There has been a growing trend in recent years that has is becoming an imminent threat to audiophiles everywhere: "The Loudness War". Record labels have been consistently releasing loudly mastered recordings and there is no sign of them stopping. These loud recordings lack musical integrity and are depriving music lovers of a true, unaltered performance.
In a nutshell, the “Loudness War” is a term adopted by sound engineers that refers to the longtime trend for record labels and the artists that they represent to master and release their music louder than their competition. The practice began in jukebox age of the 1950s, where record producers milked 45s to make them noticeably louder than their competition; they argued that this was necessary because the commonly inconvenient volume knobs on the machines could not be easily accessed to change the volume of songs.
Since that time, the Loudness War has been justified by one somewhat mythical marketing observation: “Loud sells”. Label heads believed that if a hit record was louder than its competitors, than it would be more easily heard and recognized on the radio and on jukeboxes, giving it marketing advantage that would enable it to outsell the competition.
Think of it as TV, a medium whose broadcasters will do anything to catch attention. Viewers around the world have sent in complaints about obnoxiously loud TV advertisements being sprinkled in with calmer show and ads. Why do companies make their ads louder? To scream over their competitors’ ads, obviously. It is this same philosophy that drives The Loudness War, and consumers have grown tired of it and have successfully fought it.
Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) believed that the CALM (Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation) Act was certainly more popular than any other cause she had advocated during her 18-year career in the house.
“If I’d saved 50 million children from some malady, people would not have the interest that they have in this,” said Eshoo.
She was right: while America is divided on many key issues, the public was able to swiftly reach its consensus on overly-loud TV ads. President Obama signed the CALM Act into law on December 15, 2010, and viewers rejoiced their liberation from loudness. However, music listeners have been fighting a lesser known loudness war of their own. If viewers won one loudness war, then why can’t listeners win another?
Leading record labels are the main cause to blame for louder records, and their dominance in the music industry means the public at a disadvantage in the fight.
Thankfully, vinyl records were able to hold off the Loudness War for a few years, as those mastering the discs knew that if they were produced too loud, listener’s styli would fly out of the grooves and cause expensive damage. This is not to say that they didn’t milk the format, as I have several records in my collection that are especially loud (Styx’s The Grand Illusion, for example).
In 1983, however, the music industry received a new weapon in their arsenal that has been comparable in strength to the nuclear bomb: the CD. The format quickly superseded records, thanks to its highly touted bass range and capability for dynamic contrast. Although record producers definitely took advantage of these new capabilities, they only did so to make louder music lacking dynamic contrast.
All instruments can produce both loud and soft notes; the difference between these notes is called dynamic contrast. Dynamics have fallen victim to loudness, as you simply can’t have one without the other. In other words, record producers compress music on digital formats to make it louder, sacrificing dynamics. On the flip side of the coin, there must be dynamic contrast in music in order to preserve its subtleties.
Dynamic contrast, in the opinion of many musicians and connoisseurs of music, is what makes the art interesting and powerful. There is nothing like a quiet passage that slowly creeps up on the listener until it eventually jumps out with full force. However, the Loudness War has killed dynamic contrast and has removed these charms from music.
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| Notice how much more dynamic contrast is present in Joe Jackson's original 1984 release of Body and Soul (top) than its 1997 remaster (bottom). Many album remasters heavily compress the original work. |
Think of it as typography. Fonts used to be beautifully hand-written and finessed. Typographers would spend hours honing their craft to make a living. However, as the computer age brought along a revolution in design, typography faded away—and so did all of the beautiful subtleties associated with it. Similarly, loudness is destroying the subtleties of music and hard work of the artists that create it.
The Loudness War is no longer just a war between record labels for sales: it has become a war against the artistic value of music. Viable new works might never a true, high fidelity release and classic works have been slaughtered by boatloads of loudness and compression. Need evidence? Watch this video by mastering engineer Ian Shepherd, analyzing the progressive decline of Michael Jackson’s Thriller. I’ll wait.
Notice how the later, louder remasters sounded less powerful? Michael Jackson isn’t the only victim of loudness, with works by Billy Joel, The Smashing Pumpkins, and others losing their dynamic range and their punch.
Listeners need to stand up for their music if they ever plan on listening to it with dynamics ever again. Fortunately, many have already realized that there is a problem with their music. Some have noted how annoying listening to loud recordings can be.
“When you're through listening to a whole album of this highly compressed music, your ear is fatigued, said Ludwig. “You may have enjoyed the music but you don't really feel like going back and listening to it again.”
I would have to agree with him on that one. Much of the music on my phone is loud and compressed, and I sometimes find myself with a headache following a long car ride of listening to that music.
That is not music listeners’ only trace of consciousness, as many Metallica fans will tell you. The band’s 2008 album Death Magnetic sparked controversy upon release due to its loud and heavily compressed mix. Some hardcore fans of the band could not bear to listen to it. Shepherd later discovered that the version of the album available in Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock somehow escaped the Loudness War, intriguing many fans as to how it did so.
According to Rolling Stone, “Shepherd discovered that the CD is boosted as much as compressively possible, making it 10 decibels louder than the GH version while completely bleaching out the dynamic range.”
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| The Guitar Hero version of Death Magnetic (top) sounds much more pure than the actual CD release (top). |
If artists receive enough backlash for such blunders, record labels might finally get the point and make their releases quieter.
Apple has already set forth to solve the loudness problem with its Sound Check feature on iTunes Radio, an Apple Music service. The feature, which cannot be disabled, normalizes the volume levels of all songs so that no single song can be louder than the others. This puts compressed recordings at a disadvantage because they now lack dynamic contrast and loudness.
“iTunes Radio is already so popular that it will end the loudness race by force majeure,” said American mastering engineer Bob Katz. “This development is a great opportunity for producers to explain and demonstrate to their clients how to make their songs sound better on iTunes Radio and everywhere else.”
We as music listeners must unite to preserve the flavor of music. The music industry needs to know that we want true high fidelity music, not compressed noise.
Happy Listening,
Alex
“The Loudness War is a sonic “arms race” where every artist and label feel they need to crush their music onto CD at the highest possible level, for fear of not being “competitive” – and in the process removing all the contrast, all the light, shade and depth – ruining the sound.”-Ian Shepherd
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