KVR Audio

spaceman · Post by **spaceman** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:34 pm

the thing is though.. the album doesn't really sound loud. When I play, say The Bends after playing the Muse album, The Bends sounds louder

there's something even more worrying going on I think. Some of the tracks sound muffled as if the highs have been pulled out, and the lows/midlows are overcrowded. I'm starting to suspect major phasing problems.. I think someone really f**ked up badly and it never got picked up in the process.

Jason Brian Merrill · Post by **Jason Brian Merrill** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:37 pm

spaceman wrote:the thing is though.. the album doesn't really sound loud. When I play, say The Bends after playing the Muse album, The Bends sounds louder

there's something even more worrying going on I think. Some of the tracks sound muffled as if the highs have been pulled out, and the lows/midlows are overcrowded. I'm starting to suspect major phasing problems.. I think someone really f**ked up badly and it never got picked up in the process.

OUCH!!!! bad news...

the bends is a nice album btw

blakflag · Post by **blakflag** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:38 pm

spaceman wrote:the thing is though.. the album doesn't really sound loud. When I play, say The Bends after playing the Muse album, The Bends sounds louder

there's something even more worrying going on I think. Some of the tracks sound muffled as if the highs have been pulled out, and the lows/midlows are overcrowded. I'm starting to suspect major phasing problems.. I think someone really f**ked up badly and it never got picked up in the process.

Would this be an indication it was "mastered for ipod"? (headphones)

spaceman · Post by **spaceman** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:44 pm

blakflag wrote:
spaceman wrote:the thing is though.. the album doesn't really sound loud. When I play, say The Bends after playing the Muse album, The Bends sounds louder

there's something even more worrying going on I think. Some of the tracks sound muffled as if the highs have been pulled out, and the lows/midlows are overcrowded. I'm starting to suspect major phasing problems.. I think someone really f**ked up badly and it never got picked up in the process.
Would this be an indication it was "mastered for ipod"? (headphones)

more for elevator music I think

Jbravo · Post by **Jbravo** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:46 pm

chagzuki wrote:Thing is that this process really can't go much further; the loudness wars are reaching an end. Then people will look at where they've got to and think, 'well that was bloody stupid'. Short terms gains at the expense of the longer.

Well I wonder if people will come to expect that horrible hot sound all the time from now on. It's not so bad when it's a record you don't care about but when it's a band whose music you'd normally really enjoy, it's a crying shame

spaceman · Post by **spaceman** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:47 pm

sounds even worse on an iPod btw

Jbravo · Post by **Jbravo** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:53 pm

I googled for other people talking about the mastering of the Muse album and found this comment about the track shown in the first post

"The thickness of the record is so full, heavy drums, two different guitars, strings, vocals, backing vocals.. all at once, but everything is easily seperatable from each other. Nothing drowns out anything else, fantastic mastering!"

http://www.dooyoo.co.uk/music-records/b ... e/1031074/

Sometimes hard limiting can be used creatively I think, so I'm going to judge it when I hear it, not by looking at screenshots of waveforms....

DWb · Post by **DWb** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:59 pm

Maybe Muse are just really good at playing their instruments at a constant volume?

spaceman · Post by **spaceman** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 8:08 pm

Jbravo wrote:I googled for other people talking about the mastering of the Muse album and found this comment about the track shown in the first post

"The thickness of the record is so full, heavy drums, two different guitars, strings, vocals, backing vocals.. all at once, but everything is easily seperatable from each other. Nothing drowns out anything else, fantastic mastering!"

http://www.dooyoo.co.uk/music-records/b ... e/1031074/

Sometimes hard limiting can be used creatively I think, so I'm going to judge it when I hear it, not by looking at screenshots of waveforms....

trust me, ears came first, waveform later
here's a litle example

here

Absolution was a much denser album than this last one. A lot heavier in production (the producer said he wanted to give them an epic sound on Absolution, heavy as hell, just what their music needed, he said)
but that album sounds good, even with all the added instruments and overdubs and special effects going on. The last one however..

Jbravo · Post by **Jbravo** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 8:09 pm

hmmm, well it certainly sounds very mono. I assume you didn't do that to save on filesize

Jbravo · Post by **Jbravo** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 8:11 pm

actually i checked and it really is mono, the two channels are identical

spaceman · Post by **spaceman** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 8:11 pm

Jbravo wrote:hmmm, well it certainly sounds very mono. I assume you didn't do that to save on filesize

that's ripped straight from cd

Jbravo · Post by **Jbravo** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 8:18 pm

is it all like that? If so i'd assume it was a production fault and any loss of frequencies was due to cancellation

Jbravo · Post by **Jbravo** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 8:25 pm

well I managed to download said track from a certain russian site, and it's not mono

shamann · Post by **shamann** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 8:36 pm

Jbravo wrote:actually i checked and it really is mono, the two channels are identical

Yeah, weird stuff, the two channels cancel each other out perfectly. Spaceman, are you sure there isn't something strange going on with whatever you used to copy the CD track?

How not to master an album.. holy crap?!?!?!?