Bring Back Dynamic Range!

[wilkenboy]

Great article. This is a good explanation for something I've noticed in recordings in recent years, but just thought it was my impression of newer music!

http://www.cdmasteringservices.com/dynamicrange.htm

Sorry if this has been posted before - I could not find.
I wonder if the same is true for DVDs and DVD-A/SACD.

I find it interesting that discerning artists would allow this to happen - I guess its possible this could happen in post-production mixing without their knowledge.

I would also be interested if this is focused on pop music only, or if it holds true across the whole industry.

Say it with me, very loud. "BRING BACK DYNAMIC RANGE!"

~Josh

 

[MDS]

Good article. I've read many like it over the last few years and have seen what the author is talking about first hand via my own CD collection and Sound Forge.

As just one example to illustrate how crazy it is getting consider this:

Ronnie James Dio (Solo artist, Rainbow, Black Sabbath) is generally considered 'Heavy Metal' and one would expect the music to be loud, but it is not. Nearly every Dio, Rainbow, and Black Sabbath CD I have has an average level of -18 dB.

Fast forward to the late nineties and take a campy 'pop' band like Barenaked Ladies or Backstreet Boys. Both of those CDs have an average level of around -8 dB. They are ridculously over compressed and don't sound that great.

Fortunately, I have yet to see any CD with a level as high as -3 dB like the author mentions.

P.S. Google for 'cd loudness wars' if you want to read more about this phenomenon.

 

[gene]

Great article. This is a good explanation for something I've noticed in recordings in recent years, but just thought it was my impression of newer music!

That is a good article, but only scratches the surface of the problem here.

We have about a dozen articles on this topic in our Specs & Formats section of the site.

Check out the following related articles:

The Case for NOT going above 0 dBFS For Digital Playback Systems
Issues with 0dBFS+ Levels On Digital Audio Playback Systems
DVD Industry Insider Report - October 4, 2004
Dynamic Comparison SACD vs CD - Part 5
Dynamic Comparison of LPs vs CDs - Part 4
Upsampling vs. Oversampling for Digital Audio
Dynamic Comparison of CD, DVD-A, SACD - Part 3
Dynamic Comparison of CD, DVD-A, SACD - Part 2
Dynamic Comparison of CD, DVD-A, SACD - Part 1
Brick Wall Digital Filters and Phase Deviations
Current Trends in the Recording Format Arena P2
Current Trends in the Recording Format Arena P1

 

[Resident Loser]

Not much call for it...

Great article. This is a good explanation for something I've noticed in recordings in recent years, but just thought it was my impression of newer music!

http://www.cdmasteringservices.com/dynamicrange.htm

Sorry if this has been posted before - I could not find.
I wonder if the same is true for DVDs and DVD-A/SACD.

I find it interesting that discerning artists would allow this to happen - I guess its possible this could happen in post-production mixing without their knowledge.

I would also be interested if this is focused on pop music only, or if it holds true across the whole industry.

Say it with me, very loud. "BRING BACK DYNAMIC RANGE!"

~Josh

...in modern music, generally speaking...there is no subtlety, no nuance...classical, jazz, maybe the artsy-type of rock and show tunes, but certainly not in contemporary pop...

IMHO most popular music isn't written with the same attention to emotion and the power that proper music can convey...chord structures don't resolve anything because there is nothing provided to resolve...no suspense, no drama, no tension, just a mindless mechanical attention to the beat...a great deal of it 4/4 within the confines of a pentatonic scale in a major key (if you're lucky enough to have a melody) and it sounds like it...It starts, it stops and something happens in the middle...Piano, pianissimo, forte, fortissimo...what do they mean? About as much as a rest...

Composers (and I use that term loosely) don't know how to craft a tune and the few who can come up with a melody (of sorts) haven't the first idea re: vamps, chorus and verse, coda, reprise or a bridge...no place for a transition, no place to insert that tension/resolution...It's all of a limited range melodically, so it starts to simply meld one into the other, just an audible, gray mass...On the other side there are those singers (?) who think running scales instead of holding a pure tone is something to strive for, when in reality it's nothing but a market-driven commodity and affectation.

So if all this is basic structure missing or wanting, what chance does dynamic range really have?

jimHJJ(...not much I'm afraid...)

 

[BMO]

Question: I have an older DBX# 119.I used it to compress recordings on my reel to reel. Then on plax back I would exspand it through the 119.It's variable.Would such a device work on CD's by simply exspanding signal.
It's been sitting in a box since CD's came out.

 

[Resident Loser]

Since...

Question: I have an older DBX# 119.I used it to compress recordings on my reel to reel. Then on plax back I would exspand it through the 119.It's variable.Would such a device work on CD's by simply exspanding signal.
It's been sitting in a box since CD's came out.

...the DBX is a compander that undoes it's own encoding, a half-@$$ed guess is NO...I mean it might do something, sorta' in the vein of playing Dolby tapes w/o Dolby playback and vice-versa...but I doubt it would be anything you would want to listen to...Carver gear had some single-ended expansion stuff way back when, but I recall complaints of pumping and breathing that was software dependent...

jimHJJ(...I mean you could try it, but it's not going to do what you think it might...least I wouldn't think so...)