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Post by jaba on May 25, 2023 12:51:16 GMT -6
There's a huge difference between types of dynamics. A kick drum hit might be 15dB between the transient peak and the body of the sound. The RMS level would be very low despite the transient peak being very high. It would be hard to listen to because it would be all TICK TICK TICK sounding. Clipping that transient off some would bring the RMS level up and reduce some of the TICK TICK TICK attack and perhaps make it sound more "round" and easier to hear and listen to despite being very high RMS levels. I've listened to old recordings where the mics, consoles, tapes, LP's, etc have reduced bandwidth to the point where you don't get a lot of those transients. I've also heard old recordings where all you hear are those transients. Dynamic range doesn't mean that it sounds good, nor does the lack of it mean it sounds bad. A lot of people listening to older recordings enjoy it because it's NOT very dynamic at all. They mistake quiet and low bandwidth for high dynamic range. I think it's not about dynamic range at all. I think most people who dislike modern recordings do so because they don't sound like their favorite old recordings. You make a lot of good points but as someone who does like the sound of many styles over many decades, I do find that the issue of over-limiting/compressing to can be very fatiguing and likely why many people don't like modern recording done with that kind of processing. I often find these mixes sound good and exciting (in a way that suits the song) but after 4 or 5 mins, I'm turning the volume down. Likely stop listening all-together after a few songs. Maybe it's the clipping more than the lack of dynamic range, but I do find it hard to take for very long. Maybe it's very "singles" oriented and just want to to blast out of speakers for 3.5 mins and the rest be damned. |
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Post by svart on May 25, 2023 13:16:45 GMT -6
There's a huge difference between types of dynamics. A kick drum hit might be 15dB between the transient peak and the body of the sound. The RMS level would be very low despite the transient peak being very high. It would be hard to listen to because it would be all TICK TICK TICK sounding. Clipping that transient off some would bring the RMS level up and reduce some of the TICK TICK TICK attack and perhaps make it sound more "round" and easier to hear and listen to despite being very high RMS levels. I've listened to old recordings where the mics, consoles, tapes, LP's, etc have reduced bandwidth to the point where you don't get a lot of those transients. I've also heard old recordings where all you hear are those transients. Dynamic range doesn't mean that it sounds good, nor does the lack of it mean it sounds bad. A lot of people listening to older recordings enjoy it because it's NOT very dynamic at all. They mistake quiet and low bandwidth for high dynamic range. I think it's not about dynamic range at all. I think most people who dislike modern recordings do so because they don't sound like their favorite old recordings. You make a lot of good points but as someone who does like the sound of many styles over many decades, I do find that the issue of over-limiting/compressing to can be very fatiguing and likely why many people don't like modern recording done with that kind of processing. I often find these mixes sound good and exciting (in a way that suits the song) but after 4 or 5 mins, I'm turning the volume down. Likely stop listening all-together after a few songs. Maybe it's the clipping more than the lack of dynamic range, but I do find it hard to take for very long. Maybe it's very "singles" oriented and just want to to blast out of speakers for 3.5 mins and the rest be damned. I've found very few modern songs that I consider fatiguing due to loudness. There were some in the late 90's/early 2000's that did seem extremely unlistenable but I always found it to be due to grating frequencies rather than loudness. I believe the quest for loudness brings out the frequencies rather than the loudness itself being the problem. My right ear was damaged by an infection about 10 years ago and now it's extremely sensitive to distortions in the midrange. I now use that to discern midrange grit in a mix. If it passed the fucked-up-right-ear-test then it passes as a mix! Loud can easily pass the test, but gritty distortion in the mids can't. Boosting gain and increasing limiting only brings out more of the distortion and weirdness. Mixing a loud song as a loud song doesn't, if you get what I mean. |
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Post by Deleted on May 25, 2023 13:30:44 GMT -6
There's a huge difference between types of dynamics. A kick drum hit might be 15dB between the transient peak and the body of the sound. The RMS level would be very low despite the transient peak being very high. It would be hard to listen to because it would be all TICK TICK TICK sounding. Clipping that transient off some would bring the RMS level up and reduce some of the TICK TICK TICK attack and perhaps make it sound more "round" and easier to hear and listen to despite being very high RMS levels. I've listened to old recordings where the mics, consoles, tapes, LP's, etc have reduced bandwidth to the point where you don't get a lot of those transients. I've also heard old recordings where all you hear are those transients. Dynamic range doesn't mean that it sounds good, nor does the lack of it mean it sounds bad. A lot of people listening to older recordings enjoy it because it's NOT very dynamic at all. They mistake quiet and low bandwidth for high dynamic range. I think it's not about dynamic range at all. I think most people who dislike modern recordings do so because they don't sound like their favorite old recordings. old gear isn’t clipping. Most gear only clips when exceeding its power supply rails or crapping out a tape and it sounds like shit or fuzzy. Old recordings often went through gear with limited slew rates, were subject to hysteresis, tape self erasure, and sometimes pushed into a tube’s non linear transfer curve. Tape is not clipping. Higher levels for lower noise have more self erasure. Companders for noise reduction further reduced the hf information you would get on playback even if volume remains the same. Making tape sound good requires effort that translates over to the final product. Even a cassette recording can sound great. Old recordings also used working dynamics processors even if they were cheap and sounded crappy. Modern recordings usually go through digital dynamics processors with infinite distortion in the side chain that with most settings, behave more like dysfunctional synth modulators than a control system. And are often going through a bunch of cheap opamps in gear with power supplies that do not let them be overdriven and sound cool. So you just lose high end clarity. Add in multiple loopbacks through DA circuitry with defective anti aliasing filters and the high end is fried crispy. Look ahead brickwall pcm sample limiting is the antithesis of good sound. It’s a peak limiter that can’t detect the peaks with an average smoothing to not catch the peaks with the not least distortion of the signal within the lookahead period. Add in program dependency to try to detect the not peak crest using the not peaks to detect the not rms to feed the not peaks into a pcm leveler and clipper and you get a random pumpy distortion device. |
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Post by svart on May 25, 2023 13:43:02 GMT -6
There's a huge difference between types of dynamics. A kick drum hit might be 15dB between the transient peak and the body of the sound. The RMS level would be very low despite the transient peak being very high. It would be hard to listen to because it would be all TICK TICK TICK sounding. Clipping that transient off some would bring the RMS level up and reduce some of the TICK TICK TICK attack and perhaps make it sound more "round" and easier to hear and listen to despite being very high RMS levels. I've listened to old recordings where the mics, consoles, tapes, LP's, etc have reduced bandwidth to the point where you don't get a lot of those transients. I've also heard old recordings where all you hear are those transients. Dynamic range doesn't mean that it sounds good, nor does the lack of it mean it sounds bad. A lot of people listening to older recordings enjoy it because it's NOT very dynamic at all. They mistake quiet and low bandwidth for high dynamic range. I think it's not about dynamic range at all. I think most people who dislike modern recordings do so because they don't sound like their favorite old recordings. old gear isn’t clipping. Most gear only clips when exceeding its power supply rails or crapping out a tape and it sounds like shit or fuzzy. Old recordings often went through gear with limited slew rates, were subject to hysteresis, tape self erasure, and sometimes pushed into a tube’s non linear transfer curve. Tape is not clipping. Higher levels for lower noise have more self erasure. Companders for noise reduction further reduced the hf information you would get on playback even if volume remains the same. Making tape sound good requires effort that translates over to the final product. Even a cassette recording can sound great. Old recordings also used working dynamics processors even if they were cheap and sounded crappy. Modern recordings usually go through digital dynamics processors with infinite distortion in the side chain that with most settings, behave more like dysfunctional synth modulators than a control system. And are often going through a bunch of cheap opamps in gear with power supplies that do not let them be overdriven and sound cool. So you just lose high end clarity. Add in multiple loopbacks through DA circuitry with defective anti aliasing filters and the high end is fried crispy. Look ahead brickwall pcm sample limiting is the antithesis of good sound. It’s a peak limiter that can’t detect the peaks with an average smoothing to not catch the peaks with the not least distortion of the signal within the lookahead period. Add in program dependency to try to detect the not peak crest using the not peaks to detect the not rms to feed the not peaks into a pcm leveler and clipper and you get a random pumpy distortion device. Tape does clip. Clipping is defined the same way as saturation: The lack of increase of an output signal while an input signal continues to increase. This can be done by running out of voltage headroom, or in an analogous way, running out of magnetic particles that aren't charged a specific way. The net effect is the same. The output signal cannot continue to increase in level with the input signal increasing. And not all amps clip hard. Many do have compression knees before hard limiting. |
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Post by jaba on May 25, 2023 14:08:05 GMT -6
You make a lot of good points but as someone who does like the sound of many styles over many decades, I do find that the issue of over-limiting/compressing to can be very fatiguing and likely why many people don't like modern recording done with that kind of processing. I often find these mixes sound good and exciting (in a way that suits the song) but after 4 or 5 mins, I'm turning the volume down. Likely stop listening all-together after a few songs. Maybe it's the clipping more than the lack of dynamic range, but I do find it hard to take for very long. Maybe it's very "singles" oriented and just want to to blast out of speakers for 3.5 mins and the rest be damned. I've found very few modern songs that I consider fatiguing due to loudness. There were some in the late 90's/early 2000's that did seem extremely unlistenable but I always found it to be due to grating frequencies rather than loudness. I believe the quest for loudness brings out the frequencies rather than the loudness itself being the problem. My right ear was damaged by an infection about 10 years ago and now it's extremely sensitive to distortions in the midrange. I now use that to discern midrange grit in a mix. If it passed the fucked-up-right-ear-test then it passes as a mix! Loud can easily pass the test, but gritty distortion in the mids can't. Boosting gain and increasing limiting only brings out more of the distortion and weirdness. Mixing a loud song as a loud song doesn't, if you get what I mean. Interesting. I know the hard-as-nails upper mids don't help, but I always found the level being slammed into the ceiling without a break is what tires me out. The first time I really noticed this was a power pop album from 2000. Not super bright (IIRC) but just compressed all to hell. It's stylized and (to me) totally works for the music, but since nothing is ever quieter than everything I can't go more than a song and a half without reach for the volume knob. It was the lack of moments for my ears to "breathe" that I found fatiguing, not the ice pick sensation of hard and bright. It's a like talking to someone and they're constantly 2" in front of my face, their voice may be soft as hot butter but after a while, I need some breathing room. Of course if the voice if bright and hard, I'm going to need that break even sooner. On the bright side, at least limiters can't have bad breath... |
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