Are record labels responsible for killing CD sales?

Santy

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I wonder why most of the CDs released these days are lacking dynamic range. 9 out of every 10 CDs I bought have poor DR and it is really disappointing to say the least. Music is good but recording is anywhere between poor to pathetic to ridiculous. They sound clearly is compressed and I could visualise the music being squashed through a narrow tube damaging their body. This observation is stronger in ICE systems in which even at low levels, some CDs are un-enjoyable. Today as I stepped into my car, I popped in a CD and set the volume set at 25 on my HU. After a few seconds, it turned it down to 22 because it sounded compressed. It didnt sound alright still, so it was reduced to 20 and then 18, 16 and finally 14. Now I can barely hear the whole music. I am sure many of you might have experienced the same.

I don't understand the objective of increasing the loudness in the media only to butcher the airiness and clarity of music. I believe none of us go maximum on volumes in our audio system and we have enough headroom to pump it up to desired levels if we get into a mood. I wonder if they boost the levels because the max. loudness on ipod is tolerable or because it is more suitable for broadcasting? It is all the more perplexing if we believe we have a better technology today. I think the recording labels and their mastering engineers are equally responsible for the decline in CD sales.

With balanced connection having a boost already, I am really annoyed by the loudness levels in many CDs. At a time when I started expanding my CD collection, this is really putting me on back-foot.

A very apt quote I came across recently:
There's one question that artists, producers, and record labels should ask themselves before they even hit the record button. Is it better to produce music that listeners will want to turn up, or produce music that listeners will want to turn down?
 
santy,

i see not point in even thinking aloud on this.

what you experience is true and so as a fellow CDP owner and a CD collector.. i quietly buy many of my CD's from aborad. The quality is much better though you pay a but more for courier etc..

That way atleast the music is enjoyable.

the funda is buy less but enjoy more..else switch to digital music ( which i dont see myself doing anytime soon ) or move to vinyl slowly.

In India, the quality of CD recordings that are done and marketed by Indian companies are not upto the mark in many cases.

rgds
mpw
 
Agreed. But there are plenty of people in those countries too, complaining against poor DR. I am reading lot of articles on the web.

Are all CDs pressed abroad good? How to know which are mastered well. I think there are a few sites which have measured the DR of audio CDs. May be I have to check them out.
 
You are unintentionally speaking out against the loudness wars. Read this for context.

The culprit in this was mainly radio. Historically, as radio stations proliferated, there was competition among them to stand out. And for some reason whichever station played loudest was thought to stand out (in the ears of the listener). So radio stations wanted their music to sound loud. FM stations can be made to sound louder by over modulating the audio. This is achieved by operating the modulator beyond its linear operating range. But this produces distortion in the audio. But more importantly, it produces spurious intermodulation products which MAY fall in some other station's frequency band and interfere with it. So regulators everywhere are wary of stations over modulating their music and disturbing other stations, and therefore they take a strict view (e.g. FCC in USA, Wireless Monitoring Organisation in many cities in India). So a solution is to raise the average level of the music on recordings, ever closer to the peak. That way stations will sound loud, without over-modulating and interfering with other stations. But they lose out on dynamic range. Music producers obliged as they need air play. Stations want to be loud so that listeners may like their station. It's a vicious cycle.

The advent of music television simply propagated the radio trend. Music channels are some of the loudest TV channels.

To compound the loss of dynamics, radio stations normalise their music. This involves reducing the level of music where it is peaking, and increase the level of music where is bottoming. The idea is to have uniform loudness.
 
Slightly off topic: I see the same loudness issue with Indian authored DVD and Blurays compared to the ones got from US. Indian DVDs and Blurays are noticeably loud.
 
More than just DR , the results of a comparison of same album on CD and vinyl was done by someone. I can't remember the link but will put it up if I come across it again.
The Vinyl appeared to extend about 2 1/2 octaves beyond 20 Khz, at low levels of course.
Does that matter ? Well, another report on the Net had a system where even the special tweeters went beyond 60 Khz . They played regular music with and without a filter at 20 khz. A lot of listeners could 'sense' a change in the sound though none could even hear a 20 Khz test tone.
That brings us to the concept of how we hear. They now say we hear through the ears AND the body. The body can absorb frequencies up to to about 100Khz or so ! Supposedly it does send signals to the brain though we do not hear it as sound in the normal sense. We 'sense ' the presence of the sound.

Interesting huh ?

Any psychics around ? ;)
 
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Example of truly loud record: Kelly Clarkson Stronger.

Not as loud and earbleeding as the above but this one also goes LOUD - Joss Stone - The Soul Sessions. I have this on both CD and vinyl and both are loud. Very:)
 
Example of truly loud record: Kelly Clarkson Stronger.

Not as loud and earbleeding as the above but this one also goes LOUD - Joss Stone - The Soul Sessions. I have this on both CD and vinyl and both are loud. Very:)

I've got the Soul Sessions vinyl as well. Joss Stone is fantastic with a lovely voice. I simply love the way this record sounds :).
 
I guess there is no more space to be filled...

Loudness_Race_Graph.gif


I think we must have a separate thread for warning other members about CDs with pathetic DR.
 
To view the issue from another angle, is there such a thing as too much dynamic range?

I don't think I have enough knowledge on that but I guess too much of dynamic range could mean very faint sounds recorded & seen on screen but cannot be heard at normal volumes. So you are going to pump up the volume at which there could be bursts of very loud musical bits, possibly damaging your ear?
 
Dynamic range/Loudness/Frequency-range/CD-v-LP.

Hmmm... Let's chop off the last two. If I remember this video correctly, some guy feeds the output from a turntable into his laptop, shows the frequency range, and say, Oh-wow-LP-goes-to-60k-man!-point-proved. Nope.

It is easy to prove that the CD does not go beyond 22, but we know that anyway.

It is not so easy to prove that the the vinyl goes further and that that includes any useful musical information. Especially as it can't be heard.

Dynamic range and loudness.... yes, but is it possible that there is a difference in CDs manufactured in different countries? Because the compression is done at the mastering stage, and isn't the same master given to all the manufacturers? Are there any regional variations in that?
 
I don't think I have enough knowledge on that but I guess too much of dynamic range could mean very faint sounds recorded & seen on screen but cannot be heard at normal volumes. So you are going to pump up the volume at which there could be bursts of very loud musical bits, possibly damaging your ear?

In my limited experience, I find some western classical records going over the top with the dynamics thingie. The loudness difference between the loudest and quietest passages can be so large that one needs to crank up the volume to be able to discern the quiet passages. And when a crescendo comes, it gets way too loud. On my none too resolving system playing in my none too quiet room, it becomes a bother, especially discerning the subtleties of the quieter passages. But I guess such recordings are trying to be true to the live performance. So I don't really have a complaint:)
 
You are unintentionally speaking out against the loudness wars. Read this for context.

The culprit in this was mainly radio. Historically, as radio stations proliferated, there was competition among them to stand out. And for some reason whichever station played loudest was thought to stand out (in the ears of the listener). So radio stations wanted their music to sound loud. FM stations can be made to sound louder by over modulating the audio. This is achieved by operating the modulator beyond its linear operating range. But this produces distortion in the audio. But more importantly, it produces spurious intermodulation products which MAY fall in some other station's frequency band and interfere with it. So regulators everywhere are wary of stations over modulating their music and disturbing other stations, and therefore they take a strict view (e.g. FCC in USA, Wireless Monitoring Organisation in many cities in India). So a solution is to raise the average level of the music on recordings, ever closer to the peak. That way stations will sound loud, without over-modulating and interfering with other stations. But they lose out on dynamic range. Music producers obliged as they need air play. Stations want to be loud so that listeners may like their station. It's a vicious cycle.

The advent of music television simply propagated the radio trend. Music channels are some of the loudest TV channels.

To compound the loss of dynamics, radio stations normalise their music. This involves reducing the level of music where it is peaking, and increase the level of music where is bottoming. The idea is to have uniform loudness.

I have always wondered;

Why cant all albums have a separate master for radio and retail ? I am sure this can be easily done.
 
Or don't even bother doing that ...the radios apply their own compression to the signal anyway, so why not just forget about this horrible crushed-sound mastering.

Sadly, though, I think it is what much of the music-listening market has come to expect, so the radio thing is just about the history of its origin rather than the reason for its continuation?
 
I have always wondered;

Why cant all albums have a separate master for radio and retail ? I am sure this can be easily done.

Many songs have radio edits. Of course they don't reach the general buying public for obvious reasons:)

Radio edits can be for two reasons - first reason being creative (e.g. louder?:lol: or shorter playing time than the regular album version) and secondly to avoid running afoul of regulators (e.g. explicit or foul - or both - lyrics).
 
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