pcrecord, post: 433003, member: 46460 wrote: Interesting recording ! Thing is, there is an anoying noise going on possibly in the guitar. Do you know where it comes from ?

I do not know what noise you listen for,but all that is live recording and all finger touches are here and lipsing and moveng body and more You know.Or you have golden ears and hear more than me amd the artist.Cheers

pcrecord, post: 433003, member: 46460 wrote: Interesting recording ! Thing is, there is an anoying noise going on possibly in the guitar. Do you know where it comes from ?

angel72bg, post: 433014, member: 47426 wrote: Don't know what noise you listen for or you have golden ears and hear more than me amd the artist.Cheers

In Marco's case, I wouldn't doubt that to be true. If he says he's hearing noise somewhere, then you can bet that there's noise there.

Here's the thing... you're welcome to upload anything you want here ( as long as a microphone is involved in the recording). That's a big part of why this forum exists... but you can't blame someone for critiquing that which you upload, and you can't prevent people from hearing what they hear. That's the price you pay for uploading audio here. It's a price that many gladly do pay, in order to get better at what they do, to improve their recording and mixing skills.

If you're happy with the results, then that's fine. But just because you can't hear something that someone else does doesn't mean it's not there.
If you're looking for "yes-men", or people who will tell you that what you are doing is great - whether it is or not - then you've come to the wrong place.

This forum is filled with industry veterans, professionals who have made it their number one priority in life to be able to hear things that others cannot.

If you don't want to tap into that level of talent and experience, or take advantage of that refined critical-listening ability, then that's your business - but you shouldn't get defensive about it.

To be fair, I'll say that the sample you uploaded sounds pretty good. But there is a noise happening on the guitar; I hear it, too... it's not anything blatantly obvious and out front, but it is there.

Whether you take that critique ( now from two different engineers) or not, is entirely up to you.

But please don't insult us by implying that we're both hearing things that aren't there, or, that just because you or your client can't hear it, that it must not be there.

-d.

DonnyThompson, post: 433019, member: 46114 wrote: In Marco's case, I wouldn't doubt that to be true. If he says he's hearing noise somewhere, then you can bet that there's noise there.

Here's the thing... you're welcome to upload anything you want here ( as long as a microphone is involved in the recording). That's a big part of why this forum exists... but you can't blame someone for critiquing that which you upload, and you can't prevent people from hearing what they hear. That's the price you pay for uploading audio here. It's a price that many gladly do pay, in order to get better at what they do, to improve their recording and mixing skills.

If you're happy with the results, then that's fine. But just because you can't hear something that someone else does doesn't mean it's not there.
If you're looking for "yes-men", or people who will tell you that what you are doing is great - whether it is or not - then you've come to the wrong place.

This forum is filled with industry veterans, professionals who have made it their number one priority in life to be able to hear things that others cannot.

If you don't want to tap into that level of talent and experience, or take advantage of that refined critical-listening ability, then that's your business - but you shouldn't get defensive about it.

To be fair, I'll say that the sample you uploaded sounds pretty good. But there is a noise happening on the guitar; I hear it, too... it's not anything blatantly obvious and out front, but it is there.

Whether you take that critique ( now from two different engineers) or not, is entirely up to you.

But please don't insult us by implying that we're both hearing things that aren't there, or, that just because you or your client can't hear it, that it must not be there.

-d.

Ok I can not hear that noise but you can.That is ok.We are differend people.If I can hear I will try to remove that.Or you have golden ears,when we did recording that performance at the same time we made a video clip with the camera.We use big light that has some noise,that noise was only present in room mics,that are so low in the level of hole picture.But I did not here that noise here in the finaly product.Or a have to go to fire station to clean up my ears.

I didn't want to put down your work, not at all. My comment was a simple try to help.
What I can say is that this noise isn't in the vocal because I hear it only when there is no vocal. Because it's not in the vocal and you say it's been recorded live, I doubt it was something in the room unless it wasn't the direct noise of the light itself but an electric static created by the light being plugged in to the same electrical circuit. What kind of light was it ?

As Donny said, you can forget about it if you and your customer can't hear it. But, I didn't dig very much to hear it on my laptop and apple ear-buds, the noise is pretty obvious and I'm surprised that you don't hear it.

If you want to hear it for yourself, mute the vocal, deactivate any noisegate and solo each tracks one by one.. I'm sure it'll jump at you.
Maybe like you said, it's just in the room mic...

angel72bg, post: 432998, member: 47426 wrote: Guitar-Ribbon MXL R144 Focusrite octo pre MK2
DI box from line6-guitar again.Focusrite octo pre MK2
stereo pair KM 184 Neumann for room mics about 3 m from the sourse AB config.Focusrite Octopre mk2

Let me give you some hypotheses on the source(s) of noises:

• Room mics for an acoustic guitar and vocal is a good risk for noises because the instrument isn't loud, so you need to turn up the preamp pretty high so either the preamp could start to produce noise but you can also pickup a lot of ambiance/outside noises.. In your case the Octopre isn't very quiet (I had one and sold it..)
• Talking about the Octopre, you also put a ribbon mic on it.. unless it's an active ribbon it's a recipe for noise...
• Also you recorded the guitar's pickup. pickups are known to pickup electric noises. If your light had a ballast or any part that project electro magnetics, the noise could come from there as well. . .
• The line 6 is an amp simulator. Yes, the simulations have noises like real amps

Hope this helps !

pcrecord, post: 433028, member: 46460 wrote: Talking about the Octopre, you also put a ribbon mic on it.. unless it's an active ribbon it's a recipe for noise...

Yup, again, Marco's on it.

The Octapre offers 60db of gain for mics. That's fine for condensers, but 60db is the bare minimum for Ribbons. This means that when using a ribbon mic with that pre, you're having to gain-up pretty hot on the input in order to get the minimum amount of gain needed - and that's a minimum recommendation, not an optimal recommendation.

The result is often noise, especially with lower priced mic pre's... and while the Focusrite is a very good preamp for the money, it's not what would be considered to be the optimum preamp for low-output dynamics and ribbons.

If you find yourself using ribbons quite a bit, or low output dynamics like a Shure SM7, you might want to look into a preamp that offers gain of 65db... or more, especially if you are recording softer sound sources, like light picking on an acoustic guitar, or gentle violin, etc.

You could also consider using a Cloudlifter to boost the gain; it works by taking the phantom power from your pre that you would normally use to power condenser mics with, and converts it into additional input gain for low output sources.

I listed all the reasons for noise to be present in your recording but due to the kind of noise I hear, I'm pointing more to electric noises. Grounding, balasts, AC adapters, pickups etc...

Back 10 years, CRT monitors were an instant source of noise when you'd put a guitar near it ! ;)

That noise is finger picking.

Chris Perra, post: 433072, member: 48232 wrote: That noise is finger picking.

No it's not !! listen to the song when there is no vocal.. Thank God Donny heard it.. I might just go crasy otherwise !! :ROFLMAO:

There's a character noise in the background... super quiet. I thought you were talking about the squeaking of the finger picking.
Hard to say what that is it could be the resonance of the guitar, or some electrical issue. Only way to know is to crank up the mic with nothing playing.

At any rate the level of noise doesn't make the music unlistenable to me. Plenty of pro acoustic/vocals recordings out there with far worse.

Chris Perra, post: 433075, member: 48232 wrote:
At any rate the level of noise doesn't make the music unlistenable to me. Plenty of pro acoustic/vocals recordings out there with far worse.

I agree.

It definitly is an electric noise and it jumped at me on the first listened. I thought exposing it could help, if it could be avoided in future projects ;)

Hi All,here is no mixed and master audio,raw recordnig no plugins compressio no Eq ,just on the master fader has a limiter 1-3 db limiting.
The music is Bulgarian folkore but little new wave.
I play the guitar Yamaha not so expensive about 300$.I did record it with stereo pair Neumann KM 184.1 mic is about 12 fret and 2 mic is above the my sholder.Preamp 1 is UA solo 610 tube thru SSL bus comp than Thermionic culture Mastering comp then Dangerous Bax Eq with 1db low shelf 70 Hz and 1 db at 18 KHz.Then Lyra 1 Prism
The flute is calling in Bulgarian- kaval.Rerording chain is about the same ,but mono recording with one KM184.
Do you hear noise again?
Did you like or not like something.

[MEDIA=audio]http://recording.or…

Attached files Doktora_Kaval&guitar.mp3 (13.5 MB) 

Congratulation ! it sounds very good, clean and acurate ! No noise detected here ;)
Did you add reverb or it's the room ?

I heard significant clipping on my iPad into tv into Mickie hrs (my setup of the last year). It was also significantly louder than the HBO show I was watching. I suspect maybe some over limiting, or a problem with my stuff.

pcrecord, post: 433270, member: 46460 wrote: Congratulation ! it sounds very good, clean and acurate ! No noise detected here ;)
Did you add reverb or it's the room ?

Thank's,the reverb is TL Spase plugin with impulse London Plate from Bricasti.

kmetal, post: 433273, member: 37533 wrote: I heard significant clipping on my iPad into tv into Mickie hrs (my setup of the last year). It was also significantly louder than the HBO show I was watching. I suspect maybe some over limiting, or a problem with my stuff.

Maeby I have to lower the output of limiter not to be -0.2 db but -1 db when it is convert to mp3.

angel72bg, post: 433280, member: 47426 wrote: Maeby I have to lower the output of limiter not to be -0.2 db but -1 db when it is convert to mp3.

That's what I normaly do when doing mastering (even if I'm not an ME, customers ask that I do it anyway). It puts your media safe to be played on every systems.
But we are here listening to a pre mixed recording and to me if you are being forced to apply a limiter on tracks, it meens they were recorded too hot..
angel, I know you probably didn't record too hot and your limiter is probably on the two bus.. But I felt I needed to write this anyway for beginners who may read this.

I usually record with peaks reaching -12db on a small project like this and -16 or -18db for a full band. The reason is, the more track I have the more chances the masterbus could be overloaded when playing back with faders at unit gain.. Also, I'm sure to keep any dynamics intact and avoid clipping.

pcrecord, post: 433282, member: 46460 wrote: That's what I normaly do when doing mastering (even if I'm not an ME, customers ask that I do it anyway). It puts your media safe to be played on every systems.
But we are here listening to a pre mixed recording and to me if you are being forced to apply a limiter on tracks, it meens they were recorded too hot..
angel, I know you probably didn't record too hot and your limiter is probably on the two bus.. But I felt I needed to write this anyway for beginners who may read this.

I usually record with peaks reaching -12db on a small project like this and -16 or -18db for a full band. The reason is, the more track I have the more chances the masterbus could be overloaded when playing back with faders at unit gain.. Also, I'm sure to keep any dynamics intact and avoid clipping.

Dynamics began to disappear when the " loudness wars" started... along with the addition of distortion... Suddenly, smooth, dynamic mixes took on the sonic character of a freight train, because the amount of gain reduction starting to be used was smashing the dynamics flatter than a bug's ass against a windshield.

I have no idea who that very first M.E. was, the person who first inserted a Waves L1 or whatever, and who started the craze, ( trust me, I've looked... I want to find out who it was so I can visit them and beat 'em over the head with an LA2) nor do I have any idea as to why he/she thought that by crushing a mix with such extreme limiting to reduce the DR of a song from -14 to -12db RMS or so, down to to -3 to -5 db instead, sounded anything even remotely close to "good".

IMHO of course.

The Loudness War started back in the '50s, when Producers visiting the malt shops noticed that teens would turn and look at the jukebox when a new song came on and it was louder. The higher loudness caught the teens attention for a moment.

The Producers then went back to the office and checked ... sure enough ... those particular records sold more! Probably because the teens remembered those songs at the malt shop since the loudness caught their attention.

It's all about the money. Louder = more memory retention = higher sales.

Please don't think for a second that it has anything to do with art.

It's gotten so much worse recently due to VST compressors being able to use computer precision not previously available on analog gear. IOW, the computer can make absolutely sure the mix will never exceed -0.0000000000000001 dB, so we can be safe in our smashing on the waveform.

Poop on it. That's what I say. Actually, that's not what I say, but Chris won't let me use "that word" on this forum. ;)

I think over limiting comes from the use of samples more so than track loudness at this point. Loudness pretty much has gotten as loud as it can dbfs.

When you consider a sample has already been eq/compressed/maximized already, then add another round of it during mixing, it's an identifiable sound.

Something that sounds dynamic and natural, doesn't sound current. You don't get the instrumental separation, clarity, and full spectrum from live recorded instruments. They can't compete in that realm, but the trade off in is usually vibe and character which is sometimes desirable.

So where hearing über compression/limiting on both a track level, and overall.

That said the 2-bus thing is getting better with better engineering practices/awareness, better newer equipment (records sound better than from 4-5 years ago).

Some marketing genius will start marketing their catalog in the standard(void of dynamics) form and then offer an alternative "live" version on vinyl. Live being with all the dynamics.

It could happen.

JohnTodd, post: 433284, member: 39208 wrote: The Loudness War started back in the '50s, when Producers visiting the malt shops noticed that teens would turn and look at the jukebox when a new song came on and it was louder. The higher loudness caught the teens attention for a moment.
The Producers then went back to the office and checked ... sure enough ... those particular records sold more! Probably because the teens remembered those songs at the malt shop since the loudness caught their attention.
It's all about the money. Louder = more memory retention = higher sales.

I'm aware of all that, John ;) ... I was referring more to the "damage" that's been done in the digital realm. And, you're right. Levels did creep up over the 50's, 60's and 70's... but for as loud as those levels eventually grew to, there was still a preservation of dynamics, and Fidelity wasn't destroyed at the same time, either. The following isn't aimed at you John - I now you're aware of what follows below; this is more for someone else who may be researching the subject.

We all know that Analog distorts in a way that digital doesn't, that tape saturates in a way that digital does not. (I'm not talking about VST's that are modeled to emulate distortion... I'm talking about actual bit distortion, the result of slamming "overs" into converters). With consoles, pre's and tape, that "edge" became part of "the sound" - and a good bit of that pleasant-sounding, even-order harmonic distortion also came from saturating the tape - intentionally recording "hot"- which was done to cover up the noise ratio that was inherent to tape resulted in "sweet spots"... where it all just worked.

And to be clear, I'm not saying that I don't like digital. I love digital. Today's workstations allow us to do so much more than we used to be able to do. I love how quiet it is. I love how it can be as sparkling clear as an alpine lake, or how we can use other digital tools or analog gear to color that sound to our heart's content - by as much or as little as we want. The tools are amazing. The editing is incredible. Believe me when I tell you, that I do not miss editing with a razor blade and grease pencil.

But... there's nothing at all "pleasant" about digital distortion, ( I'm not talking about using bit distortion for an effect - I'm talking about the kind that happens as a result of over limiting) and there's no excuse for it, either, (AFAIC).
There's no noise floor to cover up anymore, and in the past few years, even the older digital process of relying on volume to determine optimal bit resolutions ( like with ADATS, Tascam DA's, etc.) is now a thing of the past.

The worst violator I've heard thus far, was back around 2009, with Metallica's Death Magnetic album. I was told about how bad it sounded from an engineer colleague/friend of mine; and I wanted to hear for myself if what he had said was true.
I found out very quickly that he wasn't exaggerating - in the least - about how bad it sounded. It was bloody awful. It was the worst audio I'd ever heard. ( I'm not a huge Metallica fan or anything, but I am a fan of fidelity ) and I was shocked...
I couldn't even believe that something that bad had been released by a pro act, working with pro engineers in a pro studio, and having a pro mastering house ( Sterling) also being involved. And, I couldn't believe that their record label even allowed it to be released.
Where was the one person? That one individual, out of all the other people involved, who should have stood up and said, "Are all you guys deaf? Or are you all really that afraid to tell the truth? This is terrible. There's no way this album can be released..."

It was a huge turning point for me. I lost a great deal of faith in those who were supposed to be the top-tier engineers and guardians of our craft. They had absolutely destroyed the sonics, had decimated dynamics. It was nothing more than a wall of noise... and it wasn't even good noise. I actually considered quitting the biz at that time, figuring that if what I'd heard was an indication of where our craft was headed, I wanted no part of it. You can laugh if you want...maybe it sounds melodramatic... but that album almost made me walk away from audio for good.

Instead, I decided to adhere to what and how I'd been taught, to continue learning the craft, and to continue honing my skills to where I'd rely on only one thing as my goal, and that was - above everything else - what sounded good to me.

FWIW

-d.

The only thing stopping records from going further over the top with the loudness war was that a needle would skip or the record would be physically defective if cut too loud. They should do the same with digital audio, anything over -11rms doesn't play. ha ha

Chris Perra, post: 433298, member: 48232 wrote: The only thing stopping records from going further over the top with the loudness war was that a needle would skip or the record would be physically defective if cut too loud. They should do the same with digital audio, anything over -11rms doesn't play. ha ha

Personally speaking, I have no objection whatsoever to that rule. Absolutely none. I'd be one of the first people to jump on the -14 to -12db RMS rule-wagon. ;)

Here's an interesting video of the two different versions of Metallica's The Day That Never Comes - switching back and forth from the original retail version that was released, to the re-mastered version for Guitar Hero.
Starting at around 1:57 on-thru to the end... if you're able to listen for that long. If I had bought that album not as an engineer but as a fan, I honestly would have thought either my CD player or the disc was defective in some way, and that either my CD player was dying or that something had gone wrong during the disc pressing.

The final DR/RMS of this song on the album was -2db. Below is a pic of the mastered album version ( the top file in blue) vs the GH version (below in green):

FWIW
-d.

I kinda like the way this thread just keeps going on about things that "should" be right...but have been mishandled in a manner that makes the thing in question below standard.

Chris Perra, post: 433298, member: 48232 wrote: The only thing stopping records from going further over the top with the loudness war was that a needle would skip or the record would be physically defective if cut too loud. They should do the same with digital audio, anything over -11rms doesn't play. ha ha

With digital audio we have reach 0 dbfs. That is the clipping point. So I think the loudness from hyper limiting is over with for the foreseeable future. And the next gen IO devices/clocks/conversion are sounding significantly better than the old digi blue and grey boxes. Those two, along with a general dislike of the clipped master sound, is making far better recordings than anything from the last 15 years.

Lol if death magnetic didn't suck so bad, there'd be absolutely nothing to say about it. Metal has nothing to do w age, as Mr. Iomi here, is in his 70s, and battled cancer during the process. This is the heaviest freaking guitar sound I've heard in a long time. Dio was in his 60s. They crushed it, and this is from 2009.

I will also say that I've bought albums that sound better on the you tube than the actual cd, so there's something to be said for mastering for the destination. This YouTube sounds worse than the higher fidelity versions. Chuga chunk chug.

DonnyThompson, post: 433294, member: 46114 wrote: I couldn't believe that their record label even allowed it to be released.
Where was the one person? That one individual, out of all the other people involved, who should have stood up and said, "Are all you guys deaf? Or are you all really that afraid to tell the truth? This is terrible. There's no way this album can be released..."

Andrew Scheps in a YT video (I think its the Mixing With The Masters series) is asked by a student why he "destroyed Death Magnetic" where he refers to himself winning the Loudness Wars.

Without giving a difinitive answer, he eluded to the fact that there were others in the room (one could take that as being the band and Rick Rubin) who took the decision for the album to sound that loud and overly compressed. From his coy response he gives the impression that it wasn't for him to decide and he probably wasn't totally happy with the end result, but we most likely will never really know.
At the end of the day, he was getting paid to mix it that way and at the end of the day he wouldn't want to deny himself opportunities in the future by being critical of the album.

IMHO I think it was a middle finger by Metallica, as if to say "we are somebody, and others are going to buy our album regardless of how it sounds so who gives a rats if its overly compressed to the point of being aurally offensive to anyone with an ear for music",...
- and lets face it, music these days is 95%+ downloaded as opposed to how we aquired it in our day, and whose downloading it? - the majority are young kids who have grown up knowing little else...

-If they heard an album with amazing dynamic range such as Dark Side Of The Moon, they'd tell you to turn it up to 11 because they can't hear it...

Thats' my 2 bobs worth.

Sean G, post: 433422, member: 49362 wrote: If they heard an album with amazing dynamic range such as Dark Side Of The Moon, they'd tell you to turn it up to 11 because they can't hear it...

They wouldn't have said that if they'd have had a chance to hear it on my home hi-fi rig at the time, playing it through my McIntosh power amp into my cabinets, which were 15" woof x 6" mids x dome tweets... that could have shaken a roof loose. LOL
Turning it up to "11" would have destroyed the block I lived on, as turning it up to even 9 would have made us all deaf - and sterile. LOL

I'm sure that Scheps was doing as he was told. In the standard rank and file of a session, The Producer is the boss, and if the band is paying for the session, then they might have a say as well.
Andrew would have been way down the hierarchy totem, sitting just a step or so above the receptionist and the janitor. In that situation, it's his job to do what the producer - and the band, too, depending - tells him to do - in this case, Rick Rubin. Rubin might have asked for Schep's opinion on some things, but in the end he had the final say.

Ted Jensen, the engineer at Sterling who "mastered" the album, was quoted as saying this afterwards in defense:

"In this case the mixes were already brick walled before they arrived at my place. Suffice it to say I would never be pushed to overdrive things as far as they are here. Believe me I’m not proud to be associated with this one, and we can only hope that some good will come from this in some form of backlash against volume above all else..."

There've been some other offenders since, but I'm not seeing (or hearing) it nearly as en mass as I did during the height of that trend. 2008 seemed to be the turning point, but that trend lasted far too long, IMO.
For awhile, it seemed as if nearly everything being released suffered from the same distortive effects and decimation of dynamics as a result of intentional over-limiting.

Honestly guys, I have to be honest here and say that I've been guilty of it myself. Back around '95 or so, I was printing CD one-offs for Insane Clown Posse ( a well known rap act from Detroit who were recording in Cleveland at that time) for what became their Riddle Box album, and they were having me L1 the crap out of all the songs before we burned them to CD. At the time, I was one of only a few guys who had a CD burning rig in the area, even the studio they were working at in Cleveland didn't yet have a CD burner, and these guys were having me burn 20, 30 copies...I was charging them a service fee of $15 per burn, ( this was back when Taiyo Yuden blanks were $16 ...each ), so I was making a lot of money off of them, and so, I did what they wanted. But I was simply acting as a service for hire with those guys. I would never have intentionally done that on my own. And when I was hired to produce, I never produced anything like what was being commonly produced at the time regarding volume levels. I always tried to maintain an RMS of around -12 or so.

Personally, I think that Jensen's wishes have become kinda prophetic... because I do believe it was that particular album that was the main catalyst for change, where people finally said "okay, that's enough"...

-d.

DonnyThompson, post: 433423, member: 46114 wrote: I was printing CD one-offs for Insane Clown Posse ( a well known rap act from Detroit who were recording in Cleveland at that time) and they were having me L1 the crap out of all the songs before we burned them to CD

It could have been worse Donny....
They could have made you wear the facepaint while you did it !!!:ROFLMAO:

LOL... yeah, when they were at my place, they just looked like "normal" guys, which I thought was just as scary. LOL

Seriously, they were there with their manager - he was the one who had called me, and they were all really laid-back cats. Polite, easy going, affable. It's not like they walked into my control room and started chewing on my gear or anything. ;)

I do recall that they were under some kind of serious deadline though; I remember them being really nervous about how long it was taking - remember back then, it was a disc at a time, with speeds of either real time or 2x burn for error free discs - so it was taking quite a while... and they had to be in Dallas or Houston ( or somewhere in Texas) the next morning, where they'd made a special appointment - and had paid a lot of money for - a one day delivery from a pressing plant, to have something like 8000 CD's duped in one day. Whoever handled the money - whether it was them or a backer - had a lot of it. When we finally got done and they paid me - in cash - the manager pulled a roll of bills out of his pocket that could have choked a pig.

I never really followed them after that though. They weren't really my "thang".

The chili peppers californitcation was also a loud Rick Rubin production criticize for its loudness. A lot of his modern pop/rock productions have a loudness, audioslave is another that comes to mind.

It's interesting to me that Rick Rubin and Andrew sheops worked on Adeles 21, which was not criticized for loudness. I wonder if they worked on the same songs.

Someone should make a maximizer with some tubes and transformers on it, with digital out, straight to the box.

The biggest problem is not the loudness, it's the lack of dynamics. Which in turn help create size depth and space.

I feel that the average tv and film mixer uses far too much dynamic range, to the point of obnoxiousness.

The biggest problem I have with volume (yes I've l2'd plenty of mixes;(), is when the advertisements in between are much louder than the music/program material. I could certainly use a volume matches for Internet radio/tube. The other thing is without the radio/broadcast style limiting and compression, the differences between song volumes on the same music station can vary significantly, Amazon prime comes to minds with this, as they play a lot of the original album versions of tunes, not the re-mastered-released again-re mastered-super bonus-re mixed version, lol. When I put slash next to say ratt, or yngwie, they vary quite significantly in volume, a little too much. So while that's what volume knobs are for, aren't our devices 'smart' now?

I wish there was a form of auto gain matching for that purpose.

d- still drooling over that McIntosh amp. I've heard a few stories about those beasts!!!

kmetal, post: 433426, member: 37533 wrote: The biggest problem is not the loudness, it's the lack of dynamics. Which in turn help create size depth and space.

Well, the other problem - beyond the destruction of the dynamic range, is the distortion that is incurred when audio is limited to that degree - and it's not the "pleasing" type of even-order distortion that we experience through analog/tubes/transformers, it's that nasty digital clipping, the distortion that drills a third eye into your forehead, and makes you beg for the sound of fingernails on a blackboard as a welcome alternative instead.

There are times I love the sound of analog distortion - a gained-up console channel or pre, with that nice "edgy" sound, or that kind of "glue" that the older SSL Mix Bus Compressors used to sometimes get... also, the sound of an LA2, or even just a great sounding OpAmp on the master out of a desk. It's kinda like a warm, fuzzy hug, instead of the "scraping" or "glass-shattering" type of sound that digital gets when pushed too hard.

FWIW, I don't always want that even-order edge - there are plenty of times I also love "super clean", too, especially with classical/orchestral, or with acoustic-based music ( James Taylor comes to mind); it's good to have choices to match the style.

What I've never been able to grasp is why an RMS or around -12 to -10 isn't perfectly sufficient for listening.

If you want it "louder", then add more watts to your playback system, and buy bigger speakers, or better headphones.

That brings to mind the possibility that perhaps a part of this loudness craze is caused by the general lack of playback level available in most music playing devices - iPods, iPhones, iPads, etc., - they're all pretty shy when it comes to volume, even maxed out, where they then just distort...
So, perhaps if people had the ability to cleanly gain-up their volumes - without incurring the distortion caused by low headroom and cheap earbuds on their personal listening devices - they could then turn it up to the point that their brains were melting,
( if you want, it's your brain) and then maybe the trend of uber-limiting - along with the too frequent digital distortion that occurs because of that amount of limiting - wouldn't become as much of a factor anymore...

IMO of course.

DonnyThompson, post: 433429, member: 46114 wrote: That brings to mind the possibility that perhaps a part of this loudness craze is caused by the general lack of playback level available in most music playing devices - iPods, iPhones, iPads, etc., - they're all pretty shy when it comes to volume, even maxed out, where they then just distort...

You are spot on...heres' an exercise for anyone who is interested...

Mix a song to -23 to -24 LUFS then play it back through an iphone or android device...

Its barely audible, so much so that I emailed a song I mixed to someone the other day to listen to and they replied that even at full volume they could hardly hear it, it was like a whisper.

- I had to go back and up the level on the 1176 plug in until the song was at around -12 LUFS just so you could hear the song through the device.

With the amount of music listened to on mobile devices these days, if the broadcast standard is around -23 / -24 LUFS there will be issues playing back audio mixed to these levels on todays' devices.

Sean G, post: 433435, member: 49362 wrote: You are spot on...heres' an exercise for anyone who is interested...

Mix a song to -23 to -24 LUFS then play it back through an iphone or android device...

Its barely audible, so much so that I emailed a song I mixed to someone the other day to listen to and they replied that even at full volume they could hardly hear it, it was like a whisper.

- I had to go back and up the level on the 1176 plug in until the song was at around -12 LUFS just so you could hear the song through the device.

With the amount of music listened to on mobile devices these days, if the broadcast standard is around -23 / -24 LUFS there will be issues playing back audio mixed to these levels on todays' devices.

Crazy eh. I mix, well check... on my iphone all the time now. I hate it, but wtf can a guy do.

Try giving tracks to DJ's at the proper level. They are either hard pressed to reach for the volume or don't even know what to do. Its no wonder we are in this hell hole.

Sean G, post: 433435, member: 49362 wrote: Its barely audible, so much so that I emailed a song I mixed to someone the other day to listen to and they replied that even at full volume they could hardly hear it, it was like a whisper.

That's because you mixed at -23db, which is a broadcast standard, Sean. Your car radio is able to gain up enough so that the -23 LUFS is fine, because it has sufficient wattage behind it to play any music at healthy levels. You can't approach it in the same way with a personal listening device.

For MP3's and such, Ian Sheppard advises to mix at "CD average" levels; around -14 to -18, and never hotter than -10 to -12. With this integrated LUFS measurement, you have a dynamic range of around -12 to -14, which is considered to be a nice DR at a decent volume level. If it's then going to be played on radio or TV, at that point, the broadcast standards will kick in, ( depending on what the media is), and they will lower (or raise) it according to their own individual standards, so that all music played on that media will reside at the same LUFS range. YouTube may set it as -16, while radio may be -23. And, for those who are listening on iphones and such, the -12db level would be healthy, yet have a dynamic range that was also pleasant.

When I mentioned mixing this most recent album at -23db, it's because I knew it was going to Tom Bethel ( Thomas W. Bethel ) for mastering. I gave the mixes to him at that level because I wanted to give him room to work.
After mastering, the LUFS on the CD ( and on the MP3's for personal listening devices) sat at around -14 to -12.

You follow?

-d.

I follow(y)

Sean, check your PM's