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Why Do All Records Sound the Same?

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Re: Why Do All Records Sound the Same?

#21
post #16

I like music, really like music, but haven't been able to listen to pop music since I discovered Beethoven late one night on a radio while going to sleep. Now I like, say http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Cello+Suite+No+1+Bach/3seBIM?src...

It has been mentioned on HN before, but you might still be interested in http://allofbach.com/nl/bwv/bwv-1007/detail/

It's relevant to the discussion, since the masterful recording of these pieces is itself a work of art.

Re: Why Do All Records Sound the Same?

#23
post #18
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The format is not the limitation, but audio engineers (for major studios anyway) tend to crank the volume up on CDs more often than vinyl releases. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war

I was once told that when mastering for vinyl you have to be careful with extremes because it can cause the needle to jump off the record.

That's frequency extremes. So the high and low ends of the frequency range are rolled off. Also wide stereo in the bass region can cause the needle to jump, so either the bass needs to be reduced in volume or made mono/as-close-to-mono as possible.

Dynamic range is less of a problem.

Re: Why Do All Records Sound the Same?

#24

This reminds me of this recent popular YouTube mashup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vapt5C3yDeY 6 recent hit country songs combined into one. They blend into each other perfectly.

That's hilarious, but it sounds like those tunes were pitch shifted into the same key. Nashville producers have more skill than that. Oh, and FL/GA line is frigging awful.

Re: Why Do All Records Sound the Same?

#25

>> "In a very few years, we’ll have 1 terabyte iPods, easily capable of handling thousands of recordings in their original high-definition form." I doubt it. I think we'll be lucky if Apple has increased the maximum configuration to 256GB in a few years. The other issue is that people have moved to streaming and the connections aren't good enough to stream high-quality audio. I signed up for Tidal (lossless Spotify)…

> This article originally appeared in the March, 2008 edition of Word Magazine.

Re: Why Do All Records Sound the Same?

#26
post #24

This reminds me of this recent popular YouTube mashup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vapt5C3yDeY 6 recent hit country songs combined into one. They blend into each other perfectly.

That's hilarious, but it sounds like those tunes were pitch shifted into the same key. Nashville producers have more skill than that. Oh, and FL/GA line is frigging awful.

And time-stretched.

Re: Why Do All Records Sound the Same?

#27

This reminds me of this recent popular YouTube mashup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vapt5C3yDeY 6 recent hit country songs combined into one. They blend into each other perfectly.

That seems to be some random guy just reposting. Didn't know youtube had "blogspam" before

Original mashup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FY8SwIvxj8o

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