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Mastering Engineer Explains Types of Compression, Effects On Today's Music
Stowie101 writes "Today is Dynamic Range Day, which is an event to educate the public about the 'Loudness Wars' that are compressing and harming the quality of today's music. Ian Shepherd, a mastering engineer and founder of Dynamic Range Day, explains why music lovers should avoid MP3 files. 'The one that springs to mind is to avoid MP3, especially if it's 128 kbps. Apple uses a more advanced technology called AAC, but if someone can get lossless files like FLAC that's a better place to start.' Shepherd says it's actually harder to make a good 'lossy' encode of something that has been heavily musically compressed. Very heavy dynamic compression and limiting makes MP3s sound worse, so the loudness wars indirectly make MP3s sound worse."
Hearing the difference now isn't the reason to encode to FLAC. FLAC uses lossless compression, while MP3 is 'lossy'. What this means is that for each year the MP3 sits on your hard drive, it will lose roughly 12kbps, assuming you have SATA - it's about 15kbps on IDE, but only 7kbps on SCSI, due to rotational velocidensity. You don't want to know how much worse it is on CD-ROM or other optical media.
I started collecting MP3s in about 2001, and if I try to play any of the tracks I downloaded back then, even the stuff I grabbed at 320kbps, they just sound like crap. The bass is terrible, the midrange...well don't get me started. Some of those albums have degraded down to 32 or even 16kbps. FLAC rips from the same period still sound great, even if they weren't stored correctly, in a cool, dry place. Seriously, stick to FLAC, you may not be able to hear the difference now, but in a year or two, you'll be glad you did.
Right, because this issue JUST STARTED RECENTLY.
Damn those kids and this BRAND NEW PHENOMENON.
You tell em Neil!
Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
I am greatly enjoying 'Adopt an Audiophile... And Beat Some Sense Into Him' Month here on Slashdot.
Just tell them it goes up to 11.
The loudness wars have been a complaint of mine for some time now. The example video at the end of the article gives an EXCELLENT explanation. I only wish that more people would complain about this so that the quality of recordings would get better. Unfortunately most of the music of today sounds more like a Stephen Hawking lecture with distorted beeping and buzzing in the background and no actual music. When I was in school - music was part of the curriculum. I don't know if it still is but the kids of today are completely CLUELESS when it comes to music. They only seem to like songs about 'guns, money, drugs, niggas and bitches' because they SEE not HEAR these videos on MTV. They see some gun toting loser driving a ferrari, throwing stacks of cash around, surrounded by half naked crack whores and think - "Man that is the life I want to lead!" Their music tastes follow accordingly. If they actually listened to the lyrics - they might actually be disgusted.
I've been playing bass for 30+ years now, guess where they always stick the bass player? Right next to the crash.
First, wear hearing protection. Too few artists actually do this and it hurts them in the long run.
Secondly, why are you standing near the crash? I mean, you're in the band. Can't you stand wherever you wa-
bass player
Oh... nevermind.
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
What's the old saying, Garbage In, Garbage Out?
Damn, I thought that was a new saying after reading it in a Wired article recently.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
it makes me literally trip over my own fingers.
Some hate it when people use "literally" when they mean "figuratively".
Not me. I picture you literally tripping over your fingers. Which body parts were you playing your bass with before that happened?