I actually get annoyed when I have to fiddle with the volume knob during the course of an album.
That being said, music like jazz, classical, and folk/acoustic greatly benefit from being presented with a larger dynamic range. I don't expect a jazz drummer's snare to crack...instead I expect it to sound as if I were in the room with it. I want to hear the brushes, the snares, the rubs on the skin. And if he wants to get loud, he can "crack" it for effect in a shout chorus or something.
I think that music with arena-sized attitude deserves arena-sized maximization on the mix. Music with intimate attitude deserves an intimate mix. That's why there are more than one engineer in the world!
Sep 13, 2007 11:27 am Well, I think:
Every band worth its salt uses dynamics when they play. It should be the job of the engineer to capture those dynamics as they are without adding or subtracting anything. I understand that live sound engineers in an arena rock venue must apply some compression just to overcome crowd noise and other factors, but that compensation isn’t necessary for a home listening environment.
I ripped a track from my favorite Collective Soul CD and was startled at the level of compression in the waveform. And to be honest, I hadn’t previously noticed it. But I couldn’t help but wonder how much better it would have sounded without it!
My idea of utopia:
All music is recorded with its original dynamic range intact, and all manufacturers of playback equipment incorporate a SQUISH control in their products for those who prefer their music pancaked. Then everybody would be happy.
Sep 13, 2007 11:39 am Quote:
Where I stand on the loudness and where I would guess 98% of the world does.
That same 98% will like whatever society or clever marketing departments tell them they like.
Sorry, that's a lame argument as most people are stupid.
That said, I agree with Tad, some music lends itself to it, some does not.
Sep 13, 2007 11:55 am i'm just against overcompression. rock obviously can benefit from a little more than other genres. i like it on the loud side myself, just not totally squashed. i find it very hard to listen to danzig 7.
Sep 13, 2007 12:39 pm Quote:
Sorry, that's a lame argument as most people are stupid.
Not sure how serious that is but that's an awfully elitist attitude. The only people you find talking about this stuff are audio enthusiasts, they is not the market for the music industry. It's the same argument as the old fast food one, fast food sells because it's what people want whether or not it's quality product.
My son is not stupid, he knows what music he likes, he likes some Pink Floyd and he likes some Sum 41, one had dynamics, one doesn't. He just likes them, he doesn't like old Genesis who had plenty of dynamics and he doesn't like Bowling for Soup who are loud-mixed. Never once does he think about the dynamics, just about whether he likes the track or not.
Sep 13, 2007 12:47 pm At the risk of seeming a hypocrite, I guess I should add that I buckled under to the trend when I mastered my stepsons’ album. I found myself adding more dynamic processing than I was comfortable with so it would sound, to them, more like the stuff they were used to.
I needed to come clean with that. Now excuse me while I set fire to my equipment.
Sep 13, 2007 12:52 pm Obviously it's a sweeping generalization said partly tongue in cheek, but on the whole I couldn't care less if it's elitist or not, consumers are stupid. If they weren't "Blades of Glory" wouldn't have been a hit, Nelly would never have been a star, nobody would know the name Anna Nicole Smith, and shows like "America's Got Talent" wouldn't have been won by a ****** Ventriloquist.
Sep 13, 2007 01:13 pm ^^^^^^^Hahaha - what dB said.
I'd like to add Nigerian 419 scams and the iPhone.
Sep 13, 2007 03:01 pm america's taste in movies never ceases to baffle me. the recent crop of comedies all look terrible.
Sep 13, 2007 06:48 pm I was watching a ZZ Top concert today and I wondered, was compression the biggest change in there sound over the years? I was never quite able to put my finger on it. Either way those old guys still boogie.
Sep 13, 2007 07:01 pm OK, a couple of things. Going back to the article WYD posted the link to.
It isnt the fact that music mastered with its dynamics intact is not loud. It is if you simply turn up the freakin volume. That is the point he is trying to make.
Set down in my room here or in my car or in my living room downstairs here. All have hi powered systems in them. Why, to listen loudly. I can put on a Simon and Garfunkel record from the 60's and shake stuff off my neighbors shelfs. but guess what??? The dynamics are still intact! You can hear it out to the main road, as if it was a live band playing in my house. If that isn't loud enough, then I guess I better give up.
IF I turn newer over compressed CD's up to that level it is nothing but sonic hash. Mostly brown noise, with the occasional power scream dropped in for effect.
Whether I like it or not is a moot point, because I do actually like a lot of new music. I just wish it had the dynamics that I know are there left intact for me to hear.
I do also agree that indeed a CD should be completely level the entire way through. I too don't like to fiddle with a volume knob while I am listening.
Unless of course there is an officer with a noise complaint at my door.
Sep 14, 2007 07:10 am on one side you have...
Quote:
I ripped a track from my favorite Collective Soul CD and was startled at the level of compression in the waveform. And to be honest, I hadn’t previously noticed it.
which means, it doesn't matter how compressed it is, it's still 'good'.
on the flip side you have
[quote]Quote:
Sorry, that's a lame argument as most people are stupid.
Not sure how serious that is but that's an awfully elitist attitude. The only people you find talking about this stuff are audio enthusiasts, they is not the market for the music industry. It's the same argument as the old fast food one, fast food sells because it's what people want whether or not it's quality product.[/quote]
this is also very true....the general population could give a F less about quality, and if it (mcdonalds) tastes good is must be good....
the way i see it, F the masses, we care about audio WAY more than they do, and it's our job to keep it good....do you think a really good chef eats at mcdonalds? F no he doesn't! that's simply because he understands that it all JUNK!...
now, audio-wise, it's up to us "informed" people to educate the IDIOTS who really think Green Day's latest "sounds GOOD"....
IT DOESN'T!!! the massive general public has absolutely NO CLUE on what "sounds good", nor do they care.
if they can hear the vocals and the speakers rattle whatever is around them, they dig it....
where i'm from we call that "ignorant" or "uninformed"...
yes, it's a proven fact, people are sheep and they go with the herd. (sp?)
call it elitist if you want, but tell me how often do you eat fast food, and call it "good"?
i bet it's more than ya care to admit? don't yo tell me you've never got excited when ya get a bucket from KFC, i know, i've been there too....but THAT alone doesn't make it "good".....the masses ARE very dumb and impressionable.
everyone knows KFC is a heart attack in a bucket, but yet it tastes (read: sounds) sooooo good and full.
people are dumb in general, yet everyone has their own talents. when it comes to audio, as long as it vibrates their booty, they LOVE IT! very easily impressed these kids are these days.
Sep 14, 2007 08:40 am I think the masses aren't necessarily dumb, more like ignorant.
I think most are aware of sonic mumbo-jumbo going on in their records, but aren't inclined to feel like doing much about it, or really caring, for that matter.
It boils down to ROI: if they can feel moved, without any new energy exerted (spend $$$), then they're happy.
I know I am.
I know that I could have a much improved listening experience if I replace my home theater speaker setup with better speakers (probably the amp too). But it's not worth my investment. I'll get 2 - 5% better sound, for 400% more money.
Not good ROI in my book.
I believe the consumer market is similar: they'll take what sounds good (to them) and like it, generally knowing that they're settling for 'not as good as it could be'.
To WYD's analogy, I think the same paradigm applies: people know they're not getting quality food, but for the time and $$$ required for quality food, the fast food is a understood replacement. Less quality for less time required, and less $$$ required.
My drummer friend put it out there on the analog vs digital debate: who out there listening is going to know the difference, listening on their half-hearted stereo setup, or in their car, or on a boombox type setup. 98% of people won't care if I record and produce all digital. They just know if they like it, and if it moves them (emotionally or physically).
Sep 14, 2007 09:33 am It's all about entertainment right ? If this was life/death some of this stuff would matter more but music (and to some extent fast food) is just entertainment. Listen it makes you feel good, get some fast food, it makes you feel good (for a short time).
It's irrelevant and condescending to believe people are stupid because they enjoy what they like (even though you have a perfect right to think that and it may even be true). People like what they like and they should be allowed to. People obviously like this modern hip-hop music and style or else it wouldn't be so popular. I don't but I really don't begrudge others who do (just another example)
Music and movies and TV are an escape for most people, a way to take their minds off day to day stuff. That's why I don't think most people are thinking about sonic values. For us it's a hobby which means we take it more seriously. Stamp collectors probably love their stamps and think we're stupid for not understanding the difference but it doesn't impact our ability to send letters.
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