Re: Why contemporary music sounds terrible

[Bill Fox <billyfox@soundscapes.us>]

Krispen Hartung wrote:
> ...all the different ways you can increase levels (for CDs to sound 
> comparable to other professional CDs in your player),  yet maintain 
> natural dynamics, etc. Now, it has occured to me that often times when 
> I hear a CD, especially pop/rock CDs, and I think to myself, wow that 
> is a really hot and "in your face" level", the mix also doesn't have 
> much of a dynamic range...some guy is screaming his lyrics, or you can 
> tell that is is practically blowing his brains out to get that tone 
> out of his horn...but it is no louder than the section where he is 
> wispering poetry over an ambient section.  It's like compress, 
> compress, compress, limit, limit, limit....turn that wave form into a 
> solid bar, and then raise it to 0db...in your face, 100% of the time. 
> Below is the first time I've seen this referred to as exhausting, but 
> it makes sense. Even if you turn your stereo down, there might be 
> something to be said of giving the human pyche a break with natural 
> dynamics and more space.  
> Tension....release....tension...release....louder....softer, etc, etc. 
In the Subject: line, I would have said "Why contemporary mastering 
practices sound terrible" instead of "Why contemporary music sounds 
terrible."  I wouldn't want anyone thinking that I hate "contemporary" 
music.

But you are so right.  I'm mixing my Celtic band's demos and am fighting 
the urge to slap that multi-band compressor across the output bus inside 
of Sonar.  If I *do* use it, I hope that I at least use more 
conservative settings than the presets provide.

Cheers,

Bill