"They Really Don’t Make Music Like They Used To" — The NYT on the legacy of the loudness wars

[left channel]

Nice charts and graphs in this one. A couple of samples too.

NY Times  |  Opinion
They Really Don’t Make Music Like They Used To

If the Eagles or Marvin Gaye fan in your life is complaining about this year’s Grammy songs, this might be why.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/07/opinion/what-these-grammy-songs-tell-us-about-the-loudness-wars.html

 

 

[rando]

Quote

Recording engineers and producers often discovered their carefully rendered recordings were being squashed in the mastering stage.

 

"As the artist intended"  

 

NYT wouldn't print an opinion piece without some well established conversation on the subject existing in their sphere of readership.  Really hope this is indicative of a trend towards quality home recording that doesn't cycle through the entities owned by the same few people all money drains towards.  That era where commercial success was not on the minds of people doing home recordings was much richer for the honesty and experimentation they inspired.  Youtube and every other monetized outlet of expression full of people synthesizing being their weird selves need a cleansing. 

[left channel]

 @rando I'm sure this had to clear a certain bar of expertise and accuracy, but I don't know if it represents a trend. A lot of these Opinion columnists get introduced to the NYT by their literary agents as part of a book publicity campaign. This article is based on a section of the author's new book, Perfecting Sound Forever: An Aural History of Recorded Music

 

Having said that, these columns offer important, useful, and interesting information general readers might otherwise never encounter. And having said that, who knows, between this book and the impending launch of Qobuz, maybe we are trending towards good audio once again.

 

 

[rando]

Just the other day someone told me I was too pretty for NY and too smart for LA*.  

 

NYC is very much a place to see live music, plays, and artistic works with musical accompaniment.  Even the bar's soundsystems better recorded music.  It is also the type of place people spend hours looking into their personal thoughts by turning the camera on them self.  Or the microphone.  Of all the endless conversations, I'm of a mind this one is currently on the fringe of something actually important to how the town functions.  Also people don't write books nobody is interested in reading.  

 

"As the artist intended" was a low point numerous people here raised their voices in anger against.  That people far outside audiophile interests have taken up the torch exemplifies just how obvious the problems have become.

 

*That passes as an insult in middle america.

[DuckToller]

On 2/8/2019 at 12:25 AM, left channel said:

his article is based on a section of the author's new book, Perfecting Sound Forever: An Aural History of Recorded Music

 

small liner note: The book is from 2009, but still a very good read !
Cheers, Tom