another casualty of the loudness wars

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signorMars
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another casualty of the loudness wars

Post by signorMars » Wed May 07, 2008 10:18 pm

A Place to Bury Strangers kill a 10" vinyl record press

Seems like someone somewhere along the line should have thought to turn the fader down a dB or two...
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Post by chris harris » Wed May 07, 2008 10:30 pm

I've heard that they're one of the best live shows going right now.... but, the recordings are offensively loud. It sounds like there's some cool music in there. But, none that I could listen to for more than a few minutes.

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Post by Jon~T » Thu May 08, 2008 5:35 am

A Place To Bury Strangers is a strange band, pretty cool but weird and damn noisy.

It's a bit like upbeat Joy Division through a bit crusher.

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Babaluma
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Post by Babaluma » Thu May 08, 2008 5:46 am

aren't they the same guys that make the guitar effects pedals?

you would have thought one of the band members would have objected before it got to that stage...

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Post by Cellotron » Thu May 08, 2008 11:21 am

As someone who was a production manager for a vinyl pressing plant for a number of years - and has mastered hundreds of vinyl sides - this article is utter bullsh*t.

First off - while lots of things can damage a press (it's a mechanical device with lots of moving parts subject to extreme pressure and heat) - a press can not be destroyed only by the presence of wide/deep modulations on the stamper in it! And second - if this happened more likely during the cutting of the lacquer master - i.e. smoking the cutter head due to too many high frequencies present in the source pre-master - then it's the fault of the cutting engineer for not using an appropriate amount of high frequency limiting or LPF when transferring the program to the master.

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Post by thunderboy » Thu May 08, 2008 12:28 pm

Babaluma wrote:aren't they the same guys that make the guitar effects pedals?
Yes - it's Oliver Ackermann, A.K.A. Death By Audio.

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Post by thieves » Thu May 08, 2008 12:28 pm

Cellotron wrote:As someone who was a production manager for a vinyl pressing plant for a number of years - and has mastered hundreds of vinyl sides - this article is utter bullsh*t.

First off - while lots of things can damage a press (it's a mechanical device with lots of moving parts subject to extreme pressure and heat) - a press can not be destroyed only by the presence of wide/deep modulations on the stamper in it! And second - if this happened more likely during the cutting of the lacquer master - i.e. smoking the cutter head due to too many high frequencies present in the source pre-master - then it's the fault of the cutting engineer for not using an appropriate amount of high frequency limiting or LPF when transferring the program to the master.

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Steve Berson
i saw this article this morning and was meaning to post it here, simply to get this response. when i read it i defnitely had some serious :roll: 's going on.
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Post by RefD » Thu May 08, 2008 1:10 pm

thieves wrote:
Cellotron wrote:As someone who was a production manager for a vinyl pressing plant for a number of years - and has mastered hundreds of vinyl sides - this article is utter bullsh*t.

First off - while lots of things can damage a press (it's a mechanical device with lots of moving parts subject to extreme pressure and heat) - a press can not be destroyed only by the presence of wide/deep modulations on the stamper in it! And second - if this happened more likely during the cutting of the lacquer master - i.e. smoking the cutter head due to too many high frequencies present in the source pre-master - then it's the fault of the cutting engineer for not using an appropriate amount of high frequency limiting or LPF when transferring the program to the master.

Best regards,
Steve Berson
i saw this article this morning and was meaning to post it here, simply to get this response. when i read it i defnitely had some serious :roll: 's going on.
it's about what i expect from Pitchfork, actually.
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Re: another casualty of the loudness wars

Post by Nick Sevilla » Fri May 09, 2008 8:37 am

signorMars wrote:A Place to Bury Strangers kill a 10" vinyl record press

Seems like someone somewhere along the line should have thought to turn the fader down a dB or two...
Total Bullcrap.
Howling at the neighbors. Hoping they have more mic cables.

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Post by ;ivlunsdystf » Fri May 09, 2008 8:56 am

I'm surprised that they are aware of anything related to excessive loudness/flattening over at Pitchfork. I thought they were all deaf over there. Seriously. It's not entirely clear that the reviewer is on board with the overall mastering compression issue, but that article gives me hope that they don't just see all loudness as good.

BTW, I have always hated the Neutral Milk Hotel album that everybody here loves (i forget the name just now) because it's so much louder than anything else in my CD changer and when I shuffle the songs that darned album makes me poop my pants whenever it comes on. That album is prolly 10 years old by now? Jeez.

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thieves
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Post by thieves » Fri May 09, 2008 9:03 am

Tatertot wrote:I'm surprised that they are aware of anything related to excessive loudness/flattening over at Pitchfork. I thought they were all deaf over there. Seriously. It's not entirely clear that the reviewer is on board with the overall mastering compression issue, but that article gives me hope that they don't just see all loudness as good.

BTW, I have always hated the Neutral Milk Hotel album that everybody here loves (i forget the name just now) because it's so much louder than anything else in my CD changer and when I shuffle the songs that darned album makes me poop my pants whenever it comes on. That album is prolly 10 years old by now? Jeez.
two notes on this... i know some of the folks over at pitchfork, there's a lot of good people running that site. not to mention they've put on one of the most affordable, entertaining music festivals since lollapalooza mk1. they're just in the shitty business of reviewing records... to compound the problem, they review pretentious indie music, it's hard to even talk about that sometimes without seeming like a douche.

as for that neutral milk hotel album... i own it, like it, but not nearly as much as some. the distortion was done in tracking/mixing... all in the analog realm. there really isn't digital clipping going on there. (at least that i can hear).
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;ivlunsdystf
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Post by ;ivlunsdystf » Fri May 09, 2008 9:07 am

thieves wrote:
they're just in the shitty business of reviewing records... to compound the problem, they review pretentious indie music, it's hard to even talk about that sometimes without seeming like a douche.
Bingo.
thieves wrote: as for that neutral milk hotel album... i own it, like it, but not nearly as much as some. the distortion was done in tracking/mixing... all in the analog realm. there really isn't digital clipping going on there. (at least that i can hear).
Yeah, it's not a distortion problem, it's just a simple issue of it being too darned loud. They elegantly made it that loud, though, unlike the White Stripes new one which is just grotesque.

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Post by JGriffin » Fri May 09, 2008 9:33 am

According to an NME.com story confirmed by a publicist, the "red noise levels" on the master tape for "Gash" were so high that the process of transferring them to disc resulted in the destruction of the equipment manufacturing the record. To add insult to injury, the press was one of the few 10" presses left in the UK. You guys ever think about turning it down just a notch?
Smells like someone wants some punky cred in their promo--"our music is SO LOUD it breaks the machines that make records." Criminy. :roll:
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Post by TapeOpLarry » Sat May 10, 2008 5:13 pm

What? Music journalists don't understand the recording or mastering process? Not new news. How many times have we seen mixing and mastering interchanged, or some assistant to the assistant given credit for recording an album, or some total BS about breaking a lathe. Wait, breaking a lathe is a new one! Let's run it.
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Post by RefD » Sat May 10, 2008 6:42 pm

"breaking the lathe" should be a posting rank
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