Barry Diament
LOUDNESS WAR: PART III
(Loudness) War Is Over (If You Want It)
www.barrydiamentaudio.com/loudness.htm
The roots of the loudness wars most likely took hold when someone realized that a very small increase in level is perceived by most listeners as sounding "better". And if a little is good, the thinking must have been, more will be better still. Raising the recorded level misses the benefits of achieving the same loudness increase by turning up the volume control in playback. (More on this in a moment when we talk about volume controls.)
Many of the folks who make loudness their goal hear the compressed version and find it "better" than the uncompressed version. If they were to take the compressed version and carefully adjust the playback level to precisely match that of the uncompressed version, they might find that what impressed them was the increase in volume (i.e. quantity) but not necessarily an increase in quality. In fact, the quality in a compressed recording tends to move in the opposite direction.
To paraphrase one of my musical heroes, the loudness war is over (if you want it). And there are some good sonic and musical reasons to end it now.
To paraphrase one of my musical heroes, the loudness war is over (if you want it).
From a sonic standpoint, we can start with the volume control and its effect on how a playback system sounds. Electronically, a volume control is a type of resistor, placed in the signal path to allow us to (you guessed it) control the playback volume. If we were to bypass the volume control, would the sound disappear? Think of a water pipe that ends in a faucet you can use to control the amount or volume of water the pipe delivers to your kitchen sink. If you were to remove the faucet, the flow of water, far from stopping, would come out of the pipe at full force. Similarly, without a volume control, the playback level of your system would be full up and endanger your hearing as well as your loudspeakers. Volume controls, like water faucets are used to turn things down, not up. This means in effect that there is more of the volume control in the circuit when the volume is turned down than there is when it is turned up. Louder records make you adjust your volume to a lower setting than not so loud records to achieve the same in room loudness. Said another way, when the recorded level is not pushed, you turn up your volume control a bit more than you would for a typical compressed recording.
Anyone that has auditioned different volume controls will know these are devices that can have profound effects on the sound quality a system can deliver. This means if we make two identical recordings that differ only in level, the lower one will result in better playback quality because by turning up the playback volume there will be less of the volume control in the circuit. To play the louder recording at the same apparent level, we'd have to turn the volume control down, putting more of it in the signal path. While this might be insignificant at differences of just a few decibels, when the differences approach 10dB or more, there are audible consequences.
There are other sonic reasons to not push recorded levels, chief among these is the fact than most circuits both analog and digital (the latter, contrary to popular wisdom) provide audibly better performance when the levels are not pushed to the top.
Then there are the many musical reasons to end the loudness wars now.
Then there are the many musical reasons to end the loudness wars now. Referring again to What is mastering? I mentioned that in my experience all the best sounding recordings I have heard have in common the fact that they are not loud. Having loudness as a goal necessitates the sacrifice of dynamics.
While I can understand the use of compression as an effect on individual tracks of a multi-track (e.g. to get Ringo's cymbal sound), I don't at all like its use on whole mixes where it is generally used to achieve more loudness (some say "punch" but how do you increase punch by taking away dynamics, where the punch lives?).
Some say compression helps make the quieter parts of a record heard more easily over road noise when listening in the car. Or that it makes for easier late night listening without disturbing the neighbors. Music lovers have to ask why their records should be tailored for the lowest common denominator listening situations. Why not have a "compress" button on the player, either in the car or at home and leave the record itself whole for those occasions when we want all of
the music?
The loudness wars leave music as a casualty. When we avoid compression used for the sake of loudness we gain innumerable musical rewards: The dynamics of individual instruments help provide the rhythmic propulsion of the music, whether it is a violin concerto or a reggae beat. The sense of relaxation that ensues is in high contrast to the stress response engendered by heavy compression, allowing for much deeper involvement in the music, greater ease in hearing all the musical parts and longer listening sessions. The sense of recorded space, the acoustic of the recording venue, whether natural or studio generated, is much more in evidence, helping to bring the listener closer to the musical event. Bass instruments maintain more of their pitch definition as well, not suffering the softening and defocusing they do when loudness takes precedence. Electric guitars still have the "bite" they do when you're in their presence but which never makes it onto most records in quite the same way. Horn sections in both jazz and symphonic music get to keep the amazing power they have in real life. Instruments that play in the higher registers keep the harmonic sweetness they have in real life, without the hardening that accompanies compression. The very air around the musicians is preserved and the breath of Life makes it all the way to the record.
There will always be those who actually like the sound that results from making loudness a priority in their record. All well and good if this is their goal. It should be understood however, that there is merit in making records that sound like real music as well.
There will always be those who actually like the sound that results from making loudness a priority in their record.
Maybe it's time to get out those old "Play It Loud" labels that used to be on some of the older recordings from the days before the loudness wars. Lip service will not end the loudness wars, action will. It will take boldness on the part of musicians, producers and engineers. It will take those willing to lead the trend instead of following it. Some will take the time to actually make carefully level matched comparisons of their projects mastered for loudness vs. mastered for music. Some will have the music and not the level meters determine the final recorded level. They'll start to find their records actually "jump out" more when played on the radio, through the broadcasters' compressors, than the records that are pushed past the top. They'll find themselves having to turn up their volume controls compared to the setting for the pushed records. They'll also find their projects showing more punch, more kick, more space, more bass, more air, more ease, more music, more Life than those other records.
The end of the loudness wars will mark the dawn of the next golden age for music recording.
