apart from the loudness war

[plastic penguin]

The Jungson J88D, not a stranger to these pages but still available out of Hong Kong for a very modest US$733 FOB.

Not just VU meters, Blue VU meters....*kiss2*

You flagged this one up to me some time back. Does look nice, but as it's only available in Hong Kong it's about as much use as chocolate teapot.

They will export to the UK if you ask, in fact most of their business is export.

Try. http://www.cattylink.com/page82.html

Even allowing for extra packing, airfreight, handling charges, import duty and VAT, it should still be possible to land one in the UK for less than £1000.

I get the potential savings. That's good. Given I have a regular usage with carriers I know how reckless they can be. Last thing I want is to end up with a battered and bruised piece of electronics.

Have you heard it? if so, what's its sonic virtues?

 

[Al ears]

The vast majority of music playback now is on small portable audio. This cannot cope well with large dynamic range. As a result a lot of music is recorded with the dynamics compressed and everything whacked right up to 0db.

If you look at a VU meter these days, it often goes full scale and stays there!

Evrything in the track can be heard at the same volume throughout, yes it's often terrible on a Hi Fi system, but no one has Hi Fi systems anymore or even cares about sound quality in the way that people on these forums would.

We are the minority which is only going to decrease as time goes on. I know headphones are popular which should highlight poor recordings even when used with portable audio, but again 'Hi Fi' headphones are the minority. Headphones are mainly about fashion now.

Basically no one cares enough for anything to be done about it. There are still some good new recordings out there though, including some heavily compressed stuff.

Are you joking? VU meters? Which affordable kit has these today?

It doesn't but then he never actually said it did...

Then what the hell did he say? Why mention them ?

He just used that as an example of illustrating the levels in the recording.

The OPs original assessment that 'lots of' modern music is compressed is a fallacy.

Really? That opinion would put you at odds with most commentators on the Loudness Wars.

Perhaps, but maybe it because a don't buy run of the mill cr*p cds of the so called 'popular' music anymore.

 

[davedotco]

The Jungson J88D, not a stranger to these pages but still available out of Hong Kong for a very modest US$733 FOB.

Not just VU meters, Blue VU meters....*kiss2*

You flagged this one up to me some time back. Does look nice, but as it's only available in Hong Kong it's about as much use as chocolate teapot.

They will export to the UK if you ask, in fact most of their business is export.

Try. http://www.cattylink.com/page82.html

Even allowing for extra packing, airfreight, handling charges, import duty and VAT, it should still be possible to land one in the UK for less than £1000.

I get the potential savings. That's good. Given I have a regular usage with carriers I know how reckless they can be. Last thing I want is to end up with a battered and bruised piece of electronics.

Have you heard it? if so, what's its sonic virtues?

Grant Audio, a Canadian dealer imported some into north america. I had hands on one in the US about 5-6 years ago. Auditioning was not comparitive, fairly uncritical to be fair, though it sounded absolutely fine in context. However it did look and feel quite superb.

It had a brief period of fame at that time, with some very positive internet chatter, but in reality, who knows? It is not a brand that is widely distributed outside China, though they do appear occasionally in markets like north america and australia.

 

[MeanandGreen]

You seem to of misunderstood my reference to VU meters in the context of this subject.

If you read post #11 you will see what I'm on about.

 

[lindsayt]

Vladimir, what's the noise level in dbs at your seating position when you are driving:

(a) around town at 30 mph?

(b) on a quiet B or A road at a steady 60 mph?

(c) along a motorway at 70 mph?

(d) sitting in a traffic jam?

 

[lindsayt]

Then what the hell did he say? Why mention them ?

The OPs original assessment that 'lots of' modern music is compressed is a fallacy.

No need to go on.

Let's look at some DR ratings from here then: http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/list?artist=lionel+richie&album=slow+down

Best selling album of 2014 was Ed Sheeran's X. DR 6 for CD, 11 for vinyl version.

Best selling album of 1984 was Lionel Riche's Can't slow down. DR 14

2nd best selling album of 2014: Sam Smith's In the Lonely Hour. DR 7 (15 for the vinyl version).

2nd best selling album of 1984 was The Hits Album. No entry in DR database (probably a typically compressed compilation)

3rd best selling album of 1984: Bob Marley Legend (compilation). DR 13. The 2002 CD version has a DR of 9.

4th best selling album of 1984: Wham's Make It Big. DR 13.

3rd best selling album 2014: George Ezra's Wanted on Voyage. DR 6 (10 for vinyl version).

4th best selling album 2014: Paolo Nutini's Caustic Love: DR 9.

In 1984: the next best selling albums were Now 3, Michael Jacksons Thriller (DR13 for CD 15 for vinyl), Sade's Daimond Life (DR 15)

The next best selling albums for 2014 were: Coldplay's Ghost Stories (DR 6), Paloma Faith's A Perfect Contradiction (DR 6), One Directions Four (DR 5).

I think it's fair to say that the modern day record companies have totally lost the plot and have become Compression Crazy.

 

[Andrewjvt]

Then what the hell did  he say? Why mention them ?

The OPs original assessment that 'lots of' modern music is compressed is a fallacy.

No need to go on.

Let's look at some DR ratings from here then: http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/list?artist=lionel+richie&album=slow+down

Best selling album of 2014 was Ed Sheeran's X. DR 6 for CD, 11 for vinyl version.

Best selling album of 1984 was Lionel Riche's Can't slow down. DR 14

?

2nd best selling album of 2014: Sam Smith's In the Lonely Hour. DR 7 (15 for the vinyl version).

2nd best selling album of 1984 was The Hits Album. No entry in DR database (probably a typically compressed compilation)

3rd best selling album of 1984: Bob Marley Legend (compilation). DR 13. The 2002 CD version has a DR of 9.

4th best selling album of 1984: Wham's Make It Big. DR 13.

3rd best selling album 2014: George Ezra's Wanted on Voyage. DR 6 (10 for vinyl version).

4th best selling album 2014: Paolo Nutini's Caustic Love: DR 9.

?

In 1984: the next best selling albums were Now 3, Michael Jacksons Thriller (DR13 for CD 15 for vinyl), Sade's Daimond Life (DR 15)

The next best selling albums for 2014 were: Coldplay's Ghost Stories (DR 6), Paloma Faith's A Perfect Contradiction (DR 6), One Directions Four (DR 5).

?

I think it's fair to say that the modern day record companies have totally lost the plot and have become Compression Crazy.

Noone on this forum has a one direction cd. Please confirm

 

[lindsayt]

If any of their original albums had a DR of 13 or higher I'd be happy to buy and listen to their CD's.

With a DR of 5 I'm not going to go out of my way to get any of their over-compressed catalogue.

 

[Deleted member 108165]

Not going to hide the fact that I'm a massive Donna Summer fan.

Three years ago Universal Japan brought out SHM remasters of her 70's Casablanca albums which I snapped up at the princley sum of £240, (about £30 per CD). Remastered for loundness and loss of dynamic range - check! But what I wasn't prepared for was when I recently decided to run the albums through Audacity, *shok* . Four out of the eight albums are covered in severe clipping from start to finish!

Do I feel ripped off? Yes! Fortunately I kept all the originals to fall back on. Never gonna buy another remastered album again.

 

[Vladimir]

Not going to hide the fact that I'm a massive Donna Summer fan.

Three years ago Universal Japan brought out SHM remasters of her 70's Casablanca albums which I snapped up at the princley sum of £240, (about £30 per CD). Remastered for loundness and loss of dynamic range - check! But what I wasn't prepared for was when I recently decided to run the albums through Audacity, *shok* . Four out of the eight albums are covered in severe clipping from start to finish!

Do I feel ripped off? Yes! Fortunately I kept all the originals to fall back on. Never gonna buy another remastered album again.

You don't understand. It was remastered for road builders that hammer asphalt and concrete while listening to Donna Summer. It helps hearing the quiet bits.

 

[chebby]

... road builders that hammer asphalt and concrete while listening to Donna Summer.

Is this a euphemism?

 

[davedotco]

Not going to hide the fact that I'm a massive Donna Summer fan.

Three years ago Universal Japan brought out SHM remasters of her 70's Casablanca albums which I snapped up at the princley sum of £240, (about £30 per CD). Remastered for loundness and loss of dynamic range - check! But what I wasn't prepared for was when I recently decided to run the albums through Audacity, *shok* . Four out of the eight albums are covered in severe clipping from start to finish!

Do I feel ripped off? Yes! Fortunately I kept all the originals to fall back on. Never gonna buy another remastered album again.

No doubt about it. However it is a help to draw the right conclusions from the experience.

Not all remasters are crap, that is the wrong conclusion, some are genuinely good. The real conclusion is that anything deliberately driven into clip during mastering is crap, personally I think it contravenes Trade Descriptions as the product is not of 'merchantable quality'.

As I said earlier, dynamic range compression is not the real problem, some material is produced to deliver minimal dynamic range, as an artistic expression it is fine. However music is not enhanced by being clipped, if you hear such sh!t don't play it, don't buy it...!

 

[Vladimir]

... road builders that hammer asphalt and concrete while listening to Donna Summer.

Is this a euphemism?

Apparently it is now.

 

[Ajani]

As I said earlier, dynamic range compression is not the real problem, some material is produced to deliver minimal dynamic range, as an artistic expression it is fine.

Yep. I do wonder about the validility of using measures of dynamic range (see the website mentioned earlier in this thread) to assess whether a recording is compressed. If I sing in Acappela at a consistent volume, I would expect the Dynamic Range of the recording to be fairly low. I get the complaint about remastered albums have worse dynamic range than the original, but I'm not comfortable sweeping all modern pop etc under the limited DR therefore compressed rug.

As you rightly said, if it sounds bad don't buy it.

 

[lindsayt]

Ajani, there must be some modern pop CD's that aren't compressed to high heaven.

But how far do you have to go down the best selling charts before you find a CD with a DR of 10 or more? And how far before you find one with a DR of 15 or more?

I find the DR ratings a very useful guide to how compressed the recordings are. Every album I've heard so far with a DR of 6 or less has sounded disappointingly compressed. So many of them are missed opportunities - where without the compression the recording could have been on a par with Sade's Diamond Life.

Every album I've heard with a DR of 15 or more has been a joy to listen to, even if I don't like the artist. Michael Jackson's Thriller (vinyl) is a prime example.

 

[Andrewjvt]

Im just going to go back to when i was unaware of the loudness war an enjoy the bands i like and only if something sounds off, check the data base and then know its the recording and just execpt it for what it is. Still its annoying to know these records have been f'd on purpose

 

[Ajani]

John Atkinson (Editor for the largest US HiFi Mag, Stereophile) did quite a bit of testing several years ago to show the detrimental effect of lossy MP3s vs lossless recordings. He is a big advocate of lossless. During that same period he wrote an article about how he was caught red faced when he auditioned a product and thoroughly enjoyed the sound, only after to realise that all the music played during the demo was lossy MP3s. Maybe lossless tracks would have sounded even better, maybe not.

The point being that it's quite possible you might enjoy a compressed recording as long as no one tells you it's compressed. But if you do the typical audiophile approach of focusing on formats, physical media, analog vs digital, dynamic range, class A, AB OR D amplification etc, chances are you will not be able to enjoy anything that doesn't fit into your ideal categories.

 

[Jota180]

I think we've maybe got it all wrong n this loudness thing. Perhaps they're just trying to get the volume levels of recorded music up to the loudness levels of DJ's and radio adverts.

I'd rather they quietened down the latter two.

 

[Jota180]

As I said earlier, dynamic range compression is not the real problem, some material is produced to deliver minimal dynamic range, as an artistic expression it is fine.

Yep. I do wonder about the validility of using measures of dynamic range (see the website mentioned earlier in this thread) to assess whether a recording is compressed. If I sing in Acappela at a consistent volume, I would expect the Dynamic Range of the recording to be fairly low. I get the complaint about remastered albums have worse dynamic range than the original, but I'm not comfortable sweeping all modern pop etc under the limited DR therefore compressed rug.

As you rightly said, if it sounds bad don't buy it.

Citing a DR figure on it's own doesn't tell the whole story. Citing the DR of a CD and vinyl recording of the same album tells the story more competantly.

If it's the case that in situations where there's a vinyl and CD copy of a recording and a majority of CD's have a smaller DR than the vinyl 'equivalent' it does lend credence to the argument that the trend is digital copies are being artificially compressed and boosted.

I'm assuming that the keeper of the website that hosts the DR information has access to the collated totality of information and is able to determine a trend developing over the years.

 

[lindsayt]

Yes, of course the owner of the DR database website is fully aware of the trend towards high amounts of compression in modern releases.

That's why he created that website!

He's as disappointed in this trend as I am.

 

[splasher]

In my experience low DR music doesn't necessarily sound bad, in fact it can sound quite good. I doubt even the original recording of the Ace Of Spades had much dynamic range.

The problem I find is more that it gets tiresome, just like too much Motorhead. Years ago, I used to have a tape for the car that had Nirvana on one side and the Mamas and Papas on the other side. After each, the other was exactly what was needed. The problem with deliberately compressing the range against the max is that without troughs you can't have peaks.

 

[Blacksabbath25]

If you're listening to music in a noisy environment, such as in the car or in a factory then compression helps to hear the quieter bits without having to turn it up so much that the loudest bits are stupidly loud.

A high proportion of music listening for the average person is done in the car or as background noise whilst working.

That's not why they do it.

Sure about that? All the histories I've read suggest that compression was first added in order to make singles sound louder on AM car radios in the US, there's various stories around of producers taking their latest work into their car to listen to it to make sure it comes across well in that environment.

But hey, you know best, why do they do it?

As others mentioned, to sound as loud or louder than anything else from the competition. More attention, more popularity, more money. There is absolutely no reason for loudness compression with digital media other than that. Today cars are quieter with better sound insulation than in the 1950s. There is no need for loudness compression for headphones because they also isolate from the environment. Vinyl has lower dynamic range due to physical limitations, not because it's an improvement.

Well, I guess it could be usefull if you were driving a convertable '67 Mustang while listening to AM rock stations playing you singles.

i would love to drive and own a 67 mustang but would have to be the fastback version .*smile* this loudness war is rubbish sometimes you do not have a choice if you like a band and most of the metal bands i like have a rubbish compression so no choice there unless i do not buy music anymore and whats the fun in that so why let it bother anyone unless you like classic music then i understand why you need a good recording .

 

[MajorFubar]

John Atkinson (Editor for the largest US HiFi Mag, Stereophile) did quite a bit of testing several years ago to show the detrimental effect of lossy MP3s vs lossless recordings. He is a big advocate of lossless. During that same period he wrote an article about how he was caught red faced when he auditioned a product and thoroughly enjoyed the sound, only after to realise that all the music played during the demo was lossy MP3s. Maybe lossless tracks would have sounded even better, maybe not.

?

The point being that it's quite possible you might enjoy a compressed recording as long as no one tells you it's compressed. But if you do the typical audiophile approach of focusing on formats, physical media, analog vs digital, dynamic range, class A, AB OR D amplification etc, chances are you will not be able to enjoy anything that doesn't fit into your ideal categories.

?

 

That's data compression, not dynamic-range compression. The two are completely different things.

 

[Ajani]

John Atkinson (Editor for the largest US HiFi Mag, Stereophile) did quite a bit of testing several years ago to show the detrimental effect of lossy MP3s vs lossless recordings. He is a big advocate of lossless. During that same period he wrote an article about how he was caught red faced when he auditioned a product and thoroughly enjoyed the sound, only after to realise that all the music played during the demo was lossy MP3s. Maybe lossless tracks would have sounded even better, maybe not.

The point being that it's quite possible you might enjoy a compressed recording as long as no one tells you it's compressed. But if you do the typical audiophile approach of focusing on formats, physical media, analog vs digital, dynamic range, class A, AB OR D amplification etc, chances are you will not be able to enjoy anything that doesn't fit into your ideal categories.

That's data compression, not dynamic-range compression. The two are completely different things.

Obviously. It was used to illustrate the point. just as my reference to different to types of amplification etc.

 

[lindsayt]

In my experience low DR music doesn't necessarily sound bad, in fact it can sound quite good. I doubt even the original recording of the Ace Of Spades had much dynamic range.

The problem I find is more that it gets tiresome, just like too much Motorhead. Years ago, I used to have a tape for the car that had Nirvana on one side and the Mamas and Papas on the other side. After each, the other was exactly what was needed. The problem with deliberately compressing the range against the max is that without troughs you can't have peaks.

Motorhead's Ace of Spades has a DR of 11.

Making it more compressed than Led Zep's Physical Graffiti, but less compressed than Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds Chasing Yesterday.