from the some-art,-some-science,-and-a-whole-lotta-black-magic dept.
According to many Metallica devotees, the official version of the band's 2008 record Death Magnetic is not the one worth listening to. Upon the album's release, fan forums exploded in disgust, choked with complaints that the songs sounded shrill, distorted, ear-splitting. These listeners liked the music and the songwriting, but everything was so loud they couldn't really hear anything. There was no nuance. Their ears hurt. And these are Metallica fans—people ostensibly undeterred by extremity. But this was too much.
The consensus seemed to be that Death Magnetic was a good record that sounded like shit. That the whole thing was drastically over-compressed, eliminating any sort of dynamic range. That it had been ruined in mastering. Eventually, more than 12,000 fans signed a petition in protest of the "unlistenable" product, and a mass mail-back-a-thon of CDs commenced. The whole episode provoked a series of questions, not just about what had gone wrong with Death Magnetic but about the craft in question: What is mastering, exactly? How does it work? Beyond the engineers themselves, almost no one seems to know.
An article on sound engineering, but the real question is, people listened to Metallica after 2000?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by slash2phar on Tuesday May 24 2016, @08:49PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:29PM
Alan Parsons, Michael Bishop, Roger Nichols... there's a ton of excellent audio engineers out there.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @11:50PM
Minnie Pearl, Michael Chriton, Rand and McNally.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:09PM
Michael Crichton?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:13AM
Jupiter's Darling (Heart)
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 3, Insightful) by driverless on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:22AM
but the real question is, people listened to Metallica after 2000?
Metallica produced albums after 1990?
(Score: 2) by EQ on Wednesday May 25 2016, @09:54AM
Steely Dan - some of the best engineered recordings made. The Aja album is a masterwork in mastering. Gaucho as well.
(Score: 1) by oldmac31310 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:28PM
please, no.
(Score: 2) by purple_cobra on Monday May 30 2016, @12:12PM
Infamously named after a dildo and I'd rather have that rammed in my ears.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:25PM
Not Pitchfork. Those twits wouldn't know engineering if it had a beard, plastic glasses, and was carrying a case of PBR. They can't even differentiate between a recording, mix, and mastering engineer. Dark arts my ass. It's as if we haven't had a few hundred years of recording audio to study.
The loudness wars has already been pretty well documented. Bands are being idiots not taking the recommendations of studio engineers to heart, and then seem surprised that their albums sound like shit.
It's a product of the times, where most music is listened to on less-than-hi-fi equipment, so the nuances of a good recording aren't as apparent on a heavily compressed mp3. And you have hipster faggots gushing about how much better vinyl sounds, completely ignorant that is a product of mastering for an analogue source and a different eq setting. You could get that sound from a CD too. There is nothing inherently superior to vinyl.
There's a lot of bullshit and snake oil out there with regards to audio, and obfuscating the issue with idiocy like "dark arts" isn't helping.
Numerous bands on bandcamp have at least got the fundamentals down, with droves of websites dedicated to helping the home recordist. Let's not forget Metallica ok'ed the final release of Death Magnetic. That's how they wanted it to sound.
(Score: 2) by Alfred on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:52PM
Those twits wouldn't know engineering if it had a beard, plastic glasses, and was carrying a case of PBR.
You misspelled "hipsters." Unless PBR is some acronym for a pocket calculator of some sort?? But still the wrong kind of "engineer."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:17AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:38AM
Study of acoustics predates Edison which is part and parcel of recording.
Oh and:
http://boingboing.net/2011/12/15/the-worlds-first-audio-recor.html [boingboing.net]
(Score: 3, Informative) by JNCF on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:12AM
Audio recording and playback was invented by Thomas Edison only in 1877.
Study of acoustics predates Edison which is part and parcel of recording.
Oh and:
http://boingboing.net/2011/12/15/the-worlds-first-audio-recor.html [boingboing.net]
Your statement may not contradict GP AC's. It depends on whether GP AC intended "audio recording and playback" to be one item or two. The article you linked notes that Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville had no way to play back his recordings. If you take "audio recording and playback" as one item, whoever invents the last-to-be-invented part and combines them invents the combination of those parts.
I'm not saying anything about the history of audio recordings, just whether or not your statements are in conflict. I think you may be talking past GP AC, instead of with.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:45AM
We do however have some thousands of years of experience in delivering music to an audience. Mozart, Beethoven, and others never worried about:
“to make the song competitive in the marketplace.”
How to master classical music: Take a copy of what the musicians produced, press it to wax cylinder/vinyl/CD. There's never been any artificial need to "make it competitive in the marketplace" by adding musical MSG.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @09:24AM
The Michael Schenker Group would have sucked without MSG.
(Score: 1) by oldmac31310 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:31PM
No, they sucked regardless.
(Score: 1) by toddestan on Saturday May 28 2016, @02:17AM
It's a lot more complicated than that if you want it to sound good. You don't want the trumpets to be too loud, or the drums too soft, the flute to get drowned out, and so forth. So you typically have several microphones positioned in and around the orchestra, which you then have to mix it all together to get it to sound right. Generally you'd also want it to be in stereo too (or perhaps even surround, though that never really caught on). Yes, you can try to have one (or two) well positioned microphones and then press it right to wax/vinyl/CD/whatever but it won't sound nearly as good.
(Score: 2) by purple_cobra on Monday May 30 2016, @12:14PM
"...the flute to get drowned out..."
Please send this person to record Jethro Tull!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @07:13AM
Sure, you *could*. But I'd say that being physically unable[1] to have as compressed sound as they like to put on a CD does fall under "inherently superior" :-)
Being unable to sound as bad as a compressed CD is a quality in a world where everyone competes for the worst sound quality.
(Score: 5, Informative) by tractatus_techno_philosophicus on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:40PM
As a classically trained musician, I've spent years honing the ability to transition from pianissimo to fortissimo, and everything in between, in order to express musical ideas and phrases with greater emotion and complexity. Music is more enjoyable when there are changes in the volume throughout the composition, and metal is no exception. When CDs first came out, a large selling point was that they were capable of producing greater dynamic contrast, whereas cassettes were not capable of producing the range of volume which one would experience in an actual performance setting. Then along came compressors and maximizers, and the age of obnoxiously loud music began. Don't get me wrong, some of the tricks which producers do with techniques such as side-chaining (Deadmau5 comes to mind) are pretty cool, but eventually it becomes tedious to listen to. Given that Metallica hasn't had any interest in producing good music since the '80s (I still love Kill 'Em All, Ride the Lightning, Master of Puppets and ...And Justice for All, I don't see why anyone should be surprised by this. It's very hard to find recordings nowadays which do not artificially maximize and compress the levels. The most recent recordings I recall listening to which where recorded without said "enhancements" were Aphex Twin's Analord series, and those are a decade old now.
No moral system can rest solely on authority. ~A.J. Ayer
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:47PM
All great albums (although KEA is a bit rough), but Justice really sounds like shit compared to the others. I believe the band-members have had several discussions about their mastering choices, for better or worse.
(Score: 1) by tractatus_techno_philosophicus on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:55PM
I agree that ...And Justice for All doesn't sound as good as the others. What I mainly appreciate about it is the instrumentals and the lyrics (especially in "One"). I once heard someone say that ...And Justice for All sounded like it was being played through a metal trash can in a botched attempt to sound like Anthrax. I don't know how apt a description that is, but it certainly made me laugh.
No moral system can rest solely on authority. ~A.J. Ayer
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @10:16PM
Of course. The stories in the songs are amazing, and the actual instrumental workmanship is phenomenal. But as you said, the whole album is tinny and shallow. Would love for someone to dig up the original master tapes and give it a good reboot.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:45AM
To me Death Magnetic sounds like a lame formulaic attempt to recreate the original sound. It's like they're just going through the motions without really being into it.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:52PM
...And Justice for All wasn't that great either: it's infamous for Newsted's bass being nearly inaudible. Newsted himself blames it on Lars.
I sometimes wonder how things would be different if Lars and Cliff hadn't switched bunks in the tour bus that fateful night and Lars had been smooshed instead. We probably would have had 2 more decades of great music from them, and some better drumming too.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:55PM
(Score: 4, Funny) by RamiK on Tuesday May 24 2016, @10:38PM
I'd be more careful mentioning Justice for All's inaudible bass in public. That sort of talk got us St. Anger...
compiling...
(Score: 3, Funny) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:43AM
He never gets respect.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 4, Funny) by Alfred on Tuesday May 24 2016, @10:00PM
But back to Metalllica, when your only tool is a loud hammer...
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday May 24 2016, @11:49PM
Spinal Tap had the obvious solution: When you need an extra dynamic push, turn your amp up from 10 to 11.
(And actually, what they usually train classical guys like myself to do is simply play your pianissimos barely audibly, so that when you go for really loud there's more contrast even with less volume.)
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:07AM
Thank you. One of the first CD I ever tried back when they were new was a collection of classical music. I'll always remember the general sense of the warning that was on that CD. Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture had been recorded with actual cannon firing. Playing that track, it warned, on full volume would shred your speakers!
Perhaps that was meant to sell the idea of the potential dynamic contrast. At any rate, it brings to mind visions of Marty McFly blowing the amp in Doc's place at the beginning of Back to the Future, and I wouldn't doubt it!
One of the other CDs I bought when they were first coming out was Holst's The Planets. Venus, the Bringer of Peace is barely audible and still has good fidelity, yet Mars, the Bringer of War will practically deafen you at its crescendo!
So I got older and I realized that I had been deprived by not listening to Yes or Starcastle in CD format. Over about a year and a half, I gradually ordered nearly a full discography for both bands. Now, what's interesting is that these different albums were released in a certain order, then were remastered for CD in a different order through the years. Take any given FLAC I have from ripping, and if I turn replaygain off, I can tell you approximately when it was remastered for CD. It turns out that they all just simply get louder the later they were remastered. The classic Yes albums that were remastered always include a number of bonus tracks with quite a few repeats. Sure enough, the exact same recording of the exact same song simply gets remastered louder over the years.
The trouble is that even though 16 bits should be enough for anyone (knock on wood), compression reduces the number of bits that can effectively express loudness. When CDs first came out, there were say 8-12 bits of a difference between your pianissimo and your fortissimo. These days, it's more like 4 or 5. It sounds like Metallica here decided that they wanted all the bits of loudness, but they wanted it at levels that could only be expressed by large numbers in the 18-20 bit range or so, thus resulting in lots and lots of clipping. Talk about losing orders of magnitude of information.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @07:24AM
I guy I used to know actually did this. He had gotten new audio gear, and turned up the volume so that his neighbor across the street could hear how great it sounded.
The first cannon shot killed one of the speakers.
Realizing his mistake, he ran back in to turn the volume down, but he wasn't fast enough.
The second cannon shot killed the other speaker.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:39PM
I think the most important lesson we can take away is you should never use a compressor on an entire track because squashing the entire track simply makes no sense and is gonna make it sound canned and shitty. As someone who plays electric bass I'm probably the musician that values compression the most because if you don't use compression on fingerpicked electric bass you...ugh its really hard to put it into words, it just loses definition and punch and gets muddy, but would I ever use compression on the whole band, even in my little home studio? Not no but HELL NO as it just crushes the dynamics, especially on guitar and keyboard. Instead I use the compressor as the local studio engineer taught me, strictly as a limiter to insure someone doesn't start pounding their instrument and damage the recording unit.
But the upshot of the whole "loudness wars" is that it makes local and indie bands sound better frankly because unlike the big label artists they aren't squashing the shit out of their CDs which make them a lot more listenable. Its just a shame that big label engineers have taken an effect that can be great if used on an instrument in moderation and given it a bad rap by running everything through it and just wringing the life out of a track.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Alfred on Tuesday May 24 2016, @09:44PM
Some things are just important. When people like to emphasize important things they can use many tools like inflection, word choice, pause, cadence, crescendo, decrescendo, rhyme and sometimes raw volume. With music you also have the instruments and their interactions like chord structure and progression to work with. Dissonance can quickly grab attention. You must select things to emphasize over the rest because if you emphasize everything, you emphasize nothing.
The brain trust referred to as Metallica knew where their work stands in comparison to all of recorded music and in the scope of recorded music their greatness had to be emphasized, all of it. Obviously Metallica could only use volume, because CDs cannot transmit things like words or the nuances of 24 bit screaming, and they used volume right up to the limits of the 44100Hz/16 bit medium and everything of their greatness had to be emphasized. If you doubt this then you just couldn't understand art or music to begin with let alone the gods of music led by Lars Forgothisname.
They probably just thought everyone would pirate the 24 bit recordings they were listening to in the studio on napster and failed to properly take into account the medium they were going to sell. /sarc But really, like the TFS referred to, who would want to listen to Metallica? That is all true but really who would want to listen to Metallica
(Score: 5, Informative) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Tuesday May 24 2016, @10:04PM
CD-Quality audio, properly mastered, exceeds the human ear's capabilities by a comfortable margin.
"HD audio" is essentially a scam. You get some benefit mixing at 24bits per sample, but you won't get better reproduction in the 20-20kHZ range with a higher sample rate (by Nyquist's Theorem). In fact, because the equipment can no longer safely filter out ultrasonics, you may get more noise at a higher sample rate.
(Score: 3, Informative) by slinches on Tuesday May 24 2016, @10:30PM
CD Audio at 44kHz and 16 bits is just barely above the theoretical minimums required to cover normal human hearing ranges. So it is adequate iff the available dynamic range is used to the fullest and the proper signal conditioning is done using higher sample rates and bit depths prior to the final downsample. So, while you are technically correct that a CD can contain an audibly identical representation, masters will often sound better anyway due to the mastering engineer placing a higher value on volume than perfect reproduction of the master (aka, the "loudness wars").
(Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Tuesday May 24 2016, @10:49PM
Every stereo made in the last century has had a volume control.
I think a "loudness" button is common too, but may have fallen out of favour due to the loudness wars.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by slinches on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:15AM
Yes, true. But the volume control doesn't help remove distortion caused by the waveform on the CD itself being clipped. The distortion is being introduced before it even gets to the amplifier in that case.
(Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:11AM
The dynamic range on a CD is large enough that that should not happen with a competent sound engineer unless the distortion is intended.
Did you notice, on the DR site somebody else linked, that some vinyl albums had more dynamic range than CD releases?
That is not due to any technical limitation of the medium.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:28AM
I've noticed that CDs aren't able to deliver a brass section the way vinyl does. Vinyl can make you swoon; with CDs, you're still fiddling with your phone or whatever else is at hand.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday May 25 2016, @07:32AM
Did you transfer than vinyl track to CD using good audio equipment? No? Then how can you know that it was the physical limitations of the CD, and not the mastering?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:27PM
I gave away (sold to a used vendor for a song) my vinyl collection years ago, and have replaced a few of my favorites with CDs (purchased, not hand transfers). There have been disappointments. I suppose it could've been the work of indifferent audio engineers doing the remaster.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:41PM
(part 2) Here's one:
https://vimeo.com/19195708 [vimeo.com]
Around 1:21 the brass behind Sonny Stitt moves to the foreground. The guy who posted it obviously chose vimeo over youtube for a reason, although I get a choppy download because of my limited ISP bandwidth.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @11:01PM
masters will often sound better anyway due to the mastering engineer placing a higher value on volume
This is why god created the volume knob and high efficiency speakers.
At best, you could make the argument that 24/192 is more forgiving with digital filters.
In practice, there are far more compromises throughout the audio chain for it any improvement to be realized.
CD audio is near perfect for consumer reproduction.
(Score: 2) by slinches on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:20AM
I agree. Tell that to the mastering engineers. They're the only ones who can control whether the full dynamic range capabilities of CD Audio are actually used or not.
Like I said before, it's not that the format isn't capable, it's that it isn't currently being used to its full potential.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Alfred on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:04PM
Nyquist is about being able to detect a signal at all. Nyquist says you need double the sample rate of the frequency of the signal to be detected. Everyone knows that.
What is usually skipped over:
*The phase difference between the signal and the sampling will directly affect the amplitude of the measurement. An exactly out of phase sampling will give you 0 amplitude or read as no signal when there could be a very large signal.
*For reproduction, a nyquist sampling of a signal can playback the same if the original signal was a square, sine or triangle input. This loses the musical nature of the signal because those sure as hell sound different in real life.
*Nyquist is F*2, you will also have signals at F+1, F+2, F+3...those signals will still show up and be manifest in the measurements. The beats phenomenon will be present but you are able to determine the presence of a frequency beyond what Nyquist says is possible. F-1, F-2, F-3... signals which are within the Nyquist rate will also be detectable but also with the same beats problems as the F+1 series. Though Nyqusit says those frequencies are detectable they are not detectable consistently well. The best signal capture is having a sample rate several times higher than the frequency to be measured, then you can have an idea of the shape of the wave too. Not always important but it is impotent to music.
*Nyquist is theoretically correct for detecting signals but it is also theoretically horrible for music signals. If all you have is one clean predictable signal then Nyquist is useful for knowing how crappy your gear can be and still kinda work. Nyquist is not so useful for many signals near the same frequency, or when there are overtones above the fundamental, or just many different frequencies at the same time.
Other comments:
*Internal processing of a signal in a mixer or DAW or other should always be several bits greater than the AD or DA conversion depth. Early digital reverb effects units suffered from not having enough internal resolution when the signal faded out or was otherwise quieter. The reverb tails would sound like they had a noise gate on them.
*Yes HD audio is a scam. A recording will benefit more from good mic placement upfront than with bit depth added later. Mic placement should not be a problem in a pro studio though.
*"Safely filter out"?? Mybe you can restate but those aren't signal I consider unsafe. I don't consider filtering the signals an unsafe act either. I think just about all AD converters have an analog filter stage before the conversion.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:24PM
Nyquist's theorem assumes infinite samples and an accurate clock. As long as the signal is not at exactly at 1/2 of the sampling rate, the phase will drift.
Every wave can be broken down into frequency components (with a Fourrier Transform) that are pure sine waves. A square wave is a sine wave with odd harmonics, for example. Nyquist's theorem requires that the input signal be bandwidth limited. That means that for example, any square wave will have rounded corners as the higher frequency harmonics are filtered out.
Yes, you are supposed to filter those out with a low-pass filter. That may be what you are getting at in your overall comment. No (physical) filter is perfect, so there is some benefit to a higher sample rate: just to make sure any unfiltered higher frequency components don't cause the problems you mention.
Maybe I misunderstand the design of "HD audio" equipment. If you can reproduce frequencies up to 96Hz, you can almost fit an FM stereo broadcast in the pass-band. A wider pass-band means that you are processing information that can't be heard anyway. If ultrasonics get into the signal, it may cause problems with equipment not designed to handle it. It can also be used for "traitor tracing" by embedding extra information during playback.
If "HD audio" is still using a pass-band of 20Hz-20kHz, then I suppose to only real problem is the waste of bandwidth (which may actually be a feature if you want to discourage lossless copying).
BTW, I agree extra bit depth is beneficial for processing.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Tuesday May 24 2016, @10:08PM
I've heard of Metallica so often I thought I'd try listening to something of theirs, if, that is, they hadn't succeeded at erasing themselves from existence on the free parts of the Internet. Sure wasn't going to pay for mystery music. I don't recall which songs I found, but they sounded horrible.
There's a reason I never hear them on the radio. What kind of stations play them?
(Score: 2) by Magic Oddball on Wednesday May 25 2016, @04:44AM
What kind of stations play [Metallica]?
I periodically hear their songs on the classic rock stations I listen to.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @11:22AM
Isn't that funny? They protected their content so assiduously they have vanished from the world. That is, they totally alienated their fan base during the Napster episode, and having kept their tracks out of the ways that today's kids hear and appreciate new music, Metallica has guaranteed they will never win new fans. I can only imagine that the only people who might still listen to that band would be 50-yr old masochists.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @11:26AM
It also reminds me of a parallel in Disney, which steadfastly refused to offer its content on Netflix and Amazon Prime. Result: the new generation of kids don't really know who Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck are, and what's more, don't care. That means they also don't care to pester their parents for Disney merchandise or take them to Disneyland.
Yeah they bribed Congress into extending copyright 100 years, but that's 95 years past the point at which anybody will give a hoot.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by https on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:50AM
You're already at -1, so I can't push this comment lower, but I can correct the blatantly wrong data. CD Audio is 16 bits [wikipedia.org] per channel. Hint: look at upper right sidebar on linked page.
Offended and laughing about it.
(Score: 1) by Ambient Sheep on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:45AM
I thought that at first too, but if you read the rest of his comment, it's clear that was just a brainfart in his opening line -- he goes onto mention that CDs are only 16-bits a couple of times...
(Score: 2) by Alfred on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:28PM
(Score: 1) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:34PM
I kinda suspected that (at least after re-reading it) actually.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Rich on Tuesday May 24 2016, @10:44PM
Remember, Metallica are a business venture, not a bunch of wealthy retirees doing music for fun. The classic promotion channel for new music is radio, radio is mostly listened in (from early to late) kitchens, cars, shops, and bars. You get lots of background noise there, so the least dynamic mix is the most perceptible. Or with a silent background, simply the loudest. Hence, it sticks and turns into sales. The wheel which squeaks loudest gets the oil. The industry surely has internal research on how much a drop dynamics will increase sales for certain music styles. Also, with album sales in general declining, they might decide to crank the compressor up a bit further to squeeze out what money is left in the thing.
Music (and particularly Prog Metal) connoisseurs will listen to something not Metallica anyway. Dream Theater, Fates Warning, whatever, so it's a non-issue. A lot of unsigned local bands run cicles around Metallica writing- and performance-wise these days. Metallica were good for the energy of the first two albums, and the artistry of the third. No Cliff, no proper Metallica.
ps: I wanted to find some numbers on an example to illustrate how overcompressed "bubblegum rock pop" at the height of the loudness wars was, and I found that link. Didn't even know that it existed, but it's on-topic as it gets: http://dr.loudness-war.info/ [loudness-war.info]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @11:07PM
It does my heart good that The Shaggs apparently have higher quality masters than more commercially successful artists.
"Hear that fidelity mother fucker..."
"My pal foot-foot..."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Snotnose on Tuesday May 24 2016, @11:14PM
Wow, another Fates Warning fan. We're a rare breed.
They need to get their butts back in the studio and give us another masterpiece.
Relationship status: Available for curbside pickup.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Rich on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:19AM
Wow, another Fates Warning fan.
Heh. Where did I say so? I just mentioned that I think many people who scientifically care about the dynamic range of their music will probably appreciate Fates Warning, too ;). I think at times they can be a bit difficult to listen to, but they have that side project, O.S.I., which I find super chilly.
Myself, apart from classic and new Metal, Punk, Oi, Industrial, Electro, and Space stuff, I'm lately interested in some far east approaches to these genres; Tengger Cavalry, Shonen Knife, Mad Capsule Markets. Oh, and Babymetal. Their live band hammered like Marduk fearing to miss the last tank to Poland (...to join Behemoth for a concert of course ;) when I saw them around here.
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @08:55PM
With advances in sound systems in vehicles and headphones with actual dynamic range, I find myself listening to Prog much more in the car or at work when I cannot use a proper sound system. I still feel that something like A Pleasant Shade of Gray is difficult to properly appreciate in these circumstances. But even then it is my favorite piece of music of all time.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 1) by ramloss on Tuesday May 24 2016, @11:50PM
Excuse me, but in what possible way does Progressive Metal relate to Metallica? You could have stopped at music connoisseurs and spared me the effort of listening to those bands, nothing at all to do with heavy metal. On the other hand, it's feels weird to talk about my fallen idols, I have not thought about them since the Napster episode. Never looked back, don't miss them.
(Score: 2) by Rich on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:37AM
Excuse me, but in what possible way does Progressive Metal relate to Metallica?
Well, from the assumption that people who care about fine dynamics will also care about fine artistry, I deduced that they will not care about how Metallica's later works are mastered while they listen to Dream Theater. (They probably fear their ears might suffer from Lars' later drumming.) The (unmentioned) reverse logic therefore says that people who listen to (recent) Metallica mostly don't care about dynamics. Therefore, the amount of whiners is negligible to Metallica, Inc.
But concerning Metallica themselves, I'd say e.g. "Orion" passes the bar to "prog". Details: http://www.notreble.com/buzz/2012/10/09/transcription-cliff-burtons-orion/ [notreble.com], and, ironically, mentioned Dream Theater have covered "Master of Puppets" in its entirety.
(Score: 1) by ramloss on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:23AM
Well, from the assumption that people who care about fine dynamics will also care about fine artistry, I deduced that they will not care about how Metallica's later works are mastered while they listen to Dream Theater...
Yeah, yeah, I get that, but why single out those bands? any people who care about fine dynamics would suffice; why single out progressive rock enthusiasts?
But concerning Metallica themselves, I'd say e.g. "Orion" passes the bar to "prog". Details: http://www.notreble.com/buzz/2012/10/09/transcription-cliff-burtons-orion/ [notreble.com] [notreble.com], and, ironically, mentioned Dream Theater have covered "Master of Puppets" in its entirety.
That some song from Metallica qualifies as "prog" if looked at in the right way or some other has been covered by other band does not mean that they belong to that genre. My comment was, slightly in jest, that mentioning some other bands specifically made me listen to them, only to find that I don't care about their music at all ;-)
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:11PM
I have not thought about them since the Napster episode. Never looked back, don't miss them.
We're apparently working under different definitions of "idol."
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 24 2016, @11:32PM
Mastering is largely overblown. Make sure your mix is fine, apply your EQ and move on.
I know, the Big Bad Music Mafia are going to get me for that one ...
If your audience is the top twenty audiophiles with dedicated listening rooms east of Chicago, then yes, mastering takes on a massive level of importance.
If your audience is a harried mother who wants something to take her mind off the cable bill and her first grey hairs while three toddlers scream in the back of the van on the way to daycare, mastering beyond the level of an EQ curve is a total waste.
The two extremes given here are strictly the commercial end: what does the audience think it cares about?
The much tougher question is that of musical intention. How many composers consider it absolutely, vitally, bowel-churningly crucial that the attack scrape of every violin bow in a symphony orchestra makes it onto a record as an individually experienced event so clear that the audience could lick them off the speaker cones?
I have yet to meet that composer.
In fact, most of the time composers work in big picture items: the swing down through minor thirds from D to F. The accelerando as the tension mounts. Violin attack? Maybe sometimes, as an accent issue, but the rest of the time it's an accidental detail.
Now it does appear that Metallica have continued their well-deserved reputation of making their trash sound trashily rendered through trashy systems, but it does not follow from this that mastering is a high art that everyone, even musicians, cares about beyond the most basic. When I write a piece of music, I try to ensure that the bits and pieces are audible, in proportion to each other, and not muddy. Mastering, post-mix, is something that happens so that analogue media don't screw up with things like needles jumping tracks or tape renditions distorting like wilting leaves.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:18AM
This isn't the only example - pop music has been compressed for many decades, it makes it "pop" through cheap speakers in noisy situations and you can hear the quiet stuff without destroying your speakers on the loud stuff. Many movies are delivered _without_ audio compression, which is why you have to crank up the volume to hear people whispering to each other, then get blown out of your chair by the chase scene's sound effects. Like anything, compression can be, and has been, overdone to the point that it makes listening to music tiring, even painful. To me, overcompressed audio makes me feel like I'm listening underwater to something really constantly noisy - there's no quiet time, it's all just hammering away at you at a relatively constant volume.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:29AM
Depends.
There are albums that are defined by their production. Good quality sound is good quality sound regardless if you're an audiophile or a harried mother. Starting with a good recording is the difference between 100 hours in post-production and 1000. Not to mention microphone selection, preamp characteristics, etc.; it's a lot more detailed than you make it out to be.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:01AM
The listening needs (or desires) of the audiophile and the harried mother are like night and day.
The audiophile's listening environment has a noise floor below that of a library. The harried mother's listening environment has a noise floor that leaves her maybe 10dB of range below the pain threshold (depending on how loudly the toddlers are shrieking that day).
The audiophile's system provides crystalline response from below 20Hz to above 20KHz. The harried mother's van is in ROCK EQ preset, and has been since five minutes after she bought it, regardless of the fact that little Bobby has been shoving pretzel crumbs in the rear speaker grille just to watch them wobble.
The audiophile's speakers are exquisitely placed to provide the optimal stereo field. The harried mother's van's sound system was turned up to reflect the fact that the speaker on the right occasionally likes to blink out for no clearly defined reason, and unless she cancels her cable bill she'll never pay a technician to find the loose wire.
You could present the audiophile with a listening test based on an MP3, compared to a CD, and the audiophile would have a greater than 80% chance of differentiating the two. The harried mother wouldn't notice, and wouldn't care, and would still bob her head along and try to ignore the fact that the kids are practicing pagan rituals in the back.
Now, it's true that clarity on the track is important if you want audibility. It's true that you want a polished outcome, with a minimum of (unintended) distortion, solid signal/noise ratio, an EQ curve chosen to both respect the limitations of the media and highlight the various instruments and vocal contributions, it's true that you want a sufficient degree of amplification and compression and normalisation to have the tracks be proportional to each other - but having said all that, if you're delivering music, you're delivering compositional intent, and if you're not delivering that, you're engaged in sonic masturbation.
This is really where audiophiles go adrift. They can waffle on (and on, and on, and on, and ON) about how warm, or spacious, or exacting, or whatever buzzword makes them feel important, a given track is, and then when you ask them about the actual musical implications of a given set of modulations they don't know what to say because they were too busy paying attention to the space of the soundscape or something equally abstruse. The harried mother bobbing her head and singing along off-key to Michael Bolton is more involved in the actual musical content than most audiophiles.
If your mix is solid, the audiophile might sigh wistfully about how the real buzziness of the DX7's old circuitry denotes authenticity, or sniff disdainfully at how cheesy those old Casio synths sounded, but unless you're trying to charge $1000 per album for the audiophile market, what your bulk audience cares about is that the pounding beat doesn't wreck their speaker cones.
Mastering isn't a black art, it's polishing a window. You want that pane of glass to be clear so that you can see the music behind it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:18AM
Do you really think all the Metallica fans that complained about Death Magnetic were audiophiles?
Get over yourself.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:38AM
No, I don't.
Here, have a WOOSH . Go ahead, it's on me.
What happened as far as Metallica was concerned was that they went a bridge too far in the loudness wars. That's in direct contradiction to what I said above, about mastering being polishing a pane of glass; they ended up sandblasting the glass. Result: backlash.
Now I don't know what happened there, but I will guess that Metallica determined that they would nuke the ground in the loudness wars, and kept telling the mastering engineer to take it up to 11. The mastering engineer then sighed, dried her tears with a wad of money, and cranked the dial.
None of this has anything to do with the central contention that mastering isn't a black art, Pitchfork is scraping the bottom of the barrel for stories to publish, and most of the supposed benefits of mastering can be locked in in the mix, and should be. What I was really saying above (but apparently I was too devastatingly subtle) was that mastering for all possible listening environments is a lost cause. At best, you can master for a medium, and try not to make your audience actually cry tears of blood. At this, Metallica failed.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @02:28AM
You don't have to master for all possible listening environments.
You make sure the music has the instruments in balance, reasonable dynamic range, no unwanted distortion and call it a day.
Then when the soccer mom is playing it back in the minivan with crappy speakers, and screaming kids: the playback device can add any needed compression.
However, if you add the compression before the playback device, the audiophile has no way to filter that out (garbage in, garbage out).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:17AM
Amen, brother.
In fact, I'd go further to say that the instruments being in balance is something that should be done by the mixing engineer, and if it isn't, that's not a mastering flaw; it's a flaw in what the mastering engineer got.
Mastering should provide for dynamic range and clarity within the constraints of the target medium, and then you're done.
(Score: 1) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:34AM
I was not aware those were two different specialities. Especially since mastering seems to be done so poorly with commercial music.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @04:06AM
Yeah, the breakdown is something like this (details vary by studio, common practices, type of music, audio sources and the phase of the moon):
Musicians make grunts and squeaks.
Microphones (where applicable) pick up the primitive howls. (Otherwise it comes from synths, prerecorded samples, or similar alternatives.)
The various barbaric screechings are recorded (often in multiple takes). The screechings that go into the next stage are the stems.
The mixing engineer puts the evil chanting through levels, per-track (or bus) effects, panning, EQ, various side-chain effects (of which compression is only the most famous) and provides the mixed track. Depending on how much latitude the mixing engineer is given, this can include addition of further instruments, samples, looping of elements and more. This provides you with the mix.
The mastering engineer takes the mix, and prepares it for its commercial, on-media form. This can include further compression, application of EQ, normalisation and so on; perhaps even some additional reverb. The mastering engineer is not afforded the tools with which to fix a bad mix, but the mastering engineer can screw a good mix up out of recognition.
Then it gets cut for vinyl or CD or whatever. Generally there are different masters for different media depending on the limitations of the media and typical playback devices.
Your end-to-end bedroom producer only working with samples and synths can do everything on one laptop, or if it's a singer/songwriter thing with a guitar, with one microphone and and audio interface to the laptop. Your symphony orchestra can have a whole team of audio engineers wiring up your orchestra like they're planning a building demolition, and mixing that can be a massive undertaking. Your mastering engineer then has to cope with that really complex sound environment.
Hope this helps.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @07:30AM
So... put the compressor in the car stereo, not the studio.
On second thought, didn't they use to do that back before music went to hell?
(Score: 2) by martyb on Thursday May 26 2016, @12:07PM
Thank you so much for your post! I found it to be educational and extremely entertaining.
Many years ago when I was in college, I got involved with the 'Instant Audio' group out of our student union. We set up the mics, mixing board, amps, speakers, ... everything having to do with sound for concerts held at the student union. Had great fun doing that and learned a lot.
I even got to mix a concert once. Was long ago, but ISTR that show had 5-6 performers on stage, each with a feed for vocals and their instrument. I think we had 3-4 mics on the drum kit, too. So, I'm sitting at the mixing board and looking across the sound stage.
I listen to the lead guitar. Sounds a little too bright. Turn down the high end just a smidge using the parametric equalizer on the board. That's better. Bass end is a little weak... turn that up a smidgen. That sounds okay, but is a little hard to hear among the rest of the band... a little nudge to the volume for that input. Good! Oh, wait. He's standing left of center, but the sound is coming from right smack in the middle of the stage. A little twist on the pan control to get them to coincide. Got it!
Next up were his vocals. Ignore everything else and just listen to his voice. Adjust, tweak, nudge. Bingo!
On to the saxophone. And then the horns, and drums, and so on.
Then one more listen to the whole sound stage. How well is the mix balanced? Anyone too loud/soft compared to the others? How does it sound across the whole frequency spectrum? Is it too bright or boomy? A few more nudges and adjustments.
I can remember it like it was yesterday. There has been nothing else to compare with that experience since. I could reach out, and with exquisite control, adjust each and every voice and instrument — independently and as a whole.
The next day, I'm in my dorm room and turned on my single-speaker radio which had two knobs: volume and tone. That was painful!
My first car (bought used) had an aftermarket sound system installed. The speaker in the passenger door would pop in and out depending on how I hit bumps in the road. :(
So, I've found myself in the position of both the audiophile and the harried soccer mom of your wonderfully-written comment. So many times since then, I've wished I could decompress songs and bring out greater dynamic range. Seems that once you have made a 'sound soup', there's no getting the ingredients separated again.
Again, thanks for posting your comment! Thoroughly enjoyed it and brought back some fond memories.
Wit is intellect, dancing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 26 2016, @04:07PM
Glad you enjoyed it!
I think that the next, new audiophile format will be a set of raw stems, and the next, new audiophile equipment will be a mixing board.
If you want to recreate that experience, here's what you do today:
First, get equipment. A multichannel audio interface for your computer, a mixing board, and a couple of monitor quality speakers. This is less expensive than you think, but if you're shooting for quality, be prepared to drop four figures on it. Depending on the mixing board, some of them can take in multiple channels of audio through a USB interface. For software, use your favourite DAW, or just download Audacity. It works fine.
Next, get your stems. There are lots of remixing groups online, and it's not hard to get stems as a rule. Sometimes even big-name bands provide stems.
Then, load up your stems in Audacity (or whatever), play them through your mixing board, and listen. Let the tweaking begin!
You may find that your remixes do well in competition, if you have a knack for it.
If you really get into it, you can add effects units, and get really deep into remixing. It's a big topic.
(Score: 2) by CRCulver on Wednesday May 25 2016, @05:40PM
When a composer is emulating electronics (or replacing the live electronics used in an earlier version of the piece with purely acoustic forces) by distributing the individual frequencies among strings playing harmonics, every single string articulation is vital to achieving the intended harmony. See Saariaho's Nymphéa Reflection for string orchestra and how it relates to her earlier Nymphéa for string quartet and electronics for a good example of this, or e.g. Claude Vivier’s works where he used “les couleurs” like Lonely Child or Prologue pour un Marco Polo. In fact, I'd think that you'd find with the spectralist composer that this need for fidelity is the rule more than the exception.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @06:50PM
Not to mention there is the composer and the performer, and while the composer might want perfect execution as if descended from the heavens, the performer is free to fuck that right off and add in touches to make it their own.
This "I'm a musician therefore I should know" is smug patronizing bullshit, as if there aren't billions of approaches other musicians employ, from low-fi to the most pristine recordings and everything in between.
In fact, it was idiot musicians who wanted their albums to be louder than everyone else's that started this decline in the first place.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @07:48PM
I would explain it to you, but I'm an idiot musician too. We're the people who were too stupid to become actors, because we couldn't remember the spiel restaurants wanted us giving their customers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @08:54PM
That's okay, I'm just happy you cared enough to get someone else help you to post the reply.
Don't trip over your own drool on the way out.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @07:44PM
Yes, you're right.
You can find lots of similar cases in choral harmonies as well, where you have a large number of parts.
But that's not what I was talking about. Different parts having separate articulations is not what the second violin section's individual members of the Greater Flyover Symphonic Ensemble is about. The second violin section is, in a sense, a single instrument, with a single staff on the score (as a rule, I know some people play around with the definitions) and the fact that one violin exited the initial attack thirteen milliseconds before another is not compositionally relevant. The interpretation is up to the musicians and conductor, and that's fair enough, but it does not mean that the composer intended that, or cares about that, or even listens for it at all.
So do you see the difference? On one hand, compositional intent. On the other hand, compositional irrelevance. Provided that the mastering doesn't bury what was revealed in the mix, and works within the limitations of intended equipment and context and media, you're not far wrong. If you're desperately trying to provide for resolution beyond relevance, you're wasting everyone's time and money.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RamiK on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:29AM
Here you go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3sYPX17cFk [youtube.com]
compiling...
(Score: 2) by goody on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:58AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 26 2016, @12:52AM
You're talking about an article about Metallica. Honestly, I think you're just lucky it wasn't reduced to monosyllabic words. I don't think you ever use much more than maybe, what, a thousand words when you work third shift at Jack in the Box.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @11:04AM
An article on sound engineering, but the real question is, people listened to Metallica after Meshuggah [wikipedia.org] started recording?
Fixed it for you.
As a side note, meshuggah have always mastered their own albums as part of the conditions their recording contracts. There are some artists with integrity.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by PizzaRollPlinkett on Wednesday May 25 2016, @11:09AM
The only thing worse than mastering is remastering. The band Genesis remastered their recordings in the late 90s/early 2000s. What a disaster. They had subtle, dynamics-driven compositions that were a pleasure to listen to. And they were all ruined by a wall of sound. The new remasters mixed everything loud and up front. It's like having your ears boxed when you try to listen to the new remasters. I can't stand to listen to them. Fortunately I have the older CDs. But newer generations will never even know this music was once interesting to listen to.
(E-mail me if you want a pizza roll!)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 25 2016, @12:53PM
Yeah, I got bit by a few of the 24-bit remasters.
The irritating thing is that short of hearing the original, you'd never suspect anything was amiss. It's almost like a counterfeit.
And depending on the bit rot, it's hard to say which will survive as the definitive version. I mean in one sense a brickwalled recording is what the mobile crowd prefers. It works better when compressed.
Maybe it is just coming to terms that the age of hi-fi is ending. I'll be like those old actors complaining how color film lost something to the B/W, and people look at you funny about the extravagance of having a proper stereo.
(Score: 2) by goodie on Wednesday May 25 2016, @01:42PM
Obey your master!
Thank you, i'll be back with more lame jokes later.
Seriously, I don't really think that the recording of Metallica's songs was very good. The sound is not pleasant and "spoils" the melody to me. I have a Boss multitrack recorder that creates the same type of issue (mine is a $400 piece of equipment mind you...) especially with recording some of those 90's type of metal distortions. I have a friend who studied music recording for a year or so and was telling me that as long as your EQ is done properly, the "mastering" should not be a huge issue. Anyway, those songs just do not come out very good in recording for some reason in my (very limited) experience. In the S&M album (no matter how much people like to bitch about that album), I find the sound more pleasant to listen to. I do think however, that other bands such as Sepultura or Fear Factory have done a much better job at this around the same time.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by oldmac31310 on Wednesday May 25 2016, @03:40PM
Metallica are and always have been shite. It had to be said. Thank you and have a good day.