LOUD Remasterings - Why do they keep doing it? What can we do about it?

Though it's not my usual MO, I've actually taken to emailing the labels when I buy a disc that's been compressed.

And no - I never get a reply other than the generic "we will pass this to the relevant party".

So one might surmise they really don't give a damn.

I am also at a point where I simply skip releases that I know are heavily compressed up front. For me, there have been three major artists where I've bought all their previous releases, but have recently bailed on only because of heavy compression. I'm not someone who is bothered by compression as much as many here, but when you're dipping into DR6, you've got to shake your head.

 

The new Foo Fighters - great album crushed by digital mastering.

A buddy was streaming it, and I could tell that the music was great...

Flash forward, I find a copy on LP discounted, pull the trigger, figuring "it's gotta be better than that crushed digital stuff I heard", and when I pulled it out, the letters 'CB' etched in the deadwax made my heart flutter...

Thank you, @Chris B for all that you do.

 

The only thing we can do,
but the problem is that there are a lot of people who dont hear this, and dont care...
I was verbally assaulted on FB when I wrote about the new Residents editions.
People said they are not loud, and there are lots of dynamic and so on....
What really bothers me is that there are never anything mention about this when these re-issues are reviewed in musical magazines. Thats really what they should talk about! We already know about the music...no surprice there....
I give up!

 

I often run music through a mixer and mess with the gain and EQs to suite my tastes. Sometimes I'll record the output and just play that.

Um, about the remasters that sound bad... I just look for the original or a better pressing if I gotta have it.

 

I've no interest in Vinyl these days. I'm not going to take a retrograde step just so I can get a decent mastering on new albums - and pay more for it to boot. The way to punish these labels is not to hand them more money, but to withdraw money completely.

The down side is that I don't get to own specific titles in a physical format. Fortunately, my music tastes are vast, and no matter which way I cut it, for every CD I buy, there are three or four I want to buy. I just move on.

To be fanciful for a moment - perhaps CD sales will eventually fall enough that labels move most of their releases to streaming only - then some marketing dweeb will suggest there is indeed a niche market for CD out there, as long as it's an "audiophile mastering". Then we get full DR. Hell, it's worked with Vinyl.........

 

When available, I do this too. For new recordings, of course, it's not available. So it's new music that's being ignored, not back catalog, which generally can be had in a better release.

 

Well, people do not like hearing that the thing they just paid for is no good. It happens here a lot (see David Bowie). I agree with your comment about reviews not covering this. But, it does not make good copy and they (the reviewers) are there to encourage people to buy stuff, not discourage them. Can't seem them slagging off the mastering too often. As I said above, we have to stop buying things until we've heard them properly. But it is also good to tell the bands/labels that what they are doing sucks. Otherwise things will never improve.

 

1. Don't buy the crap. I will not buy overly compressed music because I hate the sound of it.

2. Given that this Forum has a lot of traffic, it would be foolhardy of the Industry/Artists to baltantly ignore opinions expressed here. So perhaps there should be a permanent thread identifying brickwalled music, posting the wave files and warning people not to buy because it sounds awful.

3. If there is clipping on one of your purchases (there usually is for compressed crap), then that can potentially blow amplifiers and/or speakers, therefore it is faulty. So return on that basis and demand a refund.

 

In some ways I don't mind over compressed just not too much.

I like many here remember the days of those flat sounding early cds, years later I was happy new remastered reissues were a bit louder than the original first issued cds. I like many hear don't like remasters compressed way to loud. Too loud no good a little compression is okay. IMHO.

 

This actually makes me think - is there a thread/list somewhere on this site of GOOD remasterings?

The more I think of it, the more I'm wondering if what I'd prefer are remixes, rather than remasterings.

And then, having been edu-ma-cated by Plan 9 - it begs the question, what do we expect a simple remaster to do? Clearly they compress things, there's got to be an example of remastering done right that involves something other than compression.

 

Depends on ones ears I guess. I guess just stick to the original cds.

 

Instead of a purely negative permanent thread, I'd like to see something which highlights both good and poor quality albums as they are released ie April's releases and which ones are on good quality vinyl and sound great.

 

Well, the best tool to identify bad remasters is probably Album list - Dynamic Range Database

I try to update it as much as I can. Of course, that's to the benefit of others, since I've already bought it at that point.

I guess you could use it good remasters to. However, other than compression issues, I'd be interested to know why someone prefers one mastering over another.

 

To be fair though, this is true of every Foo Fighters album on CD.

 

It's easy to say don't buy it, but I have rarely known what something sounds like before I have bought it. I like the idea of sending it back. Perhaps send it directly to the record company ... idk ... It is so unnecessary and annoying

 

I'm with you! Cd was created to help eliminate rumble, wow and flutter, pops, crackle, scratches and an improved dynamic range...and the BIG GUYS now want more $$$$'s and what better than "feed" themselves by pushing nostalgia. Bah!!! I'm not paying 30 bucks per album thanks.

 

Tomorrow is Dynamic Range Day: Dynamic Range Day

 

Amazing, then, how they sell crushed, clipped masterings with smiley-faced EQs and woofy, whompy bass response to people who somehow think it's "better" because they don't know how to take care of their records, or are just too cheap to purchase a turntable that doesn't have rumble or wow and flutter.

See how that works both ways?

 

Let's face the truth, not buying CD's or LP's because you think that they are mastered too LOUD, is not going to solve anything, in fact if it does anything, it just makes the record companies realize that "downloads" are the only way to move forward and to stop making CD's or LP's in the end.

The first question to ask when even approaching this topic is, how do most average people listen to music these days? The answer sadly is, on their phones or on their computers/tablets. We here at the Hoffman Forum are truly a very small part of the musical playback world, so we all are already outnumbered by those who really have a "voice" or "opinion" on this matter. To find out how bad the mastering issue has gotten, simply make a playlist of songs, out of your songs in a computer or if you have a multi CD player, just add one song or CD that was mastered by Steve Hoffman, among all new releases and see if you don't hear the difference? First thing that you will have to do when the Hoffman mastering comes on is to "turn it up", which makes most listeners "who don't understand just how good a remastering can sound", scream. I really don't listen to music on a computer or phone very much, as I like the completeness of playing a LP or CD on a sound system, but I do have a bunch of old loaded i-Pod's that I use when traveling or in the car and I get it. When you're driving down the highway and enjoying a bunch of great songs and a Hoffman mastered song comes on, it's almost a deal killer, because his stuff demands that you turn it up, which is good, but if you don't it's like, "what the hell happened?" LOUD across the board is easy and that's why most people accept it, plus they don't understand it, even if they know that the majority of what they listen to sounds like crap!

 

If the 0,1% of buyers who are aware of it stop buying it, it won't make any difference at all.

 

One of our forum brethren had the following helpful solution to 'fix' a brickwalled mastering:

With the CD, i have found it helpful to rip it into my roxio software and then lower the volume levels before i burn it onto a CDR.

Problem solved!

 

It’s not just CDs that can sound terrible. I have bought a few hi res downloads from recent new releases that are terribly loud as well. At least with downloads I don’t have to get mad when I see the cd sitting on the shelf knowing I reallly wasted my money.

Still hard to believe someone wants the music to be loud, compressed with a DR of 4 or 5 and have the music clipped.

 

I've seen several posting over at DR database showing values for HDTracks titles - it ain't good!

 

Any way you can post a clip of this distortion and clipping on this particular release? Curious to hear it.