Monday, June 30, 2008

too loud

Music is too loud

"Producers and engineers call this "the loudness war," and it has changed the way almost every new pop and rock album sounds. But volume isn't the only issue. Computer programs like Pro Tools, which let audio engineers manipulate sound the way a word processor edits text, make musicians sound unnaturally perfect."

It isn't just the volume. Its the way we expect music to be.
Since the mid-1990s, engineers have used dynamic compression to make CDs louder and louder. These waveforms show how loud contemporary recordings have become:

Nirvana's "Smells like Teen Spirit" (1991)

Arctic Monkey's "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" (2006)


link: Loudness War!

2 comments:

Davy J said...

I'm trying to justify my quiet mixing techniques.

Unknown said...

haha