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How would you measure compression artifacts without the original recording as a reference?
just compare the different releases and see if some are suspicious
and BTW, McD's has good frites
How would you measure compression artifacts without the original recording as a reference?
ME TOO, Thank God It's Friday!Wow, Dusty Hill gone.
Looks like I'll be having a few drinks and a loud tribute night tonight.
Wow, Dusty Hill gone.
Looks like I'll be having a few drinks and a loud tribute night tonight.
Noticed that myself, usually with no speakers in evidence anywhere in the shot. Guess I'm just not cool! But I am oldThat's so true, Sal.
It is a good thing that "normalization" by the streaming services put some limits on the worst brick walling practices but if you read down in the comments it appears the goal is still "be the loudest possible to stand out" and now they are "gaming" the normalization algorithms. The problem is these "normalization" algorithms are becoming a source of changed/ degraded sound quality themselves. I was doing some ABX of CD vs lossless streaming of some older dynamic recordings which I am fairly certain are the same mastering's and was surprised I could actually ABX some of them. As mentioned by others if new music is compressed on purpose great, but compressing older music to a modern "standard" is where I have a problem. To me these "normalization" algorithms make all music, even from different eras and different mastering styles, sound the same. If we are trying to encourage people to appreciate more dynamic mastering styles but they can't hear any difference on the streaming services I don't think we will get anywhere.
But aren't they themselves far from "neutral", whatever that means. Isn't this the unbreakable circle jerk of confusion?
If you want to break the great circle that you have so eloquently described, the first thing that needs to happen is the recording monitors are standardized.
The biggest problem is with the mastering.
No, the speakers/room is a bigger problem usually.
If you want to break the great circle that you have so eloquently described, the first thing that needs to happen is the recording monitors are standardized.
but your highly dynamic music is in no way losing its original integrity.
No, McDonalds doesn't serve up better food because it doesn't want to. It's objective is not to serve great food. It's objective is to serve fast food cheaply to as many people as possible. Attaining that objective is why they have robotics and unskilled employees (among other things). While their food tastes poor to a skilled gourmet, kids beg for it, and drag their families there. Why? Because the food is sweet, salty, and savory, which excites the untrained taste buds. McDonalds is perfectly happy if no skilled gourmet ever enters the establishment, because there are too few of them to attain their objectives in any case. But I'm quite sure that if McDonalds decided to serve food that a trained gourmet might like, it could do so, even with automation and unskilled workers.
And that's why much pop music is over-autotuned, over-processed, too loud, too bland, too formulaic, and too much about showing skin in a video.
No, that's not the right characterization, it seems to me. McDonalds didn't serve up better food even before they used automation. But one thing about the automation--any given product from one McDonalds will taste nearly identical to the same product from a McDonalds on the other side of the planet. For better or worse.
No, McDonalds doesn't serve up better food because it doesn't want to. It's objective is not to serve great food. It's objective is to serve fast food cheaply to as many people as possible. Attaining that objective is why they have robotics and unskilled employees (among other things). While their food tastes poor to a skilled gourmet, kids beg for it, and drag their families there. Why? Because the food is sweet, salty, and savory, which excites the untrained taste buds. McDonalds is perfectly happy if no skilled gourmet ever enters the establishment, because there are too few of them to attain their objectives in any case. But I'm quite sure that if McDonalds decided to serve food that a trained gourmet might like, it could do so, even with automation and unskilled workers.
And that's why much pop music is over-autotuned, over-processed, too loud, too bland, too formulaic, and too much about showing skin in a video.
Can we standardize the engineer's hearing, and/or preferences?
Recording is where science meets art. While there are many technical aspects which are open to objective analysis the process also requires musical sensibilities which are rather different.