So...who are you and where are you from?

[Brad_Mclain]

Name: Bradley Mclain
Location: Australia
Age: 19
Occupation: At University studying computer science.
Interests: Music, Guitar, Programming, Game Design

Signed up here right at the start but only finally got around to getting into this thread (damm university).

[breakerfall]

name: Jamie T
age: 23
location: Wales, UK
occupation: media student, market researcher
hobbies: film, music, literature, games all that good stuff

I'm glad to see there are actually proper sites dedicated to this issue dotted around the web. I wish more people were aware enough of how their music sounded beyond how loud they can play it on their cell phone on the bus or how much bass they get out of the ridiculously oversized speakers they've installed in their car. I'm another one who first noticed this stuff with Iron Maiden's Dance of Death, as well as Clutch's From Beale Street to Oblivion album and wondered why older CD's were so much easier to listen to than their remastered updates.

I'm currently dreading the upcoming new releases by Scott Weiland and Masters of Reality being ruined by the same plague that affected Death Magnetic so badly. Fingers crossed.

[jaskaran]

Hi all,great to see such websites against the crappy loudness war.

I am Jaskaran from India,aged 19 and studying in college.

[Dioxaz]

Name: Dioxaz
Location: Marseilles, France
Age: 28
Interests: retrogaming, music (listening and making), IT, some aspects of Japanese culture and entertainment

I only really discovered the loudness war fairly recently. I indeed had been exposed to it in a form or another but wasn't realizing it. It's when I started to see heaviliy brickwalled waveforms by myself (and that famous video) that I became fully aware of it. I was even falling into the "louder is better" trap at times. And now I'm finding myself "remastering" or "restoring" songs on albums I liked and picking only the most dynamic master possible when I look for a song in particular.
I personally consider the loudness war as an aberration now, even if I definitely don't consider myself as an audiophile.

I listen almost to all kinds of music but have a preference for 80s electropop.
I also make FM-synthesized music when I have the "courage" to do so.
I'm not sure you'll see really interesting info from me but I'll post from to time to time when I consider worth it.

[DJHybrid]

Name: Seam S
Age: 19
Location: Michigan, USA
Status: Commited Relationship
Occupation: Studio Engineer/Producer, Digital Artist, Artist Manager and Amateur Comic Writer
Hobbies: Recording, Mixing and Mastering, Writing, Drawing, Photoshop(ing), Guitar, Drums, Bass, Re-producing bad albums.

Personal Statement: Hello all. Basically I am here for one reason. I hate the way most albums or made now a days. I am studying in college to be an engineer and producer, and I am using a mindset of make it sound better than most. I get a lot of bands wanting it to be just as loud as standard albums so they sound professional. But I won't over compress any mix i do and re-up the dbs to get it at above peak levels. I won't. I hope to see more albums being mixed and mastered properly and I want to someday find a way to get Death Magnetic master tracks and reproduce them myself.

[trevaaar]

I've been here too long to not have posted in this thread

Name: Michael Burton
Location: Australia
Age: 19
Occupation: Student, studying Software Engineering

Am I the only person left on this board who's not a recording/mixing/mastering engineer? I've just loved music for as long as I can remember and it's slowly led me down the garden path into places like here.

[angelusredrove]

name: Jason R Burke
age: 18
location: Newcastle, Australia
status: Single
occupation: Student
Interests: Music - Mainly Thrash, Prog and Power Metal, Movies/TV shows, PC Games

Personal Statement: Hi people, i eventually wound up at this site after wondering why Death Magnetic sounded so bad after listening to it with good headphones on my Discman - i did some web browsing and read what other people have said about it, found out about the loudness war etc. etc after pursuing the best sounding DM i could find after trying both Moderus's and Deceifers i got to this site and found a pretty cool community and yeah.. the main thing i want to do is spread awareness about the Loudness war but ive found alot of my friends couldnt care less about it
here are alot of people that share a common interest and cause

[Phantom]

Name:John
Location: Allentown, PA
Occupation: Musician
Style of Music: Heavy Metal, mostly traditional 80s metal and thrash.

Statement: I've been for a long time preaching to anyone who will listen that modern cd mastering with it's loud dynamics and compression is ruining music. I collect vinyl records and I've come to the point that I almost won't even consider buying a new cd as I fear that it will be destroyed with compression. I found the dynamic range database as I would hoping to find somewhere that might tell me how badly compressed something is before I consider buying it. I'm excited to have these forums and look forward to talking about this subject with other people who "Get it".

[xenophile]

name: Tom W
age: 53
location: Belfast
occupation: IT
Music - Rock - prog in particular, Folk

I've always loved music and inherited an interest in hifi. As I've upgraded my music system I've become increasingly aware of the difference between CDs made before say 2000 and the increasing problems of most of those after. It's a joy to put on an old CD - say Stand Up, Jethro Tull - and have to turn the volume up. but get a real sense of the power of drum strikes or the tone of bass. I blame Philips/Sony for not setting quality standards for CD as there are for the audio on DVD. It's pity that at the time CD was the main music carrier it's potential was so degraded.

[trondhs]

name: Trond
age: 27
location: Norway
occupation: Proffesional violinst
Music - Prog fan, classical.

I enjoy good records at home, not in the car or on the bus with earbuds. Vinyl is good, as is tube amps
I very much agree with the poster above me here, there should be a loudness standard for CDs. -20db would solve most problems of today. With streaming and replay gain I hope that the reason or excuse for increasing loudness will disappear, and people will again appreciate dynamic records also in rock!

With digital editing there is also no logical explanation to why the ipod \ car \ radio mix and master is forced upon all listeners. It takes 2 minutes to completely destroy a CDs dynamics in mastering, so why not save a copy before that and make it availible for home listeners?