Why are goa/psy labels participating in the loudness war?

[Isao]

Since i have recently bought a fairly good headphone rig, i have been interested in sound quality. I previously owned a quite cheap system and never really cared about it, but one of the good/bad thing about good gear, is that it reveals the flaws there are in the music production/mastering. Consequently, i've been seeking good sound quality albums...

 

 

...And much to my surprise, it looks like the loudness war didn't spare this genre.

I would have assumed that in such an underground scene, labels/artists would value sound quality more than in the mainstream scene and thus wouldn't conform their music to the modern standards (basically: making the music louder by compressing the dynamic range).

 

What i mean is most mainstream labels are doing so to attract the mass (mass that is listening music through ultra cheap systems, usually in a loud environment), but in our scene most labels aren't made for the sole purpose of selling as much albums as possible and make profit are they? Am i wrong if i think they are made by music lovers that want to support the artists they like?

 

If that last statement isn't wrong.. then i fail to understand why they don't seem to care that much about sound quality.

I first thought it was due to their low budget, but it doesn't cost any extra buck to not compress the dynamic range does it?

 

I'm not asking labels to do things they can't do, i know you can't have a Steve Hoffman quality mastering with a low budget.

But i would very curious to know why they are participating in that "loudness war", while they probably have nothing to gain from it. It "ruins" the sound quality for the audiophiles and serious listeners out there, while their purpose is not to try and attract millions of ipod/ibuds teenagers.

 

So my question is, why would music lovers want to conform to today's standards while there are only downsides to it?

I'm asking genuinely, because i fail to understand it. Are psy/goa labels careless about sound quality? Do they simply ignore the loudness war downsides? Any other reasons?

 

 

Maybe i'm missing something, but in any case i insist on the fact i'm not trying to be ungrateful, i actually have a lot of respect toward labels for what they are doing.

[frozen dream]

what albums/labels are you talking about

 

and which ones not?

[Ormion]

To be honest I find the overall sound quality of most of today's Psytrance releases simply great compared to the budget of the procuction/mastering.

Of course there are expections. but it's really amazing that some albums that have been made in home studio can sound so great compared to mainstream ultra-high budget music.

 

Even most amazing is that psytrance is a multi-layered music and still can sound amazing.

 

Check out for example Furious both albums. The sound quality is flawless!

I haven't heard anything in mainstream music that comes even close.

Check out The Nommos-Primal Meltdown and Artifakt-The Magus and how superb the mastering is.

 

Not everything sounds bad in Psy scene. I actually believe that the majority sounds more than good, keeping in mind the low budget.

 

 

Maybe I'm wrong, but I like what I hear (quality-wise).

[Mike A]

Being one of the people this is addressed to, I will try to give you an answer, also from the point of view of an artist (which I'm one).

 

First of all, let me start by saying that I think the the thing you call "loudness war", and I just call "maximizing volume" is a good thing. I don't see why the fuck is everyone saying that this is a bad thing. Why? because of that vid on Youtube where they show how it hurts the dynamics?

 

Maximizing has very little to do with the actual sound quality. That sound quality is mostly determined by the mixing the artist did on the track. And this is before the maximizing part.

The maximizing (part of the mastering process) is mostly done to eliminate loudness level differences between tracks on an album, and compared to the rest of the tracks released at the time in the scene. Why is this good? Why does it all have to be equal? Because most of this music will be heard on portable mp3 players, and on home systems, and cars and usually they are not top notch. Dynamics is bad in those cases, because you will not hear the silent parts in tracks. I'm telling you this because I've been listening to music in a lot of different enviroments in my life and I know what I'm talking about.

If you wanna hear unmastered stuff where it actually matters - go to a live set of your favorite artists. That's raw music, without any maximizing (mostly).

 

Besides, today's goa is still far far away from let's say other genres of psytrance, mostly prog where the sound quality (and the loudness) shines. To be honest, most of today's goa - even though it sounds much better than oldschool - sounds like crap most of the time. You have to thank the mastering engineers for doing such a great job on the tracks to make them sound like that. I heard the tracks on Freshly Cut before the mastering, and after - and I can tell you, it's not just loudness. It's everything. I'm sure the Suntrippers will agree with me on that concerning their releases.

 

Bottom line - loud is good, not bad.

[Isao]

what albums/labels are you talking about

 

and which ones not?

From the albums i own (zbput 50ish), only "Twisted" and "Are You Shpongled?" don't look like a brickwall on audacity.

 

 

To be honest I find the overall sound quality of most of today's Psytrance releases simply great compared to the budget of the procuction/mastering.

Of course there are expections. but it's really amazing that some albums that have been made in home studio can sound so great compared to mainstream ultra-high budget music.

 

Even most amazing is that psytrance is a multi-layered music and still can sound amazing.

 

Check out for example Furious both albums. The sound quality is flawless!

I haven't heard anything in mainstream music that comes even close.

Check out The Nommos-Primal Meltdown and Artifakt-The Magus and how superb the mastering is.

 

Not everything sounds bad in Psy scene. I actually believe that the majority sounds more than good, keeping in mind the low budget.

 

 

Maybe I'm wrong, but I like what I hear (quality-wise).

To be honest as well in most cases i'm quite happy with what i hear too, and i agree that there is a lot worse in the mainstream scene.

The thing is it could sound even better if music wasn't compressed, and to my very limited knowledge i don't think it would cost anything to "not compress" the dynamic range.

Looking at all my albums under audacity tells me there is some room for improvements, and - again to my very limited knowledge - i think those improvements could be made without extra costs.

I'm not complaining really, just wondering.

[Mike A]

Looking at all my albums under audacity tells me there is some room for improvements

So you know better than the mastering engineer, just by looking at the waveform of a track? (no offence meant, if taken)

Seriously, there is not much you can know about sound and what to do with it by just looking at it. And even if there is something, it's very limited.

You're also making the assumption, that if it looks loud then it would sound better a bit less loud, since you were probably brainwashed by vids like the one I mentioned earlier, and by the very name of "loudness war" which has bad connotations. IMHO, those who are against the loudness war are just like the people who can't realize that cds actually sound better than vinyls. There are used to something specific, and now that it's changing, it's bad according to their opinion.

 

And let me say another thing - back in the years of fool-on domination (like 2002-2005) all psytrance had to sound very specific to be considered "well produced". The GMS-Astrix-whatever type of sound was the industry standard, and if you couldn't get there then your music was automatically labeled as "crap" by the mainstream scene. I even remember the reviews Talpa album was getting at the time - people complaining it sounded like crap. Looking back now, it sounds a whole lot better that that other music. Things changed now, there is much more open-mindness towards different sounds and you should be thankful for that, instead of complaining (or wondering) about that nonsense called "loudness war".

[Isao]

Being one of the people this is addressed to, I will try to give you an answer, also from the point of view of an artist (which I'm one).

 

First of all, let me start by saying that I think the the thing you call "loudness war", and I just call "maximizing volume" is a good thing. I don't see why the fuck is everyone saying that this is a bad thing. Why? because of that vid on Youtube where they show how it hurts the dynamics?

 

Maximizing has very little to do with the actual sound quality. That sound quality is mostly determined by the mixing the artist did on the track. And this is before the maximizing part.

The maximizing (part of the mastering process) is mostly done to eliminate loudness level differences between tracks on an album, and compared to the rest of the tracks released at the time in the scene. Why is this good? Why does it all have to be equal? Because most of this music will be heard on portable mp3 players, and on home systems, and cars and usually they are not top notch. Dynamics is bad in those cases, because you will not hear the silent parts in tracks. I'm telling you this because I've been listening to music in a lot of different enviroments in my life and I know what I'm talking about.

If you wanna hear unmastered stuff where it actually matters - go to a live set of your favorite artists. That's raw music, without any maximizing (mostly).

 

Besides, today's goa is still far far away from let's say other genres of psytrance, mostly prog where the sound quality (and the loudness) shines. To be honest, most of today's goa - even though it sounds much better than oldschool - sounds like crap most of the time. You have to thank the mastering engineers for doing such a great job on the tracks to make them sound like that. I heard the tracks on Freshly Cut before the mastering, and after - and I can tell you, it's not just loudness. It's everything. I'm sure the Suntrippers will agree with me on that concerning their releases.

 

Bottom line - loud is good, not bad.

Thanks for your answer, that was an interesting read.

 

I did watch those youtube videos indeed, where it appears "maximizing volume" is done by compressing the dynamic range which results in a loss of a part of that range - which is usually inaudible on cheap/most used systems, but annoying on "high end" ones.

I've also read a few things on head-fi, which is an audiophile forum.

Now as a label owner and an artist, you are saying "maximizing volume" is positive (which i can understand) and doesn't affect the sound quality - and i must admit that it's intriguing me.

Does it mean the sound can be made louder without affecting the overall sound quality (on an audiophile point of view) ?

I was under the impression that "brickwall looking" tracks under audicity had no dynamic range, and that we were missing something because of it.

 

Please do correct me if i'm wrong, i'll be pleased to know more about it.

 

Edit: to your second post, no i don't mean to know more than ppl actually working on it. Which is why i'm posting there, only asking to be proven wrong and learn

I tried to be careful about that, but i apologise if i sounded disrepectful or judgemental toward your (and other ppl) work.

[Mike A]

I did watch those youtube videos indeed, where it appears "maximizing volume" is done by compressing the dynamic range which results in a loss of a part of that range - which is usually inaudible on cheap/most used systems, but annoying on "high end" ones.

The thing which is lost is volume. The idea behind compression is reducing the loud parts in a track, so you can increase the loudness in the entire track. So all that you're losing is the differences in loudness, and nothing else. Not notes, frequencies, sounds, whatever. Take this as a good thing - you will know that you will not be surprised by any loud peaks causing possible hearing damage.

There is an effect on overall sound quality, of course since after all it does change the sound. But if the artist made a good mix, mastering will only make it sound better.

[frozen dream]

as far as i'm concerned, only those top israeli labels fuck the sound up like that, like electro sun - double trouble album

 

superloud, almost unlistenable on a big system 'cause of all the extra pronounced high tones.

 

painful biznez

 

also afula on II sounds pumped up like crazy, it's like listening to unreal music (both content and sound quality)

[qa2pir]

Mike A: Listen to Mindsphere's album, released on Ektoplazm (for free). It's completely fucked up, and has basically the same volume all the time. The intro is as loud as the climax. The track doesn't get louder when the bass drum kicks in. Something is wrong. Dynamics is important, not a nuisance.

[Basilisk]

I wish that album could be remastered. What a shame.

[qa2pir]

I wish that album could be remastered. What a shame.

I'm glad that you, as the head of the label, recognises this as a problem. I have to say that other Ektoplazm releases I've listened to have had excellent (transparent) mastering which doesn't harm the music. Anakoluth is a prime example of psytrance that sounds really good.

 

Analysing the Anakoluth album in Audacity, I can see that it's a brickwall for the most part, but I think there are two important differences compared to Mindsphere.

 

1. The intro's are left quiet.

 

2. The music is less dynamic composition-wise, which makes excessive loudness less of a problem - it's not made to be very dynamic. Mindsphere, on the other hand, is climactic, dynamic goa which suffers from amplitudal dynamic reduction, because highs and lows are a huge part of what makes it good.

[Malevol3nt]

Too much of anything hurts really. Personally, I think the goal behind the sound engineer should be to find that "golden middle" between the loudness and the dynamics of a track, or the entire album. You win some you loose some. But the better the mix you do as an artist, the less work the engineer has to do on mastering. Thus if your mix is really good you don't risk that many changes to your tracks in the mastering process, as it gives the engineer more time to focus on his part of the work like loudness while not having to worry about dynamics that are all out of place. And as you know, engineering's time costs money and record labels have their limit on how much they're willing to pay for the time spent on mastering your tracks.

[Isao]

Urgh, just listened to a bit of the Mindsphere album.. it's constantly above the -10db mark from start to finish :/

Thats such a shame, for what i have listened it could have been an amazing album but the mastering is ruining it all for me.

 

If we are taking this album as an exemple, does it sound bad just because of the total lack of dynamic? Or is there anything else.

[Mike A]

Mike A: Listen to Mindsphere's album, released on Ektoplazm (for free). It's completely fucked up, and has basically the same volume all the time. The intro is as loud as the climax. The track doesn't get louder when the bass drum kicks in. Something is wrong. Dynamics is important, not a nuisance.

Yea I know what you're talking about, I heard it. It's the same in the Human Hyperactivation compilation from Metapsychic. In those cases it's not loudness and maximizing, it's just an example of how not to master music. This has nothing to do with loudness war, just plain awful sound.

[Basilisk]

I'm glad that you, as the head of the label, recognises this as a problem. I have to say that other Ektoplazm releases I've listened to have had excellent (transparent) mastering which doesn't harm the music. Anakoluth is a prime example of psytrance that sounds really good.

Ektoplazm is a free music portal as well as a netlabel. I have not been personally involved in creating most of the releases that appear on my site. They are released by other netlabels and independent artists for whom I provide hosting and promotion, and that's about it. Mindsphere's album was released by Metapsychic Records. It was entirely their project; I just downloaded it, repackaged it, and posted it to my site.

 

The Anakoluth EP is a different story as it is an official Ektoplazm release. I hope that clarifies things

[qa2pir]

Yea I know what you're talking about, I heard it. It's the same in the Human Hyperactivation compilation from Metapsychic. In those cases it's not loudness and maximizing, it's just an example of how not to master music. This has nothing to do with loudness war, just plain awful sound.

This awful sound wouldn't exist if the loudness war didn't. It sounds bad because it's maximised, and it is maximised because people like you can't use the volume knobs on your iPods

[Mike A]

This awful sound wouldn't exist if the loudness war didn't. It sounds bad because it's maximised, and it is maximised because people like you can't use the volume knobs on your iPods

Blaming the loudness war on the lousy work of one mastering engineer isn't too smart, you know.

[frozen dream]

this whole thread isn't, because there's no point, every label does what it wants with its music, regardless of any so-called professional standards.

 

i wouldn't consider the stuff like Com.Pact/spun etc etc records is doing, superhard digital mastering to make your ears bleed,

 

yet to the masses, it equals profesionality and the highest status

 

personally, like the superhard mastering of delirious (poli - electric wonders) i kinda enjoy on headphones at low level, but when playing it on my monis or at a party, the extra (especially in the highs) wail in the sound is so horrible, you have to put the eq down even on most setups. it's crazy

 

i don't think there's a loudness war on an international level, just in the biggest money making scenes within psytrance, where all the same characters are at play.

 

maybe we're all trippin'

[qa2pir]

Blaming the loudness war on the lousy work of one mastering engineer isn't too smart, you know.

The sole reason why this engineer is making the tracks louder is because of this loudness war. Brickwalling stuff that shouldn't be brickwalled is always lousy work - and the loudness norm makes it happen.

 

I'm not blaming a war. A war is a human construct, and thus I am blaming the people involved.

[NEMO.BOFH]

You should all just start listening to dirty techno instead

[frozen dream]

I'm not blaming a war. A war is a human construct, and thus I am blaming the people involved.

sheer terror, gripping tight.

[qa2pir]

sheer terror, gripping tight.

Will you ever make sense?

[Malevol3nt]

You should all just start listening to dirty techno instead

Hey I listen to aphex twin's selected ambient works vol1 every so often. It ain't techno, but it's dirty!

 

I don't mind the lack of mastering there. If the music is good I won't mind if it aint mastered, but overmastering just ruins the whole thing.

[radi6404]

I hate loudness character very much too and must laugh my ass off til it tears down when someone comes and says Ipot has good music quality or the people who thing they are something better and are cool if they have an Ipod, I´ve listened to Ipods many times and they really sound shit. I don´t want to say Sony are the best but they sound way more dcent than Ipod shit.

 

Loudness character is very bad, it jsut sounds very crappy, if you put on the headphones you just realize how bad loudness character sounds, all hiphop shit stuff and pop shit stuff has the typical loudness character, when i play an oldschool psytrack over headphones over my creatuve soundcard it sounds way better than a pop song from nelly fortado for example who uses extremly much loudness character. it is also very shitty when oldschool is playing you set a volume, and if we ofcourse don´t have pop in our playlists but if we would the pop would blast very much louder on the same volume as the oldschool goa track and that´s not quality for me. If music is optimated to sound loud and clear on the cheapest speakers because they lack detail it sounds exremly awful and oversaturated on good speakers or good headphones. But I think oldschool and neschool generally don´t use the loudness character, some fullon however uses the bad loudness charcter but not to an extent as the mainstream pop scene, the worst loudness character is still used by mainstream rap.