No need for straw man here, I have a direct quote. If you acknowledge that there is some case where something that measures as DR6 can sound good, then I would be proven wrong.
This is a funny argument. What do you think I shuold want, that the drums will drown out everything else? Of course that if I want the drummer to go all out in terms of playing his instrument, I would want to mitigate his loudness so I can hear the rest of the band. With compression, you can have your cake and eat it too. Amazing!
In my view you are missing a fundamental issue in the discussion: The dynamic range you and everyone else are actually talking about is not very large to begin with.
The overwhelming majority of music - even hard rock, punk, electronic and dance music - does not "naturally" come out at DR6 even after the instruments have been recorded (or generated if they are electronic), EQ'd, processed, and mixed down. Most "loud" music comes out at around DR8 to DR12. "Whole Lotta Love" off
Led Zeppelin II is a good example. It's a very heavy track, well-regarded by multiple generations of music listeners including those who grew up in the '90s and '00s, and is full of compression in both the individual multi-tracks and the final mix down. And yet you will not find a copy of
Led Zeppelin II on CD, vinyl, digital file or any other format where Whole Lotta Love has a DR rating lower than DR9 - and that DR9 version is from the 2014 remaster where some additional (albeit light) peak-limiting was used. Older masterings have it at DR10 to DR12.
In most cases, to get DR down below 8 or 9, you have to apply additional, often heavy-handed (aka producing negative audible effects) compression or peak-limiting after the music has been mixed down, during final mastering - and that heavy peak-limiting is invariably done to make the music "radio ready," in other words with the intent of making it sound louder so it can compete with other music that is presumably compressed in the same way for the same reason. Such peak-limiting has nothing to do with bringing out specific instruments, balancing instruments, or any other sonic aspect that we might call musical or artistic.
So yes, Whole Lotta Love with the 18dB dynamic range figure that has been thrown around in this thread would indeed sound very strange and probably terrible. And you can indeed find some examples of early CD masterings from the '80s that have high DR ratings and also sound anemic and lifeless. (And less bass, which can sound anemic, is correlated with higher DR because low frequencies have so much energy compared to higher frequencies that a bass-shy tape or mastering will always have higher DR than an otherwise identical tape or mastering with more bass.)
And yes, I have heard DR6 albums that sound pretty good - but only one or two (Beck's
Morning Phase comes to mind). But ironically it's only sparse acoustic music or very clean electronic music that can sound decent at those low DR levels - bring in electric guitar and punchy drums and super-low DR is going to sound like crap and be fatiguing on an audiophile system (it might be great for the car or background music though).
Finally, compression has been applied to popular music for at least the past 60 years, probably longer. It's used in recording instruments, producing and processing the sound, and mixing. That's not what DR Meter readings are about. It's about a particular type of extra, added compression that's applied after and in addition to all that.
) but I was not a loud drummer and did not play often. And not succesfull either.
Nevermind. But the hearing loss is real nevertheless.
