Saturday, April 11, 2015

The Loudness War

So I've discussed a broad spectrum of music related things so far, and it's been quite a journey. What stood out to you most? You may recall my post about my band Monk's Wine (click here to revisit this post). Maybe it was the post about finding my old iPhone and listening to tunes that brought back touching memories (click here to revisit this post). It's been quite a blogging journey indeed, and it's been a fun experience to say the least. So, you're probably wondering what in the heck my title is talking about.

 What is the loudness war you might ask? 

 Well, the loudness war is one that is affecting everyone all over the world. Musicians, music lovers, you, your relatives...everyone who listens to music! The loudness war refers to audio engineers boosting the volume of their tracks to insane levels over the years. Producers today feel that to be competitive they need their tracks to be released as big and as loud as possible, with no regards to musicality or dynamics. How does this affect you? You only have one set of ears! Your favorite tunes on the radio have been cranked to levels that are more excruciating to your ears.

 A very bad offender and casualty to the loudness war is U2's song 'Vertigo'. Listen to the track via the YouTube link below. It sounds like one big jumbled mess! Everything is offensively loud.


While this song is loud and obnoxious, U2's newest album that was controversially released freely to iTunes users is far more tame and dynamic, making it much smoother and less fatiguing to the ear. While new functions like iTunes 'sound check' help to even out the loudness of songs, producers are still cranking their tunes to very high levels.

So in closing, you only have one set of ears. Use your volume knob with caution!
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4 comments:

  1. UnknownApril 13, 2015 at 11:20 AM

    Wow! What a great song to use in your final blog post. U2's "Vertigo" has been one of my favorite songs for as long as I can remember. I appreciate your words of caution about volume. Sometimes it amazes me how loud people can tolerate listening to music. If I listen to it too loud I immediately can tell because my head starts to throb. I think people just become super eager when a song they love comes on so they crank up the volume too loud without even realizing.

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  2. UnknownApril 25, 2015 at 7:20 PM

    The stereo in my car is awful, so I totally understand this!

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  3. UnknownApril 26, 2015 at 4:17 PM

    I dig I dig. I used to love my music really loud, maybe not so much anymore but it definitely depends on what I'm listening to.

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  4. UnknownApril 29, 2015 at 7:23 AM

    Yeah the loudness war really has to do with producers abusing what's called a limiter, and one of the parameters of the limiter is the threshold. What many producers do is lower the threshold all the way (called 'brick wall limiting') and this ruins the audio signal, and the song is no longer musical. It's all just a jumble of noise. Ugh!

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