STP - Victims of the Loudness War

[JohnL]

Thank you Chris Lord-Alge!! The new album is compressed to hell and back. There is no dynamic range at all. I included screenshots of a track from the new album versus a track from purple. Buying the vinyl will not help because the reference copy is the same.

"Dare if you Dare"
http://http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/401/98210343.png

"Silvergun Superman"
http://http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/2746/50222868.png

If you want to know about the loudness war and why it's ruining music, see this youtube video.
http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ

[RangerJim]

Although I love the new album, I did mention awhile back that Chris Lord-Alge enjoys compressing the guitar tracks a little too much.  Oh well.

[rustic]

That sucks, but I wouldn't call it unexpected.  All the major labels are doing it.  I can't remember the last time I got an album that wasn't indie that didn't suffer from this.

[Silvergun132]

I may get shot down for this and I'm no technical expert on the matter, but I felt Pearl Jam's Backspacer didn't succumb to the loudness war at all.  I thought the production on that album was pure Brendan O'Brien perfection.  I honestly don't have a problem with the production of STP's latest...but I kind of wished they would have used BO'B again...

[Lolzeyes]

Thank you Chris Lord-Alge!! The new album is compressed to hell and back. There is no dynamic range at all. I included screenshots of a track from the new album versus a track from purple. Buying the vinyl will not help because the reference copy is the same.

"Dare if you Dare"
http://http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/401/98210343.png

"Silvergun Superman"
http://http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/2746/50222868.png

If you want to know about the loudness war and why it's ruining music, see this youtube video.
http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ

there's def. loudness and overuse of pro-tools on some choruses ie:(take a load off)
The good thing is that its not sounding LOUD like freekin' Death Magnetic

[sbuxreg]

this is quite sad. becasue the deleo's are amazing players. would be nice to have the tracks as the band intended for us to hear them.

[loungefly611]

[there's def. loudness and overuse of pro-tools on some choruses ie:(take a load off)
The good thing is that its not sounding LOUD like freekin' Death Magnetic

What's the benefit from compressing the tracks? Does it save them money or something? What boggles my mind is that you can download Death Magnetic for Guitar Hero, and it sounds a hell of a lot better then the actual CD. That just boggles my mind.

[Lolzeyes]

[there's def. loudness and overuse of pro-tools on some choruses ie:(take a load off)
The good thing is that its not sounding LOUD like freekin' Death Magnetic

What's the benefit from compressing the tracks? Does it save them money or something? What boggles my mind is that you can download Death Magnetic for Guitar Hero, and it sounds a hell of a lot better then the actual CD. That just boggles my mind.

That's just a modern way to record an album. Everything is done digitally these days (saves time) rather done analogically which is more time consuming and costs a lot more. The story behind it is that a loud record does sell a lot more, it sounds "hotter" newer.

Anyway, read this, it may help out!

The practice of focusing on loudness in mastering can be traced back to the introduction of the compact disc itself but also existed to some extent when vinyl was the primary released recording medium and when 7" singles were played on jukebox machines in clubs and bars. Jukeboxes were often set to a pre-determined level by the bar owner, yet any record that was mastered "hotter" than the others before or after it would gain the attention of the crowd. The song would stand out. Also many record companies would print compilation records, and when artists and producers found their song was quieter than others on the compilation, they would insist that their song be remastered to be competitive

At the turn of the decade, CDs with music louder than this level began to surface, and CD volumes became more and more likely to exceed the digital limit as long as such amplification would not involve clipping more than approximately two to four digital samples, resulting in recordings where the peaks on an average rock or beat-heavy pop CD hovered near (usually in the range of -3 dB) 0 dB but only occasionally reached it. The Guns N' Roses album Appetite for Destruction from 1987 is an early example of this, with levels averaging -15 dB for all the tracks.[12]

In the early 1990s, some mastering engineers decided to take this a step further and treat the music's levels exactly as they would the levels of an analog tape and equate digital full scale with the analog saturation point, with the recording just loud enough so that each (or almost every) beat would peak at or close to 0 dBFS. Though there were some early cases (such as Metallica's Black Album in 1991), albums mastered in this fashion generally did not appear until 1992. Dirt by Alice In Chains and Faith No More's Angel Dust are some examples from this year. The loudness of releases during this period varied greatly depending on the philosophies of the engineer and others involved in the mastering process. This style of "hot" mastering became commonplace in 1994, though exceptions, such as the album Superunknown by Soundgarden from the same year, still existed. The most common loudness for a rock release in terms of average power was around -12 dBFS. Overall, most rock and pop music released in the 1990s followed this method to a certain extent

The concept of making music releases "hotter" began to appeal to people within the industry, in part because of how noticeably louder releases had become and also in part to the notion that customers preferred louder sounding CDs

Loud mastering practices caught media attention in 2008 with the release of Metallica's Death Magnetic album. The CD version of the recording has a high average loudness that pushes peaks beyond the point of digital clipping, resulting in distortion. These findings were reported by customers and music industry professionals. These findings were later covered in multiple international publications, including The Rolling Stone[13] The Wall Street Journal,[14] BBC Radio,[15] Wired[16] and The Guardian.[17] Ted Jensen, a mastering engineer involved in the Death Magnetic recordings, offered recalcitrant commentary that criticized the approach employed during the production process.[18] A version of the release without dynamic range compression was included in the downloadable content for Guitar Hero III.[19]

more here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war

and yes, i've too downloaded the GHIII Death Magnetic. The album version is plain awful.

[disasterami]

Aaah now i have understood this concept better Thanks johnlatham N yeah Death Magnetic gets very annoying, soooo much jarring throughout the album !!!!

EDIT: Ok so wats the case of tapes in this aspect?? Vinyls are best i read...

[live2cd]

I downloaded like 5 different version of "Death Magnetic" and the Moderus III version (which came out around Christmas 2009) is by far the best. The retail version of that record is a disgrace, sound quality wise.

Ive listened to this new STP record give or take 5 or 6 times now and I dont hear any clipping at all like I did w/ that release. Maybe its just me, but it might be overcompressed (what isnt these days?), but distorted clipping would be my main gripe, and I dont have any w/ this new STP album.

[John]

Vinyls are best i read...

Tapes are horrible.  Vinyl has it's advantages.  CDs have the best fidelity.

The reason some people claim that vinyl sounds better is because they use a different mastering process for records.  You couldn't loudness-maximize them like they do with CDs or the needle would leap out of the grooves.

[disasterami]

Aaaahhh ok ok Thanks John

The only problem i have faced with tapes annoyingly enough is the tape getting stuck and making a 2nd listen SHIT! Hehe just nice as showpieces i guess Core i had listened to the first time on tape.

This discussion cleared things up so much!! Thanks guys

[IMJ]

This is a great thread....

[jameshilliv]

I kind of noticed that when I was listening to the song samples on Amazon.  I mentioned it to my brother, but I had no idea about the sound war.  I thought it had more to do with the fact that the songs were recorded in multiple studion.  Robert doing his stuff in his studio, Eric in his, ........

[dog_day_prophet]

It always amazes me on threads like this how people use the language and terminology of sound recording, but have no earthly idea what it means.  FYI, I have a home studio and have been recording, mixing, and mastering my own stuff for about three years now.  It's still pretty lo-fi (I'm not a fucking genius or a millionaire :p), but I at least know the elements.
Here we go:

there's def. loudness and overuse of pro-tools on some choruses ie:(take a load off)

You can't "overuse" Pro Tools.  Pro Tools is the multitrack recording software that is the industry standard.  It's like saying a film editor "overused" Final Cut Pro.

I may get shot down for this and I'm no technical expert on the matter, but I felt Pearl Jam's Backspacer didn't succumb to the loudness war at all. I thought the production on that album was pure Brendan O'Brien perfection.

DISCLAIMER: I have not heard Backspacer off the CD, and you can't judge the fidelity of any recording by an mp3. However, I do remember listening to Springsteen's Magic, which was also produced by Brendan. That album was very loud, and I didn't care for the sound quality at all.

Which leads me to my main point. Chris Lord-Alge has taken a beating on this thread. However, any loudness problems have to do with the MASTERING process, not the actual mixing process. While you can compress individual files within the session, the overall compression of a track happens in the mastering.

Although I love the new album, I did mention awhile back that Chris Lord-Alge enjoys compressing the guitar tracks a little too much.  Oh well.

If you only compress the guitar tracks, you won't see a real major difference in the end result of the track unless you master the track with comprehensive, multiband compression. Also, I challenge you to find any sound engineer or mixer in the business who doesn't compress guitar tracks.

Thank you Chris Lord-Alge!! The new album is compressed to hell and back. There is no dynamic range at all. I included screenshots of a track from the new album versus a track from purple. Buying the vinyl will not help because the reference copy is the same.

If you compare the range between the highs and lows of each the two tracks you posted independently, the difference is negligible. The overall loudness is higher, but the actual "dynamic range" between the high and low of "Dare If You Dare" is pretty damn close to "Silvergun Superman." (Also, if you posted a zoomed-in screenshot that shows, from left to right, less than the entire song, you will see more dynamic range.) All that means is that Silvergun is a quieter track. Which makes TOTAL SENSE if you realize that Purple was recorded on analog. (I think. I really doubt that digital recording software was as prevalent in '94 as it is today.) Recording and printing digitally inherently compresses the tracks.  If you don't want compression, record and print on analog. But that is way more expensive, not to mention the amount of control you have when you record digitally.

The excerpt that Lolzeyes posted perfectly illustrates what's going down in the industry. In order for people's ears to perk up when a new single hits radio, you don't want your track to be quieter than others. Personally, I like to push my tracks as close to 0db as I can without distortion. If you look at the screenshot of "Dare If You Dare," even at its highest db levels, you can still see white around the edges of the blue waveform, which means that it's staying below 0db. Death Magnetic did not. That's why it was distorted. (Plus, are you really gonna compare the sonic quality of a fucking METALLICA record vs. an STP record?.....c'mon now.)

If you wanna argue the sonic benefits of compression, I'll go 12 rounds with you. I'm a fan, some people aren't. That's the way it is. But to blame the guy who mixed the record ignores so many technical elements and industry trends that it makes my head spin. Besides, I happen to think that recording engineers and mixers are some of the most brilliant people on planet Earth (that's my bias). We're living in a music world that is becoming more digital every single day. And until someone invents something nobody has thought of yet, this is the way it's gonna be with major label releases. Major labels have to sell records to stay in business; people need to buy them; people need to have to hear one song and want to buy that record. You only get one shot at a first impression. It's gotta be loud. If you don't like loud records, go buy a CD from an indie label that doesn't have to worry about numbers.

Ok, I'm done.

"Lemon OUT!..."

P.S. johnlatham: Audacity?? Really? Get a real recording software program, bro. You can pirate them. :p

P.S.S. For the audio geeks out there, I run a Beringer 8-track mini-mixer into an M-Audio Delta 44 PCI sound card with Adobe Audition 3 as my software. All on a PC.

P.S.S.S. I hate Pro Tools anyway.