Are the loudness wars fake so record companies can destroy the music?

@rickytickytwo,

Yes, and all the nice delusions we like to to entertain in our heads can’t change that brutal fact. Nor can what most people tell us or would like us to believe.

Honesty amongst the successful rich and famous is virtually unknown. And behind them stand the impossibly wealthy.

As they say, if you want to uncover any answers then ’follow the money’.

And if you want some truth, then think for yourself. Once you emerge from the ’education system’ that is.

So the obvious conclusion here must be is that loudness sells.

@uberwaltz,

'Over compressed music is just about a requirement for any music to sound acceptable to the masses on the near universal phone and earbuds setup.
Us audiophools comprise a tiny segment of the customer base and we are not the ones who are downloading songs and paying for said downloads to our iPod or whatever similar piece of gear.'


@dougeyjones,

'There’s no conspiracy here, music is just not being mastered for Audiophiles anymore, if it ever was. It’s being mastered to sound as good as possible on the devices that 98% of the world listen on. Phones, tablets, laptops and earbuds.

Is it a sad state of affairs for audiophiles who love dynamic range? Definitely. Is it a conspiracy? Not at all.'


Yes, nothing to see here, no conspiracy.

They have never promised to give us good sound. If they do it's an accident, it won't happen again.

Their business is to sell music. We're not even 1% of their market, and they know we'll buy anyway, despite our complaints.


As for big pharma, well that's another story altogether.

I find it amazing (and slightly depressing) that after decades and decades of research and untold billions spent doing it, that the single biggest ever medicinal breakthrough only happened to come by through sheer accident.

In his own words:

"One sometimes finds, what one is not looking for. When I woke up just after dawn on September 28, 1928, I certainly didn't plan to revolutionize all medicine by discovering the world's first antibiotic, or bacteria killer. But I suppose that was exactly what I did."

— Alexander Fleming

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Fleming

My problem with loudness is not just that the quiet passages are boosted, it's that the peaks are compressed. When it's overdone the music feels like it's been subdued with the life and dynamics missing - supermarket/elevator music style.

This effect is especially unpalatable with genres like rock or metal as fans of Motorhead on CD might find.

One real issue facing headphone users is the level of noise isolation they need from their cans, in-ear, on-ear or over ear?

I generally prefer open back phones but I've switched to closed back for my walk to work. I found I had to put the volume way too high to drown out the surprisingly loud road traffic.

So with my closed back on ear JVCs I can keep the volume low enough to still hear my surroundings and also the music. A fair bit of outside noise still gets in but a totally closed back over ear phone wouldn't be suitable for commuting either.

Therefore it's easy to conclude that as long as download / headphone users remain the target audience, then the mainstream use of heavy compression is going to remain.